Types of Analysis Flashcards
What is a qualitative study?
Qualitative research is fundamentally about set relationships, or cross-tabulations of nominal-scale variables; consistent connections, or causally relevant commonalities; and analytical inductions, which is the culmination of the technique used (Ragin 2008). Assessing causes and consequences calls for careful attention to concept formation and operationalization, also known as causal inference (Brady and Collier 2010). Studies using qualitative methodology tend to be more perceptive in the implications of the research process for the production of the findings (Hertz and Imber, eds. 1995).
It includes interviewing, ethnography, focus groups, surveys, Unobtrusive measures, historiography, case studies, and sociometry.
Qualitative research is defined as the meanings, concepts, definitions, characteristics, metaphors, symbols, and descriptions of things. Its strategies provide perspectives that can prompt recall of common or half-forgotten sights, sounds, and smells. Qualitative researchers are interested in how humans arrange themselves and their settings and how inhabitants of these settings make sense of their surroundings through symbols, rituals, social structures, social roles, and so on. They seek patterns among cases, which allows researchers to share in the understandings and perceptions of others and to explore how people structure and give meaning to their daily lives. They do this through symbolic interactions, which focuses on a subject’s understanding and the perceptions of and about people, symbols, and objects (Berg and Lune 2012).
What is a quantitative study?
Quantitative research methods is an approach that utilizes regression analysis, econometric refinements on regression, and the search for statistical alternatives to regression models in contexts where specific regression assumptions are not met. Brady and Collier (2010) mention that the values of these parameters are intended to reflect descriptive and causal patterns in the real world. These causal patterns are the basis of the sociometry data-gathering methods in qualitative research. I believe the connection between qualitative and quantitative methods is the study of patterns within the data.
What is a survey?
A survey is a tool, like a questionnaire, used to collect data and produce statistics, or numerical descriptions (Fowler 2014), by asking questions to a sample population about empirical research questions(s), or real world questions that can be answered with facts (Ruel 2019). Surveys are versatile, meaning that any research topic can be made to work as a survey; cost effective, or efficient in terms of time and resources, relative to the number of questions asked and the number of people surveyed; and generalizable, meaning that the information found in the survey is representative or reflective of the entire population being studied, not just the sample collected (Ruel 2019).
The most familiar uses of survey techniques include measuring (1) public opinion through newspapers magazines, (2) political perceptions and opinions to help political candidates in elections, and (3) market research designed to understand consumer preferences and interests. Examples of these types of surveys include unemployment rates conducted by the Bureau of the Census, people’s income and the way they spend money, the National Health Survey, the National Crime Survey, and farmer’s crop rotations, which is the oldest survey provided by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (Fowler 2014).
What is an interview?
Interviews are a conversation with a purpose to gather information. An interview can be seen as a performance where the researcher and subject play off one another toward a common end (Berg and Lune 2012). Interviewing is a data gathering method with several forms including (1) standard interviews that ask a set a scripted questions (108); (2) unstandardized interviews that are unscripted and let the information lead the conversation (110); and (3) semistandard interviews, which is in between standard and unstandard where there are some questions, but the answers may lead to other topics not scripted (112).
What is as questionnaire?
Rossman (1992) discusses that, “Questionnaires lack in flexibility that is required to capture the subtle character of risk definition.”
A questionnaire is a type of survey, and is the most widely used data collection method to answer research questions, which can be administered by mail, in-person, over the phone, or by email (Fowler 2014).
The types of research questions asked are driven and influenced by choosing the sample population (Ruel 2019), research design, and data collection method (Fowler 2014). A good research question is one that has been carefully thought out and precisely stated (Ruel 2019). The total survey design perspective, which involves a set of decisions to optimize the use of resources, is a practical method that sticks to strict probability sampling and standardized question wording (Fowler 2014). The mode of data collection is determined by its cost effectiveness (Fowler 2014) as well as the design, which includes cross-sectional, or surveying one group at one point in time; panel, or surveying the same group at several points in time; and trend/series, which includes surveying different groups at several points in time (Ruel 2019).
What is a focus group?
Focus groups are interview style discussions designed for small groups of unrelated individuals formed by an investigator. A typical focus group session consists of a small number of participants under the guidance of a facilitator, or moderator. Larger groups of individuals are usually broken into small groups to make them more manageable. Smaller groups are easier to effectively elicit the breadth of responses, and reducing group think, which is when members of the group band together on an idea or series of comments about a give idea, attitude, or belief resulting in pressure from the subgroup. An advantage of focus group face-to-face interviews is the ability to observe interactions, attitudes, experiences, and opinions between group members on a certain topic (Berg and Lune 2012). Focus groups should include clearly defined objective and/or research problems, the nature of the group parallels the research question, comfortable rapport, a facilitator that listens and is well prepared, a structured group, a research assistant, and a systematic analysis of the results (182).
What is ethnography?
Berg and Lune (2012) define ethnography as a study, description, and observations of culture. Brady and Collier (2010) add that ethnographic research is an analysis based on sustained, direct observation of and interaction with the individuals or groups being studied, often involving participant observation.
What is sociometry?
Sociometry is a technique of ethnography that allows researchers to consider friendship patterns, social networks, work relationships, and social distance when specifically researching groups. It is a means of assessing relational group structures such as hierarchies, friendship networks, and cliques. Sociograms are used to graphically display how close people are to one another based on responses to a sociometric test, which typically includes three basic characteristics: (1) a specific number of choices used, (2) a specific number of choices allowed, and (3) levels of preference assigned to each choice. This is a useful tool known as mapping a setting and can be used in a variety of studies from how inmates use environmental space in a prison setting, to how children use and possibly territorially divide the playground (Berg and Lune 2012).
What are unobtrusive measures?
Unobtrusive measures are the non-intrusive examinations of artifacts, traces, or other materials; the examining and assessing of human traces. Unobtrusive measures include investigations of public archives, media accounts, newspapers, official documentary records, autobiographies, archival data like diaries, memoirs, solicitation documents, drawings and sketches, and physical human traces. These traces are broken into two categories, erosion measures, which is the wearing down or away, and accretion measures, which is the accumulation or build up. An example of an erosion measure would be using replacement records to determine which series of high school French language tapes were used the most (296). An example of accretion measures is the science of garbology, studied through the Garbage Project at the University of Arizona.
What is historiography?
History can be defined as an archival past, and historians are prized with the opportunity to reconstruct those pasts through documents, verbal stories, artifacts, bones, and genuine imagination like that of Alfred Wegener in terms of continental drift. Historians are constructors of narratives, which is a simulation of what has occurred in the past by tracing processes and structures over time. The past Historians reconstruct is a thought experiment, a simulated reality, or simply a story (Gaddis 1997). Historical research is an examination of elements of history, or events of long ago; a collection of facts about the past, or an account of some past event or events; a method for discovering, from records and other accounts, what happened during a past event; and, while it is not fact centered, it offers theoretical explanations for various historical events (Berg and Lune 2012). Some examples of historical research include: (1) social historical research, which attempts to understand and explain social life in historical settings; and (2) political histories, which explain shifting political systems, distribution of power, and the impact of nations on other nations (304).
What are case studies?
George and Bennett (2005) define a case study as a well-defined aspect of a historical episode that the investigator selects for analysis, rather than a historical event itself, while Berg and Lune (2012) offer another definition of case studies as simple attempts to systematically investigate an event or set of related events.
George and Bennett (2005) discuss that case studies are strong where statistical methods and formal models are weak. It involves a trade-off among the goals of attaining theoretical parsimony, establishing explanatory richness, and keeping the number of cases being studied manageable. They offer four advantages that make this method valuable in testing hypotheses and useful for theory development including: (1) conceptual validity, or identifying and measuring the indicators that best represent the theoretical concepts the researcher intends to measure; (2) deriving new hypotheses, or possibility of new information presenting itself in the course of the research; (3) exploring causal mechanisms, which operate under certain conditions, examine large numbers of intervening variables, inductively observe any unexpected aspects, or help identify the conditions present in a case that activates the causal mechanism; and (4) modeling and assessing complex causal relationships, or equifinality, which is producing generalizations that are narrower or more contingent.
What are case studies?
George and Bennett (2005) define a case study as a well-defined aspect of a historical episode that the investigator selects for analysis, rather than a historical event itself, while Berg and Lune (2012) offer another definition of case studies as simple attempts to systematically investigate an event or set of related events.
George and Bennett (2005) discuss that case studies are strong where statistical methods and formal models are weak. It involves a trade-off among the goals of attaining theoretical parsimony, establishing explanatory richness, and keeping the number of cases being studied manageable. They offer four advantages that make this method valuable in testing hypotheses and useful for theory development including: (1) conceptual validity, or identifying and measuring the indicators that best represent the theoretical concepts the researcher intends to measure; (2) deriving new hypotheses, or possibility of new information presenting itself in the course of the research; (3) exploring causal mechanisms, which operate under certain conditions, examine large numbers of intervening variables, inductively observe any unexpected aspects, or help identify the conditions present in a case that activates the causal mechanism; and (4) modeling and assessing complex causal relationships, or equifinality, which is producing generalizations that are narrower or more contingent.
What are mixed methods?
Defining mixed methods has evolved through the years including: (1) at least one qualitative and one quantitative method where neither type of method is inherently linked to any particular inquiry paradigm (Green, Carcelli, and Graham 1989); (2) combining all phases of the research process as a methodological orientation (Tashakkori and Teddlie 1998); (3) evolving into a separate methodological orientation with its own worldview, vocabulary, and techniques (Tashakkori and Teddlie 2003); and attributing to everyday life as simply multiple ways of seeing and hearing (Greene 2007).
Mixed methods can be seen as the bridge between qualitative and quantitative research that provides more evidence for studying a research problem. It answers questions, offers insight, encourages the use of multiple worldviews or paradigms, allows the use of all methods to address a research problem, combines inductive and deductive logic through abductive thinking (Morgan 2007), enables scholars to produce multiple publications from a single study, and helps researchers to develop broader skills (Creswell and Plano Clark 2018). However, it should be noted that not all situations justify using mixed methods. There are studies where qualitative research is better because the researcher aims to explore a problem through human interactions, while on the other hand, quantitative research is sometimes better because the researcher seeks to understand the relationship among variables or groups (Creswell and Plano Clark 2018).
What is interdisciplinary research?
Ichimura (1975) discusses that there are four types of single institution interdisciplinary organizations with multiple disciplines housed within. They include: (1) university institutions, which have the best situation because professors are given the maximum freedom to earn extra income through collaborative research, (2) private institutions, which have the largest degree of freedom in allocating funds for their budget under a leadership of responsible directors, (3) intramural research programs, like the Southeast Asia Program at Cornell University, who typically don’t get full credit in their own departments for their interdisciplinary work, and (4) research projects, which are grant funded and flexible in allocating research funds, but also have short-term support and uncertainty.
Ichimura (1975) defines Interdisciplinary research as the interactive cooperation of several disciplines for the purpose of obtaining a broader or deeper understanding of common problems. While traditional single discipline research can be used to adequately analyze problems, Ichimura (1975) believes that combining neighboring disciplines can further analytical studies. This combination parallels conclusions from different departments on the same issue(s) to facilitate understanding of different aspects of the development process. When this collaborative effort is within an institution it is considered interdisciplinary, however, this specific type of research can also be referred to as multidisciplinary if the departments involved in the study cross university or organizational boundaries. An important claim to multidisciplinary collaborations is that they promote innovations (Cummings and Keisler 2005), which Amabile (1988) defines as the successful implementation of creative ideas, tasks, or procedures. Ichimura (1975) goes on to say that the most appropriate way to deal with complex problems is a combination of interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary efforts. Coordination of these collaborative efforts is the link to the different pieces of a project to accomplish a collective task (Van de Ven et al., 1976).
What is bias?
Bias can be conscious, which is when someone is aware of their bias (me and yoga pants), or unconscious (implicit), which is harder to address because they are hidden and a person may not be aware that they exist (Association of American Medical Colleges 2017). In qualitative research, bias can best be seen in the discipline of ethnography and LeCompte (1987) determines that “since the research in ethnography cannot eliminate biographical determinants, the makeup of the researcher is critical to the quality of the work done.” In ethnographic research, the researchers themselves are the tool used for research. Their makeup is critical to the quality of work they produce, thus, their own bias and subjectivity plays a vital role. Because of this, they are held to a higher standard of disciplinary honesty (LeCompte 1987).
LeCompte (1987) discusses that bias comes from two sources, personal experience and professional training.
LeCompte (1987) goes on to say that even the tools we use to write can inflict bias into the research, and was the case when she went from physically writing her notes to typing them.
