Qualitative Techniques

Damian Gordon

Outline

Ethnography Ethnomethodology Autoethnography Phenomenology Reality Testing Constructionism/Constructivism Heuristic Enquiry Symbolic Interaction Action Research Grounded Theory Case Study Biography Conversation Analysis Narrative Inquiry Content Analysis Q Methodology

Ethnography

Key Question What is the culture of this group of people?

Disciplinary roots Anthropology

Focus Describing and interpreting a cultural and social group

Data Collection Primarily observations and interviews with additional artifacts during extended time in the field (e.g., 6 months to a year)

Data Analysis •Description•Analysis•Interpretation

Narrative Focus Description of the cultural behavior of a group or an individual

Ethnomethodology

Key Question How do people make sense of their everyday activities so as to behave in socially acceptable ways?

Disciplinary roots

Sociology

Autoethnography

Key Question How does my own experience of this culture connect with and offer insights about this culture, situation, event and/or way of life?

Disciplinary roots

Literary Arts

Phenomenology

Key Question What is the meaning, structure, and the essence of the lived experience of this phenomenon for this person or group of people?

Disciplinary roots Philosophy

Focus Understanding the essence of experiences about a phenomenon

Data Collection Long interviews with up to 10 people

Data Analysis •Statements•Meanings•Meaning themes•General description of the experience

Narrative Focus Description of the “essence” of the experience

Reality Testing: Positivist and Realist Approaches

Key Question What’s really going on in the real world? What can we establish with some degree of certainty? What are the plausible explanations for verifiable patterns? What’s the truth insofar as we can get at it? How can we study a phenomenon so that our findings correspond, as much as possible, to the real world?

Disciplinary roots

Philosophy, Social Sciences, and Evaluation

Constructionism/Constructivism

Key Question How have the people in this setting constructed reality? What are their reported perceptions, “truths”, explanations, beliefs, and worldview? What are the consequences of their constructions for their behaviours and for those with whom they interact?

Disciplinary roots

Sociology

Heuristic Inquiry

Key Question What is my experience of this phenomenon and the essential experience of others who also experience this phenomenon intensely?

Disciplinary roots

Humanistic Psychology

Symbolic Interaction

Key Question What common set of symbols and understandings have emerged to give meaning to people’s interactions?

Disciplinary roots

Social Psychology

Action Research and Participatory Action Research

Key Question X

Disciplinary roots

X

Grounded Theory

Key Question Can we develop a set of flexible analytic guidelines that enable researchers to focus their data collection and to build inductive middle-range theories through successive levels of data analysis and conceptual development?

Disciplinary roots Sociology

Focus Developing a theory grounded in data from the field

Data Collection Interviews with 20-30 individuals to “saturate” categories and detail a theory

Data Analysis •Open coding•Axial coding•Selective coding•Conditional matrix

Narrative Focus Theory or theoretical model

Case Study

Key Question X

Disciplinary roots Political science, Sociology, and Education

Focus Developing on in-depth analysis of a single case of multiple cases

Data Collection Multiple sources – documents, archival records, interviews, observations, physical artifacts

Data Analysis •Description•Themes•Assertions

Narrative Focus In-depth study of a “case” or “cases”

Biography

Key Question X

Disciplinary roots

History, Anthropology, Literature, Psychology, and Sociology

Focus Exploring the life of individual

Data Collection Primarily interviews and Documents

Data Analysis •Stories•Epiphanies•Historical content

Narrative Focus Detailed picture of on individual’s life

Conversation Analysis

Key Question What is the orderliness, structure and sequential patterns of interaction, whether this is institutional (in the school, doctor's surgery, courts or elsewhere) or casual conversation?

Disciplinary roots

Narrative Inquiry

Key Question Can we discuss the situation are a story including setting, complicating action and resolution?

Disciplinary roots

Content Analysis

Key Question Who says what, to whom, why, to what extent and with what effect?

Disciplinary roots

Social Sciences

Q Methodology

Key Question What factors can be seen as correlations between subjects across a sample of variables?

Disciplinary roots

Factor Analysis