3.2 - Qualitative Research Methods

• Who are qualitative research methods favoured by?

  • interpretivists because they provide deep, subjective and meaningful insights into behaviour
• Strengths of unstructured interviews -

  1. Rapport - the informality allows a rapport to be built between the researcher and interviewee
  2. Flexibility - interviewer is not restricted to a set of questions
  3. Valid - flexible as ppl can be truthful
• Weakness of unstructured interviews -

  1. Practical - due to how unstructured, it is longer and more time consuming
  2. Unrepresentative - small sample
  3. Not reliable - cannot be replicated due to how questions are open
• What is a participant observation?

  • researcher joins in the activities of the group they are researching
• Strengths of participant observation -

  1. Valid - groups are observed in a natural setting
  2. Valid - data is richly detailed and offers insight into social behaviour
• Weakness of participant observation -

  1. Unreliable - being open ended and subjective, there is no standardised procedure
  2. Unrepresentative - small scaled population
  3. Not valid - hawthorne effect
  4. Ethical issues - anonymity of pps
• What are personal documents?

  • secondary data sources that take form of diaries, memoirs, letters and autobiographies
• Strengths of personal documents -

  1. Valid - written for personal purposes so will have a high degree of validity and insight
  2. Practical - cheap and save time
  3. Illuminates many areas of social life
  4. Can be used to confirm or question other interpretivist and accounts
• Weakness of personal documents -

  1. Some groups are unlikely to produce personal documents such as letters, diaries
  2. Personal bias - written with an audience in mind
• Strength of historical documents -

  1. Allow comparisons over time (birth, death, marriage rates)
  2. Useful for assessing outcomes of various policies
• Weakness of historical documents -

  1. Unrepresentative - may be lost or destroyed
  2. Validity of documents are open to question (may have been written selectively)
  3. Authenticity of documents is open to question as it might not have been written by person attributed too (reliability)