Week 3 Flashcards
Interpretivism
An approach that highlights the importance to understand the beliefs, motives and actions of individuals in order to understand reality
Qualitative genres or frameworks
Phenomenology Ethnography Grounded Theory Narrative Inquiry Action research Pragmatism and generic qualitative inquiry
Phenomenology
Aim is to provide rich descriptions of experience as it is lived
Researcher reduces data gathered as lengthy interviews, describing the shared experiences of several informants to a central meaning or essence of an experience
Ethnography
Aim is to describe and interpret a culture or its subgroups
The ethnographic method usually involves observation and note taking
Grounded theory
Aim is to explore social processes and to generate explanatory theories of human behaviour which are grounded in the data
Data collection and analysis occur simultaneously. Analysis includes constant comparison and systematic coding, which leads to identification of the core social processes and development of an exploratory theory based on the data
Narrative inquiry
Aim is to understand meaning individuals give to experiences
“How can this narrative be interpreted to understand and illuminate the life and culture that created it?”
Action research
Aim is to change something through systematic cycles of action and reflection
“How can we better understand a specific phenomena and change the context in which this phenomena happens alongside the local stakeholder?”
Pragmatism and generic qualitative inquiry
To strive for practical understandings and wisdom about concrete, real-world issues. For pragmatists, findings that carry no practical value are meaningless precisely because they are useless
“What are the practical consequences and useful applications of what we can learn about this issue or problem?”
Qualitative data collection methods
Naturalistic observation - observation of individuals in their natural environments
Physical and virtual documentary sources - books, websites, policy documents
Interviews - can be done in various ways, different degrees of structure, conducted individually or as a group and lasts for 45-60mins
Trustworthiness of qualitative data
Credibility
Dependability
Confirmability
Transferability
Credibility
Do the study conclusions ring true for the people studied? Want participants to react to the study’s findings like: “that’s right, but I hadn’t thought about it in that way”
Dependability
Are the observations dependable? External checks must make the researchers process trackable
Confirmability
Are the conclusions the result of the phenomenon under study rather than the biases of the researcher? Data must be traceable to their sources
transferability
Researchers aim to provide a detailed description of the setting or group under study - if the researcher has successfully provided a rich description, readers can judge for themselves whether and how the analysis is relevant to them.
