Qualitative Research Methods
Creswell, J. W. (1998),
“Qualitative Inquiry And Research Design: Choosing Among Five Traditions” Sage Publications, London
Introduction:
This website presents a tutorial on qualitative research methods. It is designed to help readers with little or no knowledge on the subject. There are several types and classifications of qualitative research methods, but here only five of them are discussed (Creswell, 1998).
A qualitative research may be generally defined as a study, which is conducted in a natural setting where the researcher, an instrument of data collection, gathers words or pictures, analyzes them inductively, focuses on the meaning of participants, and describes a process that is both expressive and persuasive in language.
Creswell (1998) defines qualitative study as:
“Qualitative research is an inquiry process of understanding based on distinct methodological traditions of inquiry that explore a social or human problem. The researcher builds a complex, holistic picture, analyzes words, report detailed views of informants, and conducts the study in a natural setting.”
Qualitative research should not be viewed as an easy substitute for a “statistical” or quantitative study. It demands a commitment to an extensive time in the field, engagement in the complex, time-consuming process of data analysis, writing of long passages, and participation in a form of social and human science research that does not have firm guidelines or specific procedures and is evolving and changing constantly. For reasons why one could conduct qualitative research, click here.
Reasons For Conducting Qualitative Research
To engage in qualitative enquiry, there is a need to first determine whether a strong rationale exists for choosing a qualitative approach. The following reasons could call for a qualitative inquiry:
- Topics that need to be explored: This is a situation where variables cannot be easily identified, theories are not available to explain behavior of participants or their population of study;
- Need to present a detailed view of the topic: This is the case where the distant panoramic view is not enough to present answers to the problem;
- Need to study individuals in their natural setting: This is the case where, if participants are removed from their natural setting, it leads to contrived findings that are out of context;
- Need to write in a literary style: This is where the writer engages a story telling form of narration and the personal pronoun “I” is used;
- Where there is sufficient time and resources to spend on extensive data collection in the field and detailed data analysis of “text” information;
- The nature of research question: In a qualitative study, the research questions often starts with a how or a what; and
- Audiences are receptive to qualitative research.
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Designing A Study
Generally, the format for the design of this study follows the traditional research approach of presenting a problem, asking a question, collecting data to answer the question, analyzing the data, and answering the question.
The following format can serve as a guide for planning a study:
- Introduction
- Statement of the Problem
- Purpose of the Study
- The Grand Tour Question and Sub Questions
- Definitions
- Delimitations and Limitations
- Significance of the Study
- Procedure
- Assumptions and Rationale for a Qualitative Design
- The Type of Design Used
- The Role of the Researcher
- Data Collection Procedures
- Methods for Verification
- Outcomes of the Study and Its Relation to Theory and Literature
- Appendixes
Characteristics of a “Good” Qualitative Research
There are standards for assessing the quality of qualitative studies (Creswell, 1998; Howe & Eisenhardt, 1990; Lincoln, 1995; Marshall & Rossman, 1995). The following short list of characteristics of a “good” qualitative research is presented by Creswell (1998):
· It entails Rigorous data collection: The researcher collects multiple forms of data, summarizes them adequately and spends adequate time in the field.
· The study is framed within the assumptions and characteristics of the qualitative approach to research.
· The researcher identifies, studies and employs one or more traditions of inquiry.
· The researcher starts with a single idea or problem that s/he seeks to understand, not a causal relationship of variables.
· The study involves detailed methods, a rigorous approach to data collection, data analysis, and report writing.
· The writing is so persuasive that the reader experiences “being there.”
· Data is analyzed using multiple levels of abstraction. That is, the researcher’s work is presented in a way that moves from particulars to general levels of abstraction.
· The writing is clear, engaging, and full of unexpected ideas. The story and findings become believable and realistic, accurately reflecting all the complexities that exist in real situation.
Types/Traditions of Qualitative Research
Five types/traditions of qualitative research are identified here.
The following are specified concerning each tradition:
- Definition
- Procedures involved in conducting a study
- Potential problems that exist in using it
Click on each of the five traditions listed below for details of the issues mentioned above on each of them:
Biography
Definition:
A biographical study is the study of an individual and his/her experiences as told to the researcher or found in documents and archival records (Creswell, 1998).
Procedures Involved In Conducting A Study:
· · It begins with an objective set of experiences in the subject’s life, noting life course stages and experiences. The life course stages may be childhood, adulthood, or old age, written in a chronology, or experiences such as education, marriage, and employment.
· · Next, the researcher gathers concrete contextual biographical material using interviewing. Here, the researcher focuses on gathering stories as the subject recounts a set of life experiences in the form of a story or narrative.
· · The researcher then organizes the stories around themes that indicate epiphanies (i.e., pivotal events) in the subject’s life.
· · The researcher explores the meanings of these stories. However, the researcher relies on the individual to provide explanations and then searches for multiple meanings.
· · In addition, the researcher looks for larger structures to explain the meanings, and provides an interpretation for the life experiences of the individual. The larger structures could be social interactions in groups, cultural issues, ideologies and historical context. If more than one individual is studied, cross-interpretation can be done.
Challenges:
· · The information gathering from and about the subject is usually very extensive and demanding.
· · There is the need to have a clear understanding of the history and context to enable one to position the subject within the larger trends in society or in the culture.
· · It takes a keen eye to determine the particular stories, slant, or angle that “works” in writing a biography and to uncover the “figure under the carpet” (Edel, 1994) that explains the multilayered context of a life.
· · The researcher needs to be able to bring himself/herself into the narrative and to acknowledge his or her standpoint, since this is an interpretive research.
Phenomenology
Definition:
A phenomenological study describes that meaning of the lived experiences for several individuals about a concept or a phenomenon (Creswell, 1998). As noted by Polkinghorne (1989), phenomenology explores the structures of consciousness in human experiences.
Procedures Involved In Conducting A Study:
· · The researcher writes research questions that explore the meaning of lived experiences for individuals, and asks individuals to describe these experiences.
· · The researcher then collects data, typically via long interviews, from individuals who have experienced the phenomenon under investigation.
· · The data analysis involves horizontalization (i.e., extracting significant statements from transcribed interviews). The significant statements are then transformed into clusters of meanings according to how each statement falls under specific psychological and phenomenological concepts. Finally, these transformations are tied together to make a general description of the experience – both the textural description (of what was experienced) and the structural description (of how it was experienced). The researcher can incorporate his/her personal meaning of the experience here.
· · Finally, the report is written such that readers understand better the essential, invariant structure of the experience (or essence) of the experience. The reader should come away with the feeling that, “I understand better what it is like for someone to experience that.” (Polkinghorne, 1989).
Challenges:
· · The researcher requires a solid grounding in the philosophical precepts of phenomenology.
· · The subjects selected into the study should be individuals who have actually experienced the phenomenon.
· · The researcher needs to bracket his/her own experiences, which is difficult to do.
· · The researcher needs to decide as to how and when his/her personal experiences will be incorporated into the study.
Grounded Theory
Definition:
The intent of grounded theory is to generate or discover a theory – an abstract analytical schema of a philosophy, that relates to a particular situation. This situation could be one in which individuals interact, take actions, or engage in a process in response to a phenomenon (Creswell, 1998).
Procedures Involved In Conducting A Study:
· · In open coding, the researcher forms initial categories of information about the phenomenon being studied by segmenting information. Within each category (a category represents a unit of information composed of events, happenings and instances), the researcher finds several properties, or subcategories, and looks for data to dimensionalize, or show the extreme possibilities on a continuum of, the property.
· · In axial coding, the researcher assembles the data in new ways after open coding. The researcher presents this using a coding paradigm or logic diagram in which he/she identifies a central phenomenon, explores causal conditions (i.e., categories of conditions that influence the phenomenon), specifies strategies (i.e., the actions or interactions that result from the central phenomenon), identifies the content and intervening conditions (i.e., the narrow and broad conditions that influence the strategies), and delineates the consequences (i.e., the outcomes of the strategies) for this phenomenon.
· · In selective coding, the researcher identifies a “story line” and writes a story that integrates the categories in the axial coding model. In this phase, conditional propositions (or hypotheses) are typically presented.
· · Finally, the researcher develops and visually portrays a conditional matrix that elucidates the social, historical, and economic conditions influencing the central phenomenon.
This process results in a theory, written by the researchers close to a specific problem or population of people.
Challenges:
· · The researcher needs to set aside, as much as possible, theoretical ideas or notions so that the analytical, substantive theory can emerge.
· · Despite the evolving, inductive nature of this form of a qualitative inquiry, the researcher must recognize that this is a systematic approach to research with specific steps in data analysis.
· · The researcher needs faces the difficulty of determining when the categories are saturated or when the theory is sufficiently detailed.
Ethnography
Definition:
An ethnography is a description and interpretation of a cultural or social group or system (Creswell, 1998). In such a study, the researcher examines the group’s observable and learned patterns of behavior, customs, and ways of life (Harris, 1968). Here, the researcher becomes a participant observer, and gets immersed in the day-to-day lives of the people or through one-on-one interviews with members of the group. The researcher focuses on the meanings of behavior, language, and inter-actions of the culture-sharing group.
Procedures Involved In Conducting A Study:
· · The research begins with the researcher looking at people in interaction in ordinary settings and attempting to discern pervasive patterns such as life cycles, events, and cultural themes.
· · To establish patterns, the ethnographer engages in extensive work in the field (field work), gathering information through observations, interviews, and materials helpful inn developing a portrait and establishing “cultural rules” of the culture-sharing group.
· · The researcher is sensitive to gaining assess to the field through gatekeepers. The ethnographer locates key informants, i.e., individuals who provide useful insights into the group and can steer the researcher to information and contacts. The researcher is also sensitive about reciprocity between the investigator and the subjects being studied, so that something will be returned to the subjects being studied in exchange for their information. Lastly, the researcher is also sensitive to reactivity, the impact of the researcher on the site and the people being studied. The researcher also makes every effort to make his/her intent known from the start to avoid any trace of deception.
· · The researcher then does a detailed description of the culture-sharing group or individual, an analysis by themes or perspectives and some interpretation for meanings of social interaction and generalizations about human social life.
Challenges:
· · The researcher needs to have a grounding in cultural anthropology and the meanings of social-cultural systems as well as the concepts typically explored by ethnographers.
· · The time to collect data is extensive, involving prolonged time in the field.
· · The style of writing, literary (almost story telling approach), may limit audience and may be challenging for some authors who are used to traditional approaches of writing social science research.
· · There is the possibility that the researcher would “go native” and be unable to complete the study or be compromised in the study.
Case Study
Definition:
Creswell (1998) defines a case study as an exploration of a “bounded system” or a case (or multiple cases) over time through detailed, in-depth data collection involving multiple sources of information rich in context. Some consider “the case” as an object of study (e.g., Stake, 1995) while others consider it a methodology (e.g., Merriam, 1998). According to Creswell, the bounded system is bounded by time and place, and it is the case being studied – a program, an event, an activity, or individuals.
Procedures Involved In Conducting A Study:
· The researcher needs to situate the case in a context or setting. The setting may be a physical, social, historical, and/or economic.
· The researcher needs to identify the focus of the study. It could be either on the case (intrinsic study), because of its uniqueness, or it may be on an issue or issues (instrumental study), with the case used instrumentally to illustrate the issue. A case study could involve more than one case (collective case study).
· In choosing what case to study, a researcher may choose a case because it shows different perspectives on the problem, process, or event of interest, or it may be just an ordinary case, accessible, or unusual.
· The data collection is extensive, drawing on multiple sources of information such as observations, interviews, documents, and audio-visual materials.
· The data analysis can be either a holistic analysis of the entire case or an embedded analysis of a specific aspect of the case.
· From the data collection, a detailed description of the case is done. Themes or issues are formulated and then the researcher makes an interpretation or assertions about the case.
· When multiple cases are chosen, a typical format is to provide a detailed description of each case and themes within the case (called within-case analysis), followed by a thematic analysis across the cases (called a cross-case analysis), as well as assertions or an interpretation of the meaning of the case.
· In the final stage, the researcher reports the “lessons learned” from the case (Lincoln and Guba, 1985).
Challenges:
· The researcher needs to identify his/her case among a host of possible candidates.
· The researcher needs to decide whether to study a single case or multiple cases. The motivation for considering many cases is the issue of generalizability, which is not so much of a pressing issue in qualitative inquiry. Studying more than one case runs the risk of a diluted study, lacking the “depth” compared to a single case. “How many” cases becomes a challenge then.
· Getting enough information to get a good depth for the case is a challenge.
· Deciding on the boundaries in terms of time, events and processes may be challenging. Some cases have no clean beginning and ending points.
References
References
Creswell, J. W. (1998), “Qualitative Inquiry And Research Design: Choosing Among Five Traditions” Sage Publications, London, New Delhi
Dabbs J.M., Faulkner R.R., and Maanen J.V., (1982), “Varieties Of Qualitative Research.” Sage Publications
Flinders D.J. and Mills G.E. (1993), “Theory And Concepts In Qualitative Research: Perspectives From The Field” Teachers College, Colombia University NY and London.
Lewin K., Stephens D. and Vulliamy G. (1990), “Doing Educational Research In Developing Countries: Qualitative Strategies.” The Falmer Press (London, New York, Philadelphia)
Patton M.Q. (1987), “How To Use Qualitative Methods In Evaluation.” Sage Publications
Shaffr W.B. and Stebbins R.A. (1991), “Experiencing Fieldwork (an inside view of qualitative research).” Sage Publications