Chapter+Six+-+Qualitative+Research

=Chapter Six: Qualitative Research=

The purpose of this chapter is to provide a discussion of various approaches to qualitative research. As with the previous chapter on quantitative research designs, each approach should address specific aspects of sampling and data collection. In addition, a mention should be made of suggested methods of data analysis based on the type of data collected.

1. An Overview
Qualitative research is research based on non-numerical data. There are several types of data you can collect, be it words, pictures, etc. There are 4 different types of qualitative research: 1. __Phenomology__ - Describing one of more individuals' experiences of a phenomenon. (e.g. How do students handle the death of a parent or caregiver?) 2. __Ethnography__ - Describe the cultural characteristics of a group of people. (e.g. Why do African-American students feel more pressure on tests than Caucasian students?) 3. __Case Study__ - Describe one or more cases in-depth and address research questions and issues. (e.g. Why does student finish none of his work in class, but scores 100's on state standard tests?) 4. __Grounded Theory__ - Inductively generate a grounded theory describing a phenomenon. (e.g. Why do students perform better when there is a class clown in the room?)

Because of the type of analysis required of qualitative data, research reports for this type of research are usually quite large in comparison to quantitative research.

2. Ethnographic Designs
__Ethnographic method__ - the intensive study of a particular society and culture as the basis for generating anthropological theory. __Ethnography__ - the major research tool of cultural anthropology; includes both fieldwork among people in society and the written results of fieldwork. Writing careful observations of a culture, from within that culture, is a key tool of the ethnographer. Data collection centers on shared values, beliefs, or norms. Carefully observing to find the patterns that define what people in the culture actually do rather than what they say they do is a lengthy process that requires dedication and skill. The emic perspective is how the people within the culture view themselves. The etic perspective is the view of the researcher looking from outside the culture to within to identify and interpret the behaviors of the culture. Both perspectives are included in ethnographic studies.
 * Definitions: **

A special branch of ethnography involves the study of cultural groups within the educational setting. These researchers are called educational ethnographers. For example, the study of the culture of middle schoolers would be an area of interest to this branch of ethnography. Ethnographic studies can be conducted on small scale cultural groups, like third grade girls in a particular school or even a particular teacher's classroom, as well as large scale cultural groups, like Asian-Americans. In studying the girls in a particular classroom, a micro-culture, the ethnographer might be trying to analyze why students in this classroom become high achievers in math. The shared values, beliefs, and norms of both the students and the teacher would be collected and analyzed to find patterns and to generate hypotheses. The ethnographer could frame many questions around the study to try to determine the pattern of high math achievement. These questions could include: What motivates the students? What values about math do they espouse? What values do they share about being in this classroom? What norms does the teacher and students buy into while in this class? How do the teacher's interactions with the students promote this positive attitude and achievement in math? Is one math strategy being used, or multiple strategies? As the ethnographer studies this cultural group, new questions could arise in response to the data. The hypotheses generated by educational ethnographers can often be used to replicate the conditions in other classrooms and to study the effects of the strategies in another culture. __Ethnology__ - comparative statements about cultural and social processes that are based on cross-cultural ethnographic data. __Ethnocentrism__ - Judging other cultures from the perspective of one’s own culture. The notion that one’s own culture is more beautiful, rational, and nearer to perfection that any other. For those of us who are interested in ethnographic design studies, we have to keep in mind that we are merely outsiders taking a peek into another groups’ way of life. When studying groups of people other than our own, we need to make sure that we are accepted into the group we want to study, protect them from risk as to not influence or interfere with their way of life, and respect their privacy and dignity. No matter how much we try to live among the groups’ culture, enculturation will be difficult to establish because we were not born into the groups’ dynamics. We simply have to learn by assimilation and respect the group’s ideology. Our ethnocentrism should not play any role when studying other cultures or else our research will be biased. Therefore, the ethnographic research will be a waste and not serve any purpose. When we receive students from other countries, sometimes our ethnocentrism unconsciously awakens because we are experiencing something new. As teachers, we sometimes feel that we overstep our boundaries because we do not understand the child’s culture. If we only put ourselves in the child’s shoes, imagine how their perception of our culture is. Even cultures within cultures of similar ethnic groups can be different. Not all Anglos, African/Americans, Hispanics/Latinos, Native Americans, etc. are the same. We cannot assume that because we all live in the United States, we all live the same. Ethnography study has many approaches and by rule of thumb, we have to respect every culture’s way of life.

3. Teacher Research
Action research has become an accepted branch of teacher research that can lead to a state of mind focusing on reflecting on the practice of teaching as a way to improve. It is also a way to bring an element of science into the art of teaching. Furthermore, teacher research, builds a body of research that can be shared with other educators.  In action research the data is collected for the use of the person conducting the research (the teacher). The sample is usually the teacher’s students, but can also be parent, colleagues, or administration. Analyzing the data is usually a process; a teacher can adjust or change methods in order to collect information that adequately addresses their questions.

4. Other Designs
__Case study__ as a design for research can provide in-depth analysis of a bounded system such as a specific process, event, or person. Some of the purposes for case studies may include: giving detailed description of a case, providing explanations for phenomena surrounding the case, or providing evaluation. The benefit of using case study as a design includes the fact that the observations occur in real-life contexts rather than artificial lab settings.

When choosing to use case study as a research design, you may choose to do an //intrinsic case study// (to understand a specific case), an //instrumental case study// (to come to a more generalized understanding), or a //collective case study// (using multiple cases).

Usually the methodology used in a case study relies on multiple measures such as observations, interviews, and questionnaires. The analysis of the case will use this data to construct a holistic picture of the person, event, or process. Sometimes, such as in cross-case analysis, multiple cases will be used in order to triangulate the data and formulate conclusions.

It is important to keep in mind however, that case studies are usually viewed as having limited generalizability since context is so heavily emphasized in data collection, methodology, and results. In spite of this lack of generalizability, case studies can be useful for describing and explaining how a particular intervention has worked in a particular case. Because the case study involves one person or a very small set of people, the researcher is able to examine an intervention in depth. The research report can be useful to special education teachers or counselors, for example, who use the information to help them decide whether to try the intervention elsewhere. __Historical research__ is another method of research that involves quite a bit of qualitative data. Historical research is a procedure supplementary to observations in which the researcher seeks to test the authenticity of the reports or observations made by others. The researcher collects data from written sources like newspapers, diaries, personal notes, bills of sale, etc. Data is also gathered by observing concrete objects such as relics and artifacts. Anything can be included as long as it fits what is being researched and is authentic. The purpose of historical research is to understand an event or person from the past and understand why things were that way. There is limited generalizability to this type of study because the research focuses on a particular period of time. Causal relationships are weak because this is not an experimental design. Still, understanding our past should help us make better present-day decisions, so this type of research is more than just interesting, but is also useful. There are several steps to follow when conducting historical research. They include: 1) Isolating the problem 2) Collecting source materials, including primary and secondary sources 3) Evaluate source material 4) Formulate hypotheses 5) Report and interpret findings

Before obtaining primary and secondary sources, it is a good idea to search some preliminary sources for good ideas of useful items to include in your study. For example, historical societies keep lists of sources that can help point you in the right direction. Bibliographies and indices from reports, books, and articles are some other good preliminary sources. Sometimes, websites can be used as preliminary sources. Doing a search of the Internet may land you on some websites that cannot be validated for accuracy but still may give you ideas of sources to seek out. Although Wikipedia has a reputation for being unreliable, due to the fact that anyone can add to it or edit it, I have found it helpful many times using it as a preliminary source.

5. Qualitative Data Analysis
Qualitative Data Analysis is a branch of research methodology. The two pioneers in qualitative data analysis Matthew Miles and Michael Huberman have come a long way with this new research methodology but much more is still missing. Because of the lack of information about qualitative data analysis, researchers will respond by writing more in the future on how to conduct qualitative research data analysis. According to the authors, they will provide us the terminology, show the basics, and discuss the use of computer software in the analysis of qualitative data.

When using qualitative research designs a researcher is usually faced with having pages and pages of data (observations, interviews, field notes). The first thing a researcher must do is called “data reduction.” In this process, data must be organized into categories or themes. The researcher(s) will decide which data to highlight, minimize, or set aside for the purposes of their study. It is important for reliability purposes that researchers use tools like rubrics or set themes that will guide the analysis of the data. After “data reduction” a researcher must then display the data (e.g. flow charts) in a way that is organized and so that clear conclusions can be drawn from the data collected. John V. Seidel explains qualitative data analysis as a process of noticing, collecting, and thinking about interesting things. This is a process that is repeated over and over as you gain understanding of your object of study. This process applies whether you are doing thematic analysis, content analysis, or some other type of analysis of your data. If you wish to learn more about his explanation, go to ftp://ftp.qualisresearch.com/pub/qda.pdf.

5.1 Thematic Analysis
Thematic Analysis is an approach to dealing with data that involves the creation and application of codes to data. The data being analyzed might take any form such as: an interview transcript, field notes, policy documents, photographs, and video footage. There is a clear link between this type of data analysis and Grounded Theory. Many Computer Assisted Qualitative Data Analysis (CAQDAS) packages are designed to include thematic coding. After ethnographic Interviews are used to collect qualitative data, researchers must interpret this information. Thematic analysis is one way to analyze participants’ experiences gathered through conversations or therapy sessions. The use of thematic analysis aids in identifying common themes or patterns present in people’s living or behavior. Once the themes are recognized, the researcher classifies all the data that pertains to each specific pattern or theme. The next step on a thematic analysis is to combine connected patterns into sub-themes. Themes give a better understanding of participants’ experiences which could seem meaningless when viewed as isolated pieces of information. The researcher’s rigorous analysis is vital in linking pieces together that will generate a comprehensive picture of people’s experiences or behaviors. This process leads to emerging patterns that the researcher shares with the participants in order to get their feedback. This feedback can be used during the interview to establish the next question or after the information has been collected and then it is incorporated in the thematic analysis. Finally, the researcher must determine the validity of such themes. This process is done by evaluating related literature.

5.2 Grounded Theory
===Grounded theory is a methodology used for generating and developing theories or explanations from the data collected during a research study. There are different philosophies explaining grounded theory, but most follow the same basic approach to research. Most theorists agree it includes collecting and analyzing data, and while the theory is being developed, collecting and analyzing more data to help clarify, generate, and validate the theory. Barney Glaser and Anselm Strauss, two sociologists, wrote a book in 1967 explaining how theory should emerge inductively from data which is systematically gathered and analyzed. Glaser and Strauss wanted to combat the trend in their field of focusing on theory confirmation (testing hypotheses based on previous theories) and instead focus more on generation and construction (developing new theories grounded in new data). They believed a grounded theory had four crucial characteristics: fit, understanding, generality, and control. First, the theory must fit or match the data to be useful. Theory must correspond closely to real-world data, not to our personal wishes or biases. The theory must also be stated clearly and understandably to people inside and outside the research field. Next, the theory should not be so specific that it only applies to a small set of people or to a specific situation. Finally, if one uses a theory, he/she should have some control over the phenomenon explained by the theory. Development of a grounded theory is therefore a never-ending process. ===

Grounded theory is generally reported as a narrative (story about the people and places involved in the study) or through a model that shows how categories relate and interact with each other. According to “The Grounded Theory Institute” website (http://www.groundedtheory.com/), grounded theory can be used with either qualitative or quantitative data. 

5.3 Content Analysis
Content Analysis is a methodology for studying the content of communication. It is most often used by researchers to analyze recorded transcripts of interviews with participants. Content analysis is a way of analyzing data that does not have a specific format but is driven by the data itself. It can be used in various types of research designs and can also be a design on its own. Content analysis is done in order to analyze changes or trends in attitudes or perceptions. All research involves creative thinking but this type of analysis is especially creative as you are thinking “outside the box.” You look for patterns in the data in an atypical way. For example, in a newspaper, rather than analyzing specific content of articles, you might look at the amount of space given to a particular issue over time. The basic steps of content analysis include:
 * Deciding on the research question and objectives
 * Defining key terms and specifying what is being analyzed
 * Finding or generating useful data
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Times, serif;">Creating a rationale and sampling plan
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Times, serif;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Times, serif;">Developing detailed categories

<span style="font-family: 'Arial Black', Gadget, sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Times, serif;">In conducting content analysis, it is important to decide what you are looking for and what data you need to seek. Otherwise, you could be on an interesting investigative adventure without coming to any conclusions. You will draw conclusions based on the patterns you find. What you actually find in the data is called the manifest content. The meaning behind what you find is called the latent content. For example, discussions found on FaceBook about political candidates would be the manifest content, but the meaning behind the frequency of discussions about this topic would be the latent content.

6. Summary
Qualitative research is research resulting in non-numerical data. The four types of qualitative research are phenomology, ethnography, case study, and grounded theory. Ethnography is the major research tool of cultural anthropology, it studies a particular society and culture. A branch of ethnography involves studying cultural groups within an educational setting. When studying ethnography, it is important to remember that you are a researcher taking a peek into another groups’ way of life. Teachers have been accepted as action researchers which can lead to a way to improve teaching. Teachers use their own data they collect and can address their questions about their own students. Case studies can provide an in-depth analysis on a specific process, event or person. Case studies can be intrinsic, instrumental, or collective. Qualitative data analysis is a branch of research methodology. Data should be organized into categories and the researcher decides which data to highlight, minimize, or set aside for the purpose of the study. The researcher must use rubrics or set themes to guide the analysis of the data. The researcher then displays the data in an organized way. Thematic Analysis involves the creation and application of codes to the data. This helps in identifying common themes or patterns in the data. Grounded Theory is used for generating and developing theories or explanations from the data that is collected throughout the research study. Development of a grounded theory is a never-ending process. Content Analysis is a methodology for studying the content of communication. Researchers often use this methodology to analyze recorded transcripts of interviews. It is a way of analyzing data that does not have a specific format but is driven by the data itself.