Participant Observation

Question 1

What is Participant Observation?

Answer 1

Derives from Ethnography, studying small-scale societies by observing people’s daily lives. Interpretivists favour this due to the production of qualitative data.

Question 2

What is Covert Observation?

Answer 2

When the researcher can adopt a covert role, concealing their identity.

Question 3

Advantages of Covert Observation:

Answer 3

Produces valid data.

Question 4

Disadvantages of Covert Observation:

Answer 4

Need to rely on memory to take notes, difficult to access, need specific skills, no right to withdraw, deceptive, no informed consent, has to fit appropriate characteristics, unreliable.

Question 5

What is Overt Observation?

Answer 5

When the researcher can adopt an overt role, declaring their own identity.

Question 6

Advantages of Overt Observation:

Answer 6

Researcher can take notes and not get involved in illegal activity, cheap, informed consent, not deceptive, valid data.

Question 7

Disadvantages of Overt Observation:

Answer 7

Unlikely to gain full trust of the group so leads to socially desirable behaviour, invalid, needs specific skills to observe and take notes, unreliable, time-consuming.

Question 8

An example of participant observation:

Answer 8

John Howard Griffin ‘Black Like Me’ (1959) - used chemicals to change colour of his skin in order to gain a fully empathetic understanding of what it is like to be a person of colour. He argued that they may not be entirely trusting of a white man due to bad experiences in the past.