RESEARCH DESIGN: QUALİTATİVE AND QUANTITATIVE

BUSN 364 – Week 6Özge Can

Research Activities:

Read article: “Bilim Ortamı Olmadan Bilim Olmaz” by Dogan Kuban Available at Course webpage – Reading

Materials

Read article: “Science in America: Decline and Fall” Available at Course webpage – Reading

Materials

Triangulation

Triangulation: We learn more by observing from multiple perspectives than by looking from only a single one

Improves the accuracy of the research

Triangulation

Triangulation of measures: Taking multiple measures of the same phenomena

Triangulation of observers: Multiple observers/ researchers bring a fuller picture of a phenomenon

Triangulation of theory: Using multiple theories to plan a study or interpret data. Each has certain assumpitons and concepts

Triangulation of method: Mixes the qualitative and quantitative research approaches and data. The research becomes richer and more comprehensive.

Triangulation: Examples

Research Topic: The amount of violence in popular American films

Measures: The frequency (number of killings, punches), intensity (volume and length of time screaming, amound of pain in face and body), level of explicit graphic display (showing a corpse wtih blood flowing, close-ups of injury) in films

Observers: Have five different people independently watch, evaluate and record forms and degrees of violence in a set of 10 highly popular American films

Triangulation: Examples

Theory: Compare how feminist theory, functional theory and symbolic interaction theory explain the forms, causes and societal results of violence that is in popular films

Method: Conduct a content analysis of 10 popular films As an experiment, measure the responses of experimental

subjects to violence in each film Survey attitudes toward film violence among the public Make a field observation on audience behavior during and

immediately after watching the films

Quantitative vs. Qualitative Research

Qualitative Research

Research Aspect Quantitative Research

Discover ideas;Used in exploratory research with general research topics

Common Purpose Hypothesis testing;Specific research questions

Observe and interpret Focus Measure and test

Unstructures, flexible Data Collection Approach Structured, standard

Researcher highly involvedResults are subjective

Researcher Researcher uninvolvedResults are objective

Few cases, natural settings Samples Many cases, attaining generalizability

Exploratory and descriptive research

Most often used for: Descriptive and explanatory research

Quantitative vs. Qualitative Research

Qualitative and Quantitative Research

Differences between qualitative and quantitative research approaches in terms of:1) Nature of data2) Assumptions of social life3) What are we trying to accomplish in

a study4) Type of “logic” and research path5) Researcher characteristics6) Type of question

1) Nature of Data

Soft data: Words, sentences,

photos, symbols

Data collection methods:

Field research, interview, natural observation, historical comparative research

Hard data: Numbers

Data collection methods:

Experiment, survey, existing statistics (secondary data), content analysis

Qualitative Research Quantitative Research

2) Assumptions of Social Life

Interpretive perspective:

Use a language of “cases and contexts” and of cultural meaning

Emphasis on conducting detailed examinations of specific cases in the natural flow of social life

Positivist perspective:

Use a language of variables and hypotheses

Emphasis on precisely measuring variables and testing hypotheses

Qualitative Research Quantitative Research

3) What We Want to Accomplish?

We describe details of a mechanism or process for a limites set of cases

We often generate new hypotheses (and theories) => induction

We focus on an outcome or effect that is found across many cases

We try to verify or falsify a relationship (hypothesis testing) we already have in mind => deduction

Qualitative Research Quantitative Research

4) Type of “Logic” and Path of the Research

Implicit knowledge from practical activities, specific experiences, individual “judgment calls”

Nonlinear path: research proceeds a cyclical, iterative, back-and-forth pattern

Organizing, standardizing, codifying knowledge and practices into explicit rules, formal procedures techniques

Linear path: research procees in a clear, logical, step-by-step straight line

Qualitative Research Quantitative Research

5) The Researcher

Emphasis on researcher’s: openness and integrity

Validation: Self-discipline and trustworthiness. Researcher takes maximum advantage of personal insights, and life pescpectives

Intimate, first-hand knowledge of a setting

Emphasis on researcher’s: neutrality and objectivity

Validation: Replication, explicit standard procedures, numerical measurement, anayzing the data with statistics (similar to natural sciences)

Objective knowledge

Qualitative Research Quantitative Research

6) Questions Asked

Mostly starts with a vague or loosely defined topic. Specific topic emerges slowly during the study; it may change with new data

High flexibility: questions become clear only after we become immersed in the data

A topic is narrowed into a focused question in the very beginning before we design the study and collect data

Research questions refer to relationships among a small number of variables

Qualitative Research Quantitative Research

Research Question

Both approaches work well with some topics:

E.g. Poverty. You can study poverty by examining official

statistics, conducting a survey, doing ethnographic field research or completing a historical comparative analysis

But some topics are best suited for qualitative and others best suited for quantitative research

Research Question

Typical qualitative questions: How did a certain condition or social

situation originate? How do people, events, and conditions

sustain over time? By what processes does the situation

change, develop or end?

Typical quantitative questions: Associations, relations “Is age at marriage associated with

divorce?”

Ways to Select a Research Topic:

Personal experience, everyday life and personal values

State of knowledge in the field Social premiums; curiosity based on

media Solving a problem

How to Narrow the Topic into a Research Question:

Examine the literature Published articles are excellent sources of ideas for

research questions. They provide lots of suggestions Talk over ideas with others

Ask people who are knowledgeable about the topic; seek out others’ opinions

Apply a specific context Focus on a specific time period, society, catgeory,

subgroup or geographic unit Define the aim or desired outcome of the

study Is it an exploratory, descriptive or explanatory stdudy?

Good and Bad Research Questions

Quantitative Design: Variables Variable: Empirical measure of a concept

that can take multiple values Attributes: Categories or levels of a

variable

For Example: gender is a variable; male is an attribute marital status is a variable; married is

an attribute

Quantitative Design: Variables Independent Variable: Variable that

produces an effect or result on the dependent variable in a causal hypothesis

Dependent Variable: The effect or result variable that is caused by the independent variable

Intervening (Mediating) Variable: Comes logically or temporally after independent variable and before dependent variable; helps to show the link or mechanism between them

Quantitative Design: Hypotheses

Causal Hypothesis: Statement of a causal explanation or proposition that at least one dependent and one independent variable and yet to be empirically tested

Characteristics of causal hypotheses: At least 2 variables (dependent and independent) Expresses a cause-effect relationship Can be expressed as a prediction Logical link between hypothesis and theory Falsifiable

Quantitative Design: HypothesesLogic of Disconforming (“Falsification”): Testing for

no relationship provides more cautious support for possible existence of a relationship. Negative, disconforming evidence is more significant.

*We never prove a hypothesis; but we can disprove it!

Null Hypothesis: states that there is no significant effect

of the independent variable on the dependent.

Alternative Hypothesis: paired with the null hypothesis

stating that there is a significant effect

Potential Errors in Causal Explanation

Potential Errors in Causal Explanation

Potential Errors in Causal Explanation

Reductionism: An error in explanation in which empirical data about associations among small-scale units of analysis are greatly overgenralized

Example: Did World War I really occur because a Serbian shot an archduke in the Austria-Hungarian Empire in 1914?

Potential Errors in Causal Explanation

Spuriousness: An apparent causal relationship is illusionary due to the effect of an unseen, hidden causal factor

Example:

Potential Errors in Causal Explanation

Exam Content:

Textbook – Chapters 1, 2, 3, 4 and 6 Major topics that we have covered:

Science and scientific method (week 3) How does science differ from other ways

of knowing (week 3) Theory; elements of theory (concepts

and relations), direction of theorizing (deduction and induction), causal explanations (week 4)

Exam Content:

(con’td): Three major approaches to science:

Positivist, intepretive and critical (week 4)

Five dimensions of research; major types of research (week 5)

The difference between quantitative and qualitative research approaches; research question and topic; hypotheses (week 6)

Exam Format:

Multiple choices (%50) Short essay questions based on 2-3

research cases (%50)

Exam Date:April 3, 2013 –WednesdayO 001- O 002

Example Questions

Which concept has the HIGHEST level of abstraction; i.e., it is the most abstract?

A) racial injustice

B) years of education attained

C) the size of a city’s population

D) a murder

Example Questions

A researcher needs all of the following to make a casual statement, EXCEPT:

A) temporal order.

B) elimination of alternative explanation.

C) association.

D) mathematical proof.

Example Questions

Which of the following is NOT an example of quantitative research?

A) surveys

B) content analysis

C) historical-comparative research

D) experiments

Example Questions

According to interpretative social science, human beings are:

A) beings with great potential who are trapped by illusion and exploitation.

B) self-interested and rational beings who are largely shaped by outside forces.

C) slaves full of unrealized potential who are waiting for emancipation.

D) meaning-creating beings who attempt to make sense of the world around them.

Example Questions

Which of the following is a characteristic of quantitative research design?

A) Researchers begin by developing hypotheses then they test them using empirical data.

B) Researchers ignore past research studies on their topic so that their work can be original.

C) Researchers never attempt to replicate their findings in a diverse social setting.

D) Researchers develop measurement tools during the data collection phase.

Example Questions

What is the independent variable in the following hypothesis? “Persons who experience economic deprivation during socialization will place a higher priority on economic self-interest later in life than will people who did not experience economic deprivation during socialization.”

A) later life

B) persons

C) priority of economic self-interest

D) economic deprivation

Example Questions

A recent article on the topic of gun control legislation argued that those who said they oppose gun control laws do so because they have a negative attitude towards laws controlling guns. The problem with the article is

A) ecological fallacy.

B) tautology.

C) teleology.

D) spurious statement.