RESEARCH DESIGN: Qualitative and quantITATIVE

RESEARCH DESIGN: Qualitative and quantITATIVE BUSN 364 – Week 6 Özge 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 and Quantitative Research • Differences between qualitative and quantitative research approaches in terms of: 1) Nature of data 2) Assumptions of social life 3) What are we trying to accomplish in a study 4) Type of “logic” and research path 5) Researcher characteristics 6) Type of question

1) Nature of Data Qualitative Research Quantitative Research 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

2) Assumptions of Social Life Qualitative Research Quantitative Research 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

3) What We Want to Accomplish? Qualitative Research Quantitative Research • 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

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

5) The Researcher Qualitative Research Quantitative Research • 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

6) Questions Asked Qualitative Research Quantitative Research • 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

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: Hypotheses Logic 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 CausalExplanation

Potential Errors in CausalExplanation • 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 CausalExplanation • Spuriousness: An apparent causal relationship is illusionary due to the effect of an unseen, hidden causal factor • Example:

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 –Wednesday O 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 economicself-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 controllaws 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.

RESEARCH DESIGN: Qualitative and quantITATIVE