Download Content Analysis: Overview of Concepts and Applications

Qualitative Research Methods
Communication Research
Week 12
Who uses qualitative methods?
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Philosophers
Psychologists
Sociologists
Anthropologists
Students of literature
Historians
…anyone who finds the methods of the
physical sciences inappropriate for
understanding human realities
Why qualitative methods?
“Not everything that can be counted counts,
and not everything that counts can be counted.”
… Albert Einstein
Varieties of Qualitative Methods
Sources of data can include:
 One’s own immediate experience
 Other’s experiences that can be
sought to be understood via …
 their speaking or writing
 their other behaviours
 their other products – technology,
artwork, footprints etc
Qualitative Methods
 provide in-depth descriptions
 study things in natural settings
 from the individual’s perspective
 complexity
 in-depth examination of a number of
issues
 contextual
 situational and environmental concerns
specific to people
Myths and Realities of Qualitative
Research
Qualitative research …
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is not as reliable as
takes more time than
does not involve numbers like
is generalisable unlike
is subjective unlike
is not as systematic as
…quantitative research
Why do some researchers prefer
qualitative methods?
 Ethical concerns about manipulation
 Reliance on measurement a concern
 Issue of control in quantitative
methods
 Concern on quantitative tendency to
reductionism
 Concern that experimental methods
are deterministic
Some types of qualitative
research methods
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Historical
Survey
Case Study
Participant Observation
Ethnography
Phenomenological
Interviews
Historical Research
 Studies available data to study, understand, and
interpret past events
 Uses primary, secondary and tertiary data sources
 Art or science?
 Interpretation can change over time and according
to political, social and philosophical perspectives ie
historical revisionism
 was Australia “discovered” or “invaded”?
 C19th Colonialism and the “White Man’s Burden”
Views of history
 History is
 History is
Marx
 History is
 History is
 History is
the record of progress …
the study of class conflict …
bunk … Henry Ford
the story of great figures …
the study of everyday life …
What is history?
“These so-called facts which are the the same for
all historians, commonly belong to the category of
raw materials of the historian rather than of history
itself … The necessity to establish these basic facts
rests not with any quality in the facts themselves,
but on an ‘a priori’ decision of the historian …
What is history? …continued
It used to be said that facts speak for themselves.
This is, of course untrue. The facts speak only when
the historian calls on them: it is he who decides to
which facts to give the floor, and in what order or
context.”… E.H. Carr (1961,5) What is history?
Potential problems of historical
research
 Limited to data already available
 Excessive reliance on secondary sources
 Uncertainty about authenticity and/or
accuracy of sources
 Lack of objectivity
 Need to find patterns/weave a narrative
Case Studies
 Pioneered by Sigmund Freud – case of
Anna O
 Examine the characteristics of a
particular entity, phenomenon, or
person
 Focus is on a single subject or unit
(could be multiple individuals)
 A rich account of a phenomenon not
available by other means
Problems with case studies
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Limited generalisability
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Deep but not broad
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What you see is not always what you get
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Researchers notes may only reflect one reality
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Observer (researcher) bias
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Cause-effect links difficult to validate
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Need for extensive data collection
Ethnographic Research
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studies cultural patterns and perspectives of
participants in their natural settings
 describes and analyses practices and beliefs of
cultures and communities
 guided by theory: anthropology, education,
psychology
 understand the culture from insider and outsider
perspective
 focus on behaviors, ideas, beliefs, knowledge, etc…
Phenomenological Research
 considers how the experience of particular
participants exhibits a unique perspective
 aims to understand and describe an event
from the point of view of the participant
 subjective experience is the centre of the
inquiry
 researcher does not make assumptions
about reality that is outside of the
individual
Unstructured Interviews
 Interaction between researcher and
person(s) of interest
 Guiding questions; but no formal structured
instrument or protocol
 Interviewer moves conversation in direction
of responses
 Need to tape record the interviews
 Consent forms for tape recording
Focus Groups
 group interviews that rely on the
interaction within the group
 designed to elicit more of the participants’
points of view
 interested in how individuals perceive a
problem
Focus Groups
 exchange of ideas of how to interpret key
terms or differences are resolved and
consensus is built
 systematic variation across groups
 variations in:
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ordering of questions
background traits of participants
homogenous groups vs heterogeneous groups
compare responses of individuals who meet
several times
Grounded Theory – Glaser &
Strauss 1960s
 method for developing grounded theory is
based on data that are systematically
gathered and analysed
 theoretical propositions are not stated at
the beginning
 generalisations (theory) comes from the
data and not before data collection
Grounded Theory
 emerging theory is ‘grounded’ in the
current project
 constant comparative method
 researcher interprets the data and uses
it to generate theory
 must verify the hypotheses that emerge
from the study
Key Features of Grounded Theory
 constant interaction with data to
identify possible theories & relate to
the study
 select incidents that seems to reflect
the emerging theory; ask more
questions that will fill in the gaps
 coding techniques to help organize
the information
Finally …general characteristics of
qualitative research...
 Data sources are real-world situations
 Data are descriptive
 Emphasizes a holistic approach (processes and
outcomes)
 Data analysis is inductive
 Describes the meaning(s) of research finding(s)
from the perspective of the research
participants
The general characteristics of
qualitative research...
 Involves developing generalisations from a
limited number of observations or experiences
 Highly dependant upon the representativeness
of the specific observations used to make the
generalisation
The last word on qualitative
methods from a famous researcher…
Anyone who wants to know the human psyche will
learn nothing from experimental psychology. He
would be better advised to abandon exact science,
put away his scholar’s gown, bid farewell to his
study, and wander with human heart through the
world. There in the horror of prisons, lunatic
asylums and hospitals, in drab suburban pubs, in
brothels and gambling hells in the salons of the
elegant …
Last word continued …
…the Stock Exchange, socialist meetings,
churches, revivalist gatherings and ecstatic
sects, through love and hate, through the
experience of passion in every form of his own
body, he would reap richer stores of knowledge
than text books a foot thick could give him,
and he will know how to doctor the sick with
the real knowledge of the human soul. …Carl
Jung