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Qualitative and Quantitative. Qualitative and quantitative Orientation. Both have their own strength. They differ in many ways but they complement each other.
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Qualitative and quantitative Orientation • Both have their own strength. They differ in many ways but they complement each other. • Qual and quant researcher hold different assumptions about social life and have different objectives—thus tools used by other style inappropriate or irrelevant.
Nature of data • Qual—soft data; in the form of impression, words, sentences, photos, symbols, etc. • Quant—hard data; in the form of numbers.
Technocratic and Transcendent perspective • Quant-- technocratic perspective; fits with positivism; the researcher is the expert, and research questions often originate with the sponsors of the research. • The goal is to discover and document generalizations. It is the perspective of a technician who serves bureaucratic needs. Gather data to resolve problems defined by the paradigm.
Qual--transcendent (metaphysic/ paranormal / etc.) perspective; fits with the interpretive and critical approaches. Research questions originate with the standpoint of the people being studied, not that of outsiders. • The goal is to remove false beliefs held by those being studied and to treat people as creative living things, not as objects. • Ask critical theoretical and political questions (eg. Who benefits?)
Reconstructed logic and logic in practice • The way social researchers learn and discuss research usually follows one of two logic. Most will mix two logics but the proportion of each varies. • Quant—apply more reconstructed logic—the logic of how to do research is highly organised and restated in an idealised, formal and systematic form.
It reconstructed into logically consistent rules and terms. Eg. The rules for conducting a simple random sample are very straightforward and follow a step-by step procedure. • This reconstructed logic is easier to define and learn from books or formal instructions
Qual—apply logic in practice, the logic of how research is actually carried out. • It is messy, more ambiguity and tied to specific cases and oriented toward the practical completion of a task. • Has fewer set rules. The logic is based on judgment calls or norms shared among experienced researchers—depends on informal folk wisdom passed among researchers.
Many qualitative researchers learned how to do research by reading many reports, by trial and error, and by working in an apprentice role with an experienced researcher. • But this does not mean that qual research is less valid, however, it may be more difficult for someone learning about it for the first time.
Linear and non linear paths • The path is the metaphor for the sequence of things to do—what is finished first or where a researcher has been, and what come next or where he is going. • Quant– follow a more linear path than qual. • A linear research path follows a fixed sequence of steps.
A linear path, is a way of looking at issues—direct, narrow, straight path is most common in western European and North American culture
Qual—is more nonlinear and cyclical. • More of a spiral moving slowly upward but not directly, with each cycle/repetition, a researcher collects new data and gains new insights • From a strict linear perspective, a cyclical path looks inefficient and sloppy.
But the cyclical approach can be highly effective for creating a feeling for a whole, grasping subtle shades of meaning, pulling together divergent info and for switching perspectives • It is oriented towards constructing meaning • A cyclical path suitable for task such as translating languages, where delicate shades of meaning, subtle connotations, or contextual distinction can be important.
‘circularity is one of the strengths of the approach, because it forces the researcher to permanently reflect on the whole research process and on particular steps in light of the other steps’ (Flick, 1998:43)
Objectivity and integrity • Opportunity for being biased, dishonest, or unethical exist in all research. • All social researchers want to be fair, honest, truthful, and unbiased in their research activity. • Qual and quant emphasize different ways to ensure honest, truthful research
Qual emphasize the human factor and the intimate firsthand knowledge; avoid distancing themselves from the people or events they study. • This does not mean being sloppy about data collection, or using evidence selectively to support personal prejudices. • Conversely, it means taking advantage of personal insight, feelings, and human perspectives to understand social life more fully.
Researcher makes his presence explicit • In place of ‘objective’ technique, the qual researcher is open about his personal involvement--Emphasized trustworthiness as a parallel to objective standard in quant research design. • To ensure the research is dependable and credible the researcher accurately reflects the evidence and have checks on the evidence
Eg. The field researcher listen to and records a students who says “Prof. Smith threw an eraser at Prof. Jones”. • The researcher treats this evidence carefully. • To strengthen the claim, researcher consider what other people say, look for confirming evidence, and checks for internal consistency—ask the student’s firsthand knowledge of the event—and whether the student’s feelings or self-interest would lead him to lie (may be they like/dislike Prof. Smith for other reasons)
Although the student made a false statement, it is evidence about student’s perspective. • Another check is the great volume of detailed written notes the researcher records—detailed verbatim description of evidence, notes include references to the sources, commentaries by the researcher and key terms to help organize the notes, as well as quotes, photographs, maps, diagrams, paraphrasing, etc.
Though qual researcher work alone others know about the evidence—the subject being observed can read details of the study; historical documents are cited and other researchers can check references and sources. • Qual research raises questions of bias, but at the same time provides a sense of immediacy, direct contact, and intimate knowledge.
While qual stress on integrity, quant emphasized on objectivity and more ‘mechanical’ techniques. • Use principle of replication, adhere to standardized methodological procedures, measure with numbers, and analyze data with statistics. • Quant research eliminates the human factor—objectivity means rule of law, not of men. It implies the subordination of personal interests and prejudices to public standards.
Preplanned and emergent research questions • Qual and quant researcher tend to adopt different approaches to turn a topic to a focused research question to a specific study. • Qual start with vague or unclear research questions; the topic emerges slowly during the study; often combine focusing on a specific question with the process of deciding the details of study design that occurs while they are gathering data.
Qual style is flexible and encourages slowly focusing the topic throughout a study. • Qual researcher begins data gathering with a general topic and notions of what will be relevant—focusing and refining continues after he gathered some of the data and started preliminary analysis.
Qual use early data collection to guide how they adjust and sharpen the research question(s) because they rarely know the most important issues or questions until after they become fully immersed in the data.
Qual researcher is open to unanticipated data and constantly reevaluates the focus early in a study. He is prepared to change the direction of research and follow new lines of evidence. • Typical research questions for qual include: how did a certain condition or social situation originate? How is the condition/situation maintained over time? What are the process by which a condition changes, develops, or operates?
Quant researcher narrow topic into a focused question as a separate planning step before they finalize study design—use it as a step in the process of developing a testable hypothesis, and to guide a study design before they collect any data. • Quant researcher focus on a specific research problem within a broad topic.
Eg. Labour union as a topic, not a research question/problem. • Before proceeding to design a research project, narrow and focus the topic. Eg. of research question, ‘how much did US labour unions contribute to racial inequality by creating barriers to skilled jobs for African Americans in the post WWII period?’
When starting research, ask yourself, ‘what is it about the topic that is of greatest interest? • Research question refer to the relationships among a small number of variables and specify the relationships among them. • ‘what cause divorce’ is not a good research question; ‘is age at marriage associated with divorce?’ is a better one.
When refining research question consider the practical limitation: time, costs, access to resources, approval by authorities, ethical concerns, and expertise.
In sum…The Assumptions of Qualitative Designs • Qualitative researchers are concerned primarily with process, rather than outcomes or products. • Qualitative researchers are interested in meaninghow people make sense of their lives, experiences, and their structures of the world. • The qualitative researcher is the primary instrumentfor data collection and analysis. Data are mediated through this human instrument, rather than through inventories, questionnaires, or machines.
Qualitative research involves fieldwork. The researcher physically goes to the people, setting, site, or institution to observe or record behavior in its natural setting. • Qualitative research is descriptive in that the researcher is interested in process, meaning, and understanding gained through words or pictures. • The process of qualitative research is inductive in that the researcher builds abstractions, concepts, hypotheses, and theories from details.
Arguments Supporting Qualitative Inquiry • Human behavior is significantly influenced by the setting in which it occurs; thus one must study that behavior in situations. The physical settinge.g., schedules, space, pay, and rewardsand the internalized notions of norms, traditions, roles, and values are crucial contextual variables. Research must be conducted in the setting where all the contextual variables are operating. • Past researchers have not been able to derive meaning...from experimental research.
The research techniques themselves, in experimental research, [can]...affect the findings. The lab, the questionnaire, and so on, [can]...become artifacts. Subjects [can become]...either suspicious and wary, or they [can become]...aware of what the researchers want and try to please them. Additionally, subjects sometimes do not know their feelings, interactions, and behaviors, so they cannot articulate them to respond to a questionnaire.
One cannot understand human behavior without understanding the framework within which subjects interpret their thoughts, feelings, and actions. Researchers need to understand the framework. In fact, the "objective " scientist, by coding and standardizing, may destroy valuable data while imposing her world on the subjects. • Field study research can explore the processes and meanings of events.
Contrasting Positivist and Naturalist Axioms (Beliefs and Assumptions)
Strengths of Qualitative Research • Depth and detail--may not get as much depth in a standardized questionnaire • Openness--can generate new theories and recognize phenomena ignored by most or all previous researchers and literature • Helps people see the world view of those studies--their categories, rather than imposing categories; simulates their experience of the world
Attempts to avoid pre-judgments (although some recent quals disagree here--we always make judgments, but just don't admit it--choice of one location or group over another is a judgment)--goal is to try to capture what is happening w/o being judgmental; present people on their own terms, try to represent them from their perspectives so reader can see their views, always imperfectly achieved--it is a quest.
Weaknesses of Qualitative Research • - Fewer people studied usually • - Less easily generalized as a result • - Difficult to aggregate data and make systematic comparisons • - Dependent upon researcher's personal attributes and skills (also true with quantitative, but not as easy to evaluate their skills in conducting research with qual) • - Participation in setting can always change the social situation (although not participating can always change the social situation as well)
