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Semester 1 > Qualitative Research > Flashcards

Qualitative Research Flashcards

1
Q

Week 1
Understand the historical context of qualitative research methods in psychology

A
  • Wundt - Viewed as equally important as experimental
  • Flanagan - Critical Incident Technique, first qual research method
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2
Q

Week 1
Explain how qualitative research methods developed in psychology

A
  • Late 1960’s-1980’s - Sociologists developed qual methods
  • Grounded Theory - 1967
  • Psychologists called for a greater use of qual methods
  • Giorgi developed usable qual methods for psych
  • 2006 Qualitative Methods Section of BPS is formed
  • Attempt to establish a Division for Qualitative Inquiry for the American Psychological Society failed in 2008 (succeeded in 2013)
  • The ESRC require that doctoral students in psychology are trained in both quant and qual research methods
  • Specialist qual methods-based journals such as Qualitative Research in Psychology were established
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3
Q

Week 1
Outline key concepts from the philosophy of science

A
  • Ontology - What is real? What exists?
  • Epistemology - Study of knowledge, e.g., how we know
    – Objectivism, constructivism, subjectivism, interpretivism
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4
Q

Week 1
Explain the different perspectives taken by positivism and interpretivism

A

Positivism
- Reality consists of what is available to the senses
- Inquiry should be based upon scientific observation
- Objective, value-free discovery
- Dominant approach in psychology

Interpretivism
- Humans generate knowledge and meaning from their interactions with the world
- Knowledge is interpretation
- Importance of the researcher’s perspective and the interpretative nature of social reality

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5
Q

Week 2
Consolidate understanding of the basic principles of qualitative research

A
  • Explores beliefs, experiences, attitudes, behaviours, and interactions through the perspective of the individual
  • Aims to understand ‘what is going on’
  • Explores words/textual data rather than numbers and stats
  • Interpretivist epistemology
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6
Q

Week 2
Describe the key differences between qualitative and quantitative research

A

Quant
- Numbers, explanation
- Statistical sampling
- Physical sciences, objective
- Inquiry from the outside
- Cause/effect relationships
- Theory/explanation testing and development
- Researcher impersonal

Qual
- Words, understanding
- Purposive sampling
- Social sciences, subjective
- Inquiry from the inside
- Meaning of behaviours, broad focus
- Discovery, gaining knowledge, understanding actions
- Practitioner as human instrument to gather data, personal

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7
Q

Week 2
Understand how qualitative methods are presented in research

A
  • Interviews
  • Focus groups
  • Diary entries
  • Case study
  • Documents
  • Observations
  • Images
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8
Q

Week 3
Understand how to formulate a research question

A
  • Ask ‘what’, ‘how’ or ‘why’ something happens
  • Nothing too big but also not too narrow
  • Research must be doable and relevant
  • Must be ethical
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9
Q

Week 3
Identify the steps required in designing a qualitative study

A
  • Define research problem
  • Study design
  • Data collection
  • Data management
  • Data analysis
  • Write up
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10
Q

Week 3
Understand the literature review process in qualitative research design

A

David E. Gray
1. Identify relevant literature
2. Search systematically - keywords
3. Critically evaluate sources
4. Synthesise literature - trends, organise
5. Document and reference
6. Write review

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11
Q

Week 3
Describe different approaches to sampling in research

A
  • Convenience
    – Drawn from a part of the population that is close to hand
  • Purposive
    – Built up that enables the researcher to meet the needs of the project
    – Participants are well-informed on the topic of interest
    – Focuses on data saturation
  • Snowball
    – Existing participants recruit further participants from among their acquaintances
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12
Q

Week 4
Explain the importance of ethics in qualitative research

A
  • Assists a researcher to conduct research in a
    responsible and morally defensible way
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13
Q

Week 4
Describe why adopting an ethical approach to research is important

A
  • Promotes the aims of research
  • Promotes the values that are essential to collaborative work
  • Ensure that researchers can be held accountable to the public
  • Build public support for research - more likely to be funded
  • Promotes moral and social values
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14
Q

Week 4
Detail the steps you can take to ensure ethical standards are adhered to

A
  1. Informed consent
  2. Minimise deception unless absolutely necessary
  3. Protect & safeguard participants from harm
  4. Ensure privacy & confidentiality of participants
  5. Inform of right to withdraw
  6. Debriefing
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15
Q

Week 5
Detail specific qualitative methods of data collection

A
  • Diaries
  • Focus groups
  • Interviews
  • Observations
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16
Q

Week 5
Discuss the use and application of interviews and focus groups as a research approach

A

Interviews
- To explore a phenomenon not yet researched
- When it is crucial to understand individuals’ perspectives
- When a research question is largely exploratory
- When the issue is too complex/rich to be grasped by a questionnaire/survey
- When observation alone will not suffice
- When experiments are inappropriate

Focus Groups
- Alternative to semi-structured 1:1 interviews
- Groups of people are asked their opinions on a particular topic
- Interaction between participants is key

17
Q

Week 5
Discuss the use and application of observation and diary studies as a research approach

A

Observation
- Collected in naturalistic settings
- Convert / overt

Diary Entries
- Often used when observations aren’t possible
- Capture what’s important for the participant - view from within

18
Q

Week 5
Critically evaluate the use of different methods in qualitative research

A

Focus Groups
/ Can be recorded and transcribed
/ More naturalistic than 1:1
X Group nature may lead to disagreements
X Less structured - more difficult to analyse (transcribe, code, etc.)

Observations
/ Naturalistic settings
/ Field notes provide a record
X Overt - participants are aware, SDC
X Covert - valid consent

Diary Entries
/ Less reliant on memory recall– Real time account
/ Participants can be provided with specific info on what to note in their entries
X More reliant on participant engagement – Sending reminders
X Might be less inclined to record details that are personal

19
Q

Week 6
Discuss the potential benefits and pitfalls of transcription

A

Benefits
- Represents the audio/video data collected
- Provides the researcher with something tangible they can analyse
- Allows verification of analytic claims

Pitfalls
- Time-consuming
- No ‘standard’ has been established
- Different methods are more/less precise than methods

20
Q

Week 6
Demonstrate how to assign codes to textual data for analysis

A
  • Deductive (top down / a priori), driven by a specific research question, pre-determined hypothesis
  • Inductive (bottom up / emergent), codes are linked to the data, free of pre-determined hypothesis
21
Q

Week 6
Apply ethical principles to handling qualitative data

A
  • Confidentiality - how data is stored, possibility to identify participants
    – Use names with the same syllable length
    – Town, village & institution names should be changed/replaced with similar fictitious places
22
Q

Week 6
Identify the limitations of coding and categorising approaches in general

A
  • Need to be organised
  • Can be time-consuming
  • Poorly transcribed data is more difficult
  • Active process of researcher - requires some skill/experience
23
Q

Week 7
Discuss the role of interpretation in qualitative research

A
  • Involvement of researcher
  • Relation between researcher and respondent
  • Application of responses
24
Q

Week 7
Evaluate the benefits and limitations of coding and categorising approaches in general

A

Benefits
- Provides fuller and deeper understanding
- Deeper insights into relevant social and psychological processes may be gained

Limitations
- Involves active engagement - effort
- Subjective between researchers, difficult to standardise

25
Q

Week 7
Consider the ethical issues associated with interpretation in qualitative data

A
  • Subjective - may not represent what the respondent meant/intended to say
  • Can involve sensitive topics - risk of harm
26
Q

Week 8
Describe the central features of Content Analysis and Template Analysis

A

Content
- Quantifies concepts in qualitative data to be statistically analysed or used descriptively
- Used to reduce large data sets, examine trends and identify important aspects of content

Template
- Development of a coding ‘template’ which summarises themes
- Hierarchical suggested - using broad themes initially and then narrowing them down

27
Q

Week 8
Know how to conduct a basic Content Analysis and Template Analysis

A

Content
- Quantify a given concept within a qualitative data set
- May include word counts

Template
- Main questions from the interview schedule can serve as the initial template (a priori/top-down)
1. Identify a priori themes
2. Collect data
3. Transcribe interviews and familiarise with small subset of data
4. Initial coding (identify new themes)
5. Produce initial template
6. Refine template as more data is analysed
7. Use final template to interpret and write up findings

28
Q

Week 8
Understand when Content and Template Analysis can be used

A

Content
- Existing data (speech scripts, newspapers, letters, texts)
- Large range of disciplines

Template
- Larger data sets
- Any textual data

29
Q

Week 8
Evaluate the effectiveness of Content and Template Analysis

A

Content
/ Unobtrusive
/ Systematic and transparent analysis
/ Fewer ethical issues
/ Researchers don’t require a specific ‘skill’
X Time-consuming
X Prone to increased error
X Reductionist & descriptive
X Ignores context

Template
/ Flexible - a priori codes can be re-defined
/ Links to previous research
/ Builds on existing theory/findings
/ Makes data analysis less time-consuming
/ Allows the researcher to ensure the capture important theoretical concepts
X Deciding on a priori codes can be challenging
X Loss of holistic understanding - individual accounts
X Can lead to a very simple template
X Can lead to a flat, descriptive account of the data
X A priori may not be useful

30
Q

Week 9
Understand the key features of Thematic Analysis

A
  • Form of pattern recognition in qualitative data
  • Requires involvement and interpretation from the researcher
  • Involves semantic coding
  • Used for identifying, analysing and reporting patterns
31
Q

Week 9
Know how to conduct a basic Thematic Analysis including theme generation

A
  1. Familiarisation with the data
  2. Generating codes
  3. Generating initial themes
  4. Reviewing initial themes
  5. Defining and naming themes
  6. Producing the report

Theme Generation
- Important codes get promoted
- Clusters of codes (similar meanings/concepts)
- Use thematic maps
- Look for relationships between the themes

32
Q

Week 9
Evaluate the effectiveness of Thematic Analysis

A

/ Adapting to any quantitative data
/ Flexible and easy to grasp for unexperienced researchers
/ Finding hidden/deeper meanings
/ Generating a deeper understanding of data
X Can be poorly defined
X May miss the rich amount of data present
X Time-consuming
X Subjectivity in theme identification

33
Q

Week 10
Describe the steps involved in a Grounded Theory study

A
  • Developed inductively from a body of data
  • Theory is verified through data collection and analysis
  • General questions about a research topic of interest
  • Certain research interests
  • Data collection and analysis are entwined - working with participants to construct the data
  • Analyse data early
  • Simultaneous data collection and analysis
  • Theoretical sampling
  • Memo writing
34
Q

Week 10
Apply the basic principles of IPA to psychological research
(Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis)

A

Deviant Cases
- Negative case analysis - search for cases that don’t fit the emerging theory
- Redefine or reformulate their emerging theory

35
Q

Week 10
Distinguish between action research and other research methodologies

A

Action Research
- Focused on solving a problem
- Addresses real world problems and what can be done
- Reveals different truths and realities held by different groups and individuals

36
Q

Week 10
Describe the processes involved in conducting action research

A
  • Cyclical process
  • Choosing the focus
    – Consider the matter feasibility
  • Gathering evidence
    – Decide what actions to take
    –Wide range of research methods to acquire a comprehensive data set
    – Representative & diverse sample
  • Analysing the impact
    – What has been achieved?
    – Meetings of stakeholders
  • Evaluating the impact of the project
    – Evaluate the change that has taken place
    – Quantitatively & qualitatively
    – Reflection - what was learned? How can this learning be applied?
37
Q

Week 11
Describe the concepts of reliability and validity within qualitative research

A

Reliability
- Predictable / causal relationships
- Replicated in different contexts
- A quantitative judgement on validity

Validity
- The property of particular statements
- How well has the research been carried out?
- Are the findings trustworthy?
- Is the research useful?

38
Q

Week 11
Understand why demonstrating validity is important in qualitative research and appreciate how validity can be enhanced

A

Importance of Validity
- Objectivity
- Reliability
- Generalisability

Enhancing Validity
- Triangulation (combining methods)
- Member checks (participants comment on analysis)
- Peer debriefing (comparing coding - inter-rater reliability)
- Disconfirming case analysis (negative case analysis)
- Audit trail (evidence to link raw data to final report)
- Immersion in the setting (ethnography/observation studies)
- Thick Description (sufficient breadth and depth)
- Reflexivity (acknowledging influence of researcher)

39
Q

Week 11
Understand the basic principles of presenting qualitative research

A

Know Your Audience
- Different styles and conventions
- Lay / Corporate audience:
– Interested in findings and implications
– Clear, concise messages, bullet points, so what?
- Academic audience:
– Interested in how data was collected and analysed
– Objective language, scientific outlines, first-person writing

Ways of Writing
- Qualitative research may be written in the first person, but traditional academic writing (third person, objective) is recommended

Scientific Structure
- Academic audience
1. Title
2. Abstract (250-300 word summary)
3. Literature review (provides rationale)
4. Method (many sections, description & justification)
5. Findings (relate to & answer research questions)
6. Discussion (locates findings in further work)

Semester 1 (3 decks)

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