Qualitative: Participant Observation (Primary)

Question 1

What are the 2 types of observation?

Answer 1

1. Non-participant observation - researcher observes the group without participating.
2. Participant observation - researcher participates in the life of the group whilst observing it.

Question 2

What is observation used for?

Answer 2

By observing people in their natural environment, we can try to observe what people actually do rather than what they say they do.

Question 3

What is a developed definition of participant observation?

Answer 3

• Participant is used more often than non-participant.
• Favoured by interpretivists.
• Positivists can use structured non-participant observation. This will have a structured observation schedule (a predetermined list of behaviours that the sociologist is interested in). Each time the behaviour occurs, the observer records it on the schedule.
  = This produces quantitative data from which patterns and correlations can be established.

Question 4

What is the difference between overt and covert observation?

Answer 4

• Overt observation = The researcher reveals their true identity and purpose to those being studied and asks their permission to observe.
• Covert observation = The researcher conceals their true identity and purpose, usually posing as a genuine member of the group.
• Most observation used is unstructured participant observation, which offers an insight into a group’s way of life and therefore is often used by interpretivists.

Question 5

How easy is ‘getting in’ in participant observation?

Answer 5

• Some groups are easier than others.
• Having the right skills to get in.
• Overcoming suspicion and gaining trust.
• Having to fit in: age, gender, class, ethnicity can be an obstacle if different from the group.
• Shouldn’t disrupt the group’s normal behaviour → it isn’t always possible to take a role that is non-disruptive and a good vantage point.
• Role may require to take sides in conflicts, meaning the researcher may be estranged from one faction to the other, making observation more difficult.

Question 6

How easy is ‘staying in’ in participant observation?

Answer 6

• Researcher has to be involved in the group and its activities to understand it fully.
• However, must be detached enough to remain objective and unbiased.
• Too involved = risk going native.
• Too detached = risk not understanding what is observed.
• Need to strike a balance.
• Longer amount of time the researcher spends with the group = less strange its ways will appear.
• “I started as a non-participating observer and ended as a non-observing participator” - William F. Whyte (1955).

Question 7

How easy is ‘getting out’ in participant observation?

Answer 7

• Usually less of a problem.
• Leaving a group you have become close to can be difficult as well as re-entering the researcher’s ‘normal world’. For example, strong friendships and partnerships can be made in the group.
• Can be worse if research is conducted on and off over a period of time.
• Loyalty to the group may prevent researchers from fully disclosing everything they have learnt.

Question 8

P.E.T.
Practical issues: What insight is there?

(include verstehen)

Answer 8

• The best way to understand something is to experience it for yourself.
• It gives us insight into other people’s lives and how they live → we can put ourselves in their place (verstehen).
• Verstehen = german word meaning empathy or subjective understanding.
• PO allows sociologist to gain verstehen through first hand experience and can understand their life-world as they themselves understand it.
• PO produces large amounts of rich, detailed, qualitative data that gives us a feel of what it is like to be a member of the group.

Question 9

Practical issues: How is the observation situation accessed?

Answer 9

PO may be the only suitable method for accessing and studying certain groups. For example:
- Groups who engage in deviant activities may be suspicious of outsiders who come asking questions, but are more willing to cooperate with someone who seeks to share their way of life.
- Where members of a group are unaware of the unconscious stereotypes behind their actions, observation may be the only means of uncovering them since it would be pointless asking questions about them.

Question 10

Practical issues: How flexible is participant observation?

Answer 10

• PO is flexible in comparison to survey methods (questionnaires and structured interviews).
• Enter the research method open-minded and formulate hypotheses and research questions as and when we encounter new situations. This allows the researcher to discover new things that other methods miss.
• Whyste - “I learned answers to questions that I would not have had the sense to ask if I had been using interviews”.
• Polsky - “Initially, keep your eyes and ears open but keep your mouth shut”.

Question 11

How are overt observations conducted?

Answer 11

• The researcher can behave normally and doesn’t have to put on an act.
• Because the researcher is known to be an outsider, they don’t need any special knowledge or personal characteristics to join.
• The group may refuse to let an outsider join them, or may prevent them witnessing certain activities.
• As an outsider, the researcher can ask naive but important questions.
• The researcher can take notes openly and doesn’t have to rely on memory.
• The researcher can use interviews or other methods to check insights derived from observations.
• The researcher can opt out of any dangerous or illegal activities.
• It risks creating the Hawthorne effect, where those who know they are being observed behave differently as a result.

Question 12

How are covert observations conducted?

Answer 12

• The researcher must keep up an act. This can be stressful, especially if it involves staying in role for long periods.
• The researcher may need detailed knowledge of the group’s way of life before joining , and characteristics (e.g. gender) that allows them to fit in.
• It may be the only way to obtain information. The researcher may have more chance of being accepted and seeing things outsiders could not.
• The researcher cannot ask naive questions as this could blow their cover.
• The researcher usually has to rely on memory and write notes in secret.
• The researcher can’t combine observation with any ‘overt’ methods such as interviews.
• To maintain cover, the researcher may have to engage in dangerous activities.
• There is less of a risk altering the group’s behaviour because they don’t know they are being observed.

Question 13

What are the negatives of practical issues?

Answer 13

• Fieldwork is very time consuming and may take years to complete. It produces large amounts of qualitative data, which can be hard to analyse and categorise.
• The researcher needs to be sociologically trained so that they recognize the aspects of a situation that are significant and worth investigating = expensive.
• It can be personally stressful and demanding, and sometimes dangerous.
• It requires observational and interpersonal skills that not everyone possesses.
• Powerful groups may be able to prevent sociologists from participating in them. This is one reason why participant observation often focuses on relatively powerless groups → they are less able to resist being studied.

Question 14

Theoretical issues: How is interpretivism applied to participant observation?

Answer 14

• As PO produces qualitative data, it is liked by interpretivists.
• Produces detailed and authentic pictures of actors’ meanings and life-worlds in the following ways:
  Validity.
  Flexibility and Grounded Theory.

Question 15

1. Is PO high or low in validity?

Answer 15

• Sociologists have a high level of involvement in PO, which enables them to get close to people’s lived reality and gain a deep subjective understanding of their meanings.
• Therefore, uniquely valid, insightful, qualitative data is produced.
• PO provides us with a truer picture of how people live.

Question 16

2. What is the flexibility and grounded theory, and how does it relate to PO?

(Glaser and Strauss - 1968)

Answer 16

• Flexibility of PO produces valid data.
• Glaser and Strauss (1968) - by being able to enter the research without a pre-formed hypothesis or questions, the researcher can modify and develop their ideas during research to produce grounded theory.
• This means concepts, categories and hypotheses are grounded in the observed realities, rather than imposed on the data by the researcher.
• Being able to spend lengthy amounts of time with a group we can see how actors’ meanings develop over time = more valid picture than a snapshot in time.

Question 17

How do positivists view PO?

Answer 17

• Reject the use of PO due to its unscientific method.
• Positivists don’t like PO for the following reasons:
  Lack of representativeness.
  Lack of reliability.
  Bias and lack of objectivity.
  Lack of validity.

Question 18

Is PO high or low in representativeness?

Answer 18

• Groups studied are usually very small.
• ‘Sample’ is often selected haphazardly (unplanned/unorganised), for example, a chance encounter with someone who turns out to be a key informant.
• Therefore, the group that is studied is likely to be unrepresentative of the wider population and therefore we cannot really make generalisations.
• Downes and Rock (2003) - although participant observation may provide valid insights into the particular group being studied, it is doubtful how far these ‘internally valid’ insights are ‘externally valid’.

Question 19

Is PO high or low in reliability?

Answer 19

• PO is not a standardised, scientific measuring instrument.
• Success depends on personal skills and characteristics of the lone researcher. The method may be unique to the researcher.
• Therefore, it is impossible for other researchers to check the original study by replicating it (= not replicable).
• Comparisons with other studies are difficult due to the qualitative nature of data produced.

Question 20

Is there a bias and lack of objectivity in PO?

Answer 20

• Researcher’s close involvement = lack of objectivity.
• Involvement risks ‘going native’ = breeding loyalty to the group.
• PO appeals to sociologists who perhaps sympathise with the underdog - they may be biased in favour of the subject’s viewpoint.

Question 21

Is PO high or low in validity?

Answer 21

• Positivists reject the interpretivist claim that PO produces valid data (argues there is a lack of validity).
• Findings are merely biased subjective impressions of the observer.
• The observer selects the only facts they think are worth recording, which are likely to fit in with their own values and prejudices.

Question 22

How is the Hawthorne effect applied to PO?

Answer 22

• Undermine the validity of PO studies → the observer’s presence may make the subjects act differently.
• More of an issue for overt observation than covert.
• Interpretivists argue that over time the group generally gets used to the observer’s presence and behaves normally.
• Researchers can also try to adopt a less obtrusive (noticeable in an unpleasant way) role to minimise the threat to validity.

Question 23

What are structure vs action perspectives applied to PO?

Answer 23

• PO normally associated with ‘action’ perspectives, like interactionism.
• Action perspectives see society as being constructed.

Question 24

Methods in Context links.
In which ways is observation used in studies of education?

Answer 24

• Gender and classroom behaviour.
• Teacher expectations and labelling.
• Speech codes in the classroom.
• Pupil subcultures.
• Teacher and pupil racism.
• The hidden curriculum.

Question 25

Structured Observation.
What practical issues are there?

(Based off the Flanders system of interaction analysis categories - FLAC)

Answer 25

• One example of the structured observational schedules favoured by positivists is the Flanders system of interaction analysis categories (FLAC).
• This is used to measure pupil-pupil and pupil-teacher interaction quantitatively.
• The observer uses a standard chart to record interactions at tree-second intervals, placing each observation in one of ten pre-defined behaviour categories.
• Therefore, observations can easily be converted into quantitative data by counting the number of times each type of behaviour occurs.
• For example, Flanders (1970) found that in the typical American classroom, 68% of the time is taken up by teacher talk, 20% by pupil talk and 12% lost in silence or confusion.
• The relative simplicity of structured observational methods, such as FLAC, means they are quicker, cheaper and require less training than less structured methods.

Question 26

Is PO high or low in reliability?

Answer 26

• Easily replicable.
  For example, FLAC uses only 10 categories of classroom interaction, which makes it relatively easy for other researchers to apply in a standardised way.
• It also generates quantitative data, which makes the findings easy to compare with those of other studies.

Question 27

Is PO high or low in validity?

Answer 27

• Interpretivist sociologists criticise structured observation of classroom interaction for its lack of validity.
• For example, Sara Delamont argues that simply counting classroom behaviour and classifying it into a limited number of predefined categories ignores the meanings that pupils and teachers attach to it.

Question 28

Unstructured Observation.
What is unstructured observation, and are they favoured by positivists or interpretivists?

Answer 28

• Interpretivists favour the use of less structured, more flexible, qualitative observational methods.
• These allow them to gain access to the meanings that teachers and pupils give to situations by immersing themselves in those situations.
• Unlike structured methods with their observation schedules, this approach does not make assumptions in advance about what the key research issues will be.
• Sociologists use these observational methods more than the structured ones.

Question 29

What practical issues are in PO?

(Relate to examples: Lacey, Eggleston, Fuller and the head of the London school, Wright, Hammersley)

Answer 29

• Schools are complex places and more time-consuming to observe than many other settings.
• It took Lacey 2 months to familiarise himself with the school, whilst Eggleston (1976) needed over 3 months just to set up his cover role for his observations.
• However, it may be easier to gain permission to observe lessons than to interview pupils and teachers.
• For example, the head of the London school studied by Fuller decided not only that it would be good for the pupils to have a non-teaching adult around, but that permission from parents wasn’t required for her to observe normal school behaviour (whereas it would have been if she had wanted to conduct interviews).
• Personal characteristics such as age, gender and ethnicity affect the process of observation.
  At the time, Wright (1992) was carrying out her research, there were a few Black teachers and she found that her African Caribbean ethnicity produced antagonistic reactions from some White teachers. She also found that many black pupils held her in high esteem and would ask her for support.
• Observation of interactions in school settings is limited by the restrictions on the school timetable, holidays, control over access, health and safety legislation and etc.
• Schools are busy places = the observer may find it hard to find the privacy needed to record observations.
• Hammersley found that noting down the staffroom conversations he overheard had to be done covertly and hurriedly, in one case on the back of his newspaper. He acknowledges that he may well have made mistakes or relied on his own interpretation of the general sense of what was said.

Question 30

What ethical issues are there with PO?

(Observing young people, Delamont, ‘guilty knowledge’, Delamont again).

Answer 30

• Ethical issues in relation to the observation of young people usually mean that a covert approach to studying pupils isn’t appropriate. Their vulnerability and limited ability to give informed consent means that observation normally has to be overt.
• Delamont points out that every observer in a school sees and hears things that could get pupils into trouble. This may even be with the law.
• What to do with this ‘guilty knowledge’ is both an ethical and a practical problem: ethically, it could be argued that the researcher is obliged to report the wrongdoing. However, doing so may breach the trust that pupils have placed in the researcher and may mean pupils will no longer confide in them or cooperate with their research.
• Delamont also notes that, given the harm that can be done to pupils, teachers and schools, additional care should be taken to protect their identity. This is even more of an issue in the marketised education system where a good public image is important to the success of a school.

Question 31

Validity…?

Answer 31

• For interpretivists, the main strength of observation, and especially participant observation, is its validity → it gives us an authentic understanding of the world-views of social actors.
• This understanding is particularly important when researching issues such as classroom interaction or labelling in schools.
• However, the power difference between young people and adults is a major barrier to uncovering the real attitudes and behaviour of pupils.
• They may present a false image when being observed by an adult researcher, therefore undermining the validity of the research.
• Observation is more likely than most methods to overcome this problem because it gives the researcher the opportunity to gain acceptance by pupils.
• A further factor limiting validity → teachers may be quite skilled at disguising their feelings and altering their behaviour when being observed (e.g. by inspectors and school managers).
• This may mean that the sociologist’s data from classroom observation lacks validity.
• There is also the problem that the pupil’s language may differ from the researcher’s.
• This makes it difficult for researchers to be sure that they understand pupils’ meanings.

Question 32

How is the Hawthorne effect applied to covert observation?

Answer 32

• It is hard to carry out covert observation of educational settings, especially classrooms, because there are fewer ‘cover’ roles the researcher can adopt and because they stand out as being much older than the pupils. = Most classroom observation has to be overt.
• However, this makes it difficult avoid the Hawthorne Effect, where the presence of the researcher influences.