Showing papers in "Qualitative Research in 2016"
TL;DR: The authors discusses the effectiveness of using video internet technologies, like Skype, for qualitative interviews and discusses some challenges for interviewing, including dropped conversations and dropped chat sessions, which may present some challenges.
Abstract: This research note discusses the effectiveness of using video internet technologies, like Skype, for qualitative interviews. Skype may present some challenges for interviewing, including dropped ca...
280 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors discuss their experience calculating ICR in the context of a behavioural HIV prevention trial for young women in South Africa which involves multiple rounds of longitudinal qualitative data collection.
Abstract: Qualitative interviews are increasingly being utilized within the context of intervention trials. While there is emerging assistance for conducting and reporting qualitative analysis, there are limited practical resources available for researchers engaging in a group coding process and interested in ensuring adequate Intercoder Reliability (ICR); the amount of agreement between two or more coders for the codes applied to qualitative text. Assessing the reliability of the coding helps establish the credibility of qualitative findings. We discuss our experience calculating ICR in the context of a behavioural HIV prevention trial for young women in South Africa which involves multiple rounds of longitudinal qualitative data collection. We document the steps that we took to improve ICR in this study, the challenges to improving ICR, and the value of the process to qualitative data analysis. As a result, we provide guidelines for other researchers to consider as they embark on large qualitative projects.
267 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, a specific focus on geography is presented with a focus on participatory and reflexive reflexivity in terms of their practical employment. But this focus was not considered in this paper.
Abstract: Participation and reflexivity have become buzzwords that are seldom discussed in terms of their practical employment. Against this backdrop, with a specific focus on geography, this article present ...
87 citations
TL;DR: The authors explored the possibilities and limitations of contemporary qualitative methods for understanding materials and material culture and how these can be expanded through interdisciplinary approaches, taking the case study of an interdisciplinary project into old jeans.
Abstract: This article aims to explore the possibilities and limitations of contemporary qualitative methods for understanding materials and material culture and how these can be expanded through interdisciplinary approaches. Taking the case study of an interdisciplinary project into old jeans, the article first considers the use of object interviews and life histories to explore how people ‘speak’ the material. Second, it develops the possibilities afforded by inventive material methods, such as socio-archaeological approaches of ‘material imaginings’. Finally, the article discusses the interdisciplinary project through the dialogues that took place around the methods of design and of textile technology and the data produced. Focusing upon dialogues offers a means of exploring the tensions and also connections between methods as a site for expanding qualitative understandings of materials as ‘live’ and vibrant. It aims to widen the remit of qualitative research methods to incorporate the material.
86 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors focus on the tension experienced regarding academic legitimacy and the use of the arts in producing and disseminating research and argue for the need to reconsider what counts as knowledge and to reconceptualize notions of evaluation and rigor in order to effectively support the effective production and dissemination of ABHR.
Abstract: Using the Canadian context as a case study, the research reported here focuses on in-depth qualitative interviews with 36 researchers, artists and trainees engaged in ‘doing’ arts-based health research (ABHR). We begin to address the gap in ABHR knowledge by engaging in a critical inquiry regarding the issues, challenges and benefits of ABHR methodologies. Specifically, this paper focuses on the tensions experienced regarding academic legitimacy and the use of the arts in producing and disseminating research. Four central areas of tension associated with academic legitimacy are described: balancing structure versus openness and flexibility; academic obligations of truth and accuracy; resisting typical notions of what counts in academia; and expectations vis-a-vis measuring the impact of ABHR. We argue for the need to reconsider what counts as knowledge and to reconceptualize notions of evaluation and rigor in order to effectively support the effective production and dissemination of ABHR.
86 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors illustrate how to engage peer-interviewers, meet potential challenges, and the benefits of such engagement, and draw upon their experience from a qualitative study designed to understand men's experiences of problem gambling and housing instability.
Abstract: Engaging peer-interviewers in qualitative inquiry is becoming more popular. Yet, there are differing opinions as to whether this practice improves the research process or is prohibitively challenging. Benefits noted in the literature are improved awareness/acceptance of disenfranchised groups, improved quality of research, and increased comfort of participants in the research process. Challenges include larger investment in time and money to hire, train, and support peer-interviewers, and the potential to disrupt peer recovery. We illustrate, through case study, how to engage peer-interviewers, meet potential challenges, and the benefits of such engagement. We draw upon our experience from a qualitative study designed to understand men’s experiences of problem gambling and housing instability. We hired three peers to conduct semi-structured qualitative interviews with 30 men from a community-based organization. We contend, that with appropriate and adequate resources (time, financial investment), peer-int...
83 citations
TL;DR: It is argued that active engagement with stigmatised communities through multi-sited digital ethnography can complement and augment the findings of digital trace analyses and help researchers to emulate, test and adapt their approach to the diverse range of illicit studies online.
Abstract: Conducting research in the rapidly evolving fields constituting the digital social sciences raises challenging ethical and technical issues, especially when the subject matter includes activities o...
77 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, a special issue on the topic of feminist participatory methodologies in geography is presented, with the authors drawing upon the experiences of the contributors in developing new tools and methods to develop new tools.
Abstract: This introduction prefaces a special issue on the topic of feminist participatory methodologies in geography. Drawing upon the experiences of the contributors in developing new tools and methods to ...
69 citations
TL;DR: Kiyimba et al. as discussed by the authors investigated the risk of secondary traumatic stress in the qualitative transcription process and found that the risk was higher for women with higher levels of stress than men.
Abstract: Kiyimba, N. & O'Reilly, M., The risk of secondary traumatic stress in the qualitative transcription process: a research note, Qualitative Research (16:4) pp. 468-476. Copyright © Nikki Kiyimba & Michelle O'Reilly, 2015. Reprinted by permission of SAGE Publications.
65 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors focus on the challenges related to the assumed shared relationship with language between migrant researchers and their migrant informants and discuss the implications of collecting data in one language and presenting the findings in another.
Abstract: In an era of accelerated international mobility, migrant researchers are increasingly studying their migrant co-nationals in a language different from the language in which they report their findings. This raises very significant considerations regarding language experience and translation of research data. While crucial for understanding production of knowledge, these issues have not yet been given adequate attention. In response, this article focuses first on the challenges related to the assumed shared relationship with language between migrant researchers and their migrant informants. In doing so, it contributes to the discussion about positionality of a migrant researcher. Second, it recognizes the role of a translator researcher and discusses the implications of collecting data in one language and presenting the findings in another. As such, it addresses essential methodological queries many migrant researchers face when conducting studies involving their compatriot communities.
TL;DR: In social research some places and populations are disproportionately targeted by researchers as mentioned in this paper, and while relatively little work exists on the concept of over-research those accounts that do exist tend to tend...
Abstract: In social research some places and populations are disproportionately targeted by researchers. While relatively little work exists on the concept of over-research those accounts that do exist tend ...
TL;DR: In this article, the authors discuss the experience of a multidisciplinary project investigating how young people imagine their future and critically consider the use of arts-based methods and the kinds of data produced through these practices.
Abstract: Visual and arts-based methods are now widely used in the social sciences. In youth research they are considered to promote engagement and empowerment. This article contributes to debates on the challenges of using arts-based methods in research with young people. We discuss the experience of a multidisciplinary project investigating how young people imagine their futures – Imagine Sheppey – to critically consider the use of arts-based methods and the kinds of data produced through these practices. We make two sets of arguments. First, that the challenges of participation and collaboration are not overcome by using apparently ‘youth-friendly’ research tools. Second, that the nature of data produced through arts-based methods can leave researchers with significant problems of interpretation. We highlight these issues in relation to the focus of this project on researching the future.
TL;DR: The experience of using the smartphone app in this qualitative research is reflected, analysing the advantages, disadvantages and the main risks that researchers will need to take into account when using smartphone apps in their future qualitative research projects.
Abstract: This article reflects on the use of a smartphone application (‘app’) in qualitative research following the experience of the FREE (Football Research in an Enlarged Europe) project, which investigated the lives of football fans in the UK. To meet this aim, a participant-focused audiovisual methodology was designed, featuring the use of an app to collect data. Fans were asked to take photographs and keep diaries to show the role football plays in their lives. The smartphone app was developed to allow fans to use their own mobile phones, capturing qualitative data in ‘real time’. The paper reflects on our experience of using the smartphone app in this qualitative research, analysing the advantages, disadvantages and the main risks that researchers will need to take into account when using smartphone apps in their future qualitative research projects. We encourage others to build on and advance this under-researched but potentially valuable tool.
TL;DR: Some of the emergent methods developed to fit a study of quality in inclusive research with people with learning disabilities are presented, specifically the creative use of metaphor as stimulus and the playful adaptation of I-poems from the Listening Guide approach as writing and performance.
Abstract: This article presents some of the emergent methods developed to fit a study of quality in inclusive research with people with learning disabilities. It addresses (i) the ways in which the methodology was a response to the need for constructive, transformative dialogue through use of repeated focus groups in a design interspersing dialogic and reflective spaces; and (ii) how stimulus materials for the focus groups involved imaginative and creative interactions with data. Particular innovations in the blending of narrative and thematic analyses and data generation and analysis processes are explored, specifically the creative use of metaphor as stimulus and the playful adaptation of I-poems from the Listening Guide approach as writing and performance. In reflecting on these methodological turns we also reflect on creativity as an interpretive lens. The paper is an invitation for further methodological dialogue and development.
Journal Article•
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors outline key theoretical and methodological aspects of critical discourse studies and suggest how they may be applied to social media data and present a case study analyzing some aspects of the life of protest movements.
Abstract: This chapter outlines key theoretical and methodological aspects of critical discourse studies (CDS) and suggests how they may be applied to social media data. After a brief overview of the main features of CDS, there is a discussion of what makes data in digitally mediated contexts different and interesting for researchers who adopt a critical perspective to social phenomena. Eight methodological steps from one approach to CDS, the discourse-historical approach, are presented with specific reference to how they can be applied to social media data. In the final part of the chapter, a case study analysing some aspects of the ‘life of protest movements’ (Arab Spring, Occupy) on Web 2.0 is used by way of illustration.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors discuss the emotional impact of having a "dirty secret" in the field of social work, and describe how the ethnomethodological notions of being a member, the unique adequacy requirement of methods, and breaching worked to make the familiar strange and became key to my understanding.
Abstract: The paper is a discussion of my attempt to move beyond familiarity by using ethnomethodology – and the emotional impact of doing so; namely, the feeling of having a ‘dirty secret’. As a social work group member interviewing social workers, the process of fieldwork was all too familiar. However, during transcription and analysis, what I had considered to be ‘business as usual’ was revealed as something more complex. The paper describes how the ethnomethodological notions of being a member, the unique adequacy requirement of methods, and breaching worked to make the familiar strange and became key to my understanding.
TL;DR: In this paper, the role of research assistants in empirical research has been examined and the authors conclude that ignoring the role and contributions of assistants will lead to flawed processes, biased data and possibly misleading results.
Abstract: Research assistants play a vital role in the research process, often acting as more than just translators or interpreters. However, their contributions to and impacts on the research process and outcomes often remain unacknowledged or unaccounted for. We build on previous work that looks at the subjective relations between the researcher, research assistant and research participant to explore this issue. In particular, drawing on a political economy approach, we look at how research assistants, through their objective position, mediate relations between researcher and participants, and also how power relations and different configurations of roles influence the research process and outcomes. Our analysis concludes that ignoring the role of research assistants in empirical research will lead to flawed processes, biased data and possibly misleading results.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors highlight the importance of utilizing documentary analysis as one of the important qualitative methodologies to explore post-disaster distress of the survivors, and discuss the methodological steps, rigour and resulting categories of survivors' suffering (overwhelmed by losses, relational disruption, living a forced identity and denial of justice and equity).
Abstract: A paradigm shift in disaster mental health research has renewed the emphasis on the survivors’ experiences of suffering and healing. This article highlights the importance of utilizing documentary analysis as one of the important qualitative methodologies to explore post-disaster distress of the survivors. Following Figueroa’s (2008) approach to the analysis of audio-visual texts, the methodological steps, outcomes and their salience have been illustrated through an analysis of a documentary produced by Rakesh Sharma titled Final Solution, based on post-Godhra riots in 2002 in India. The two-phased analysis involved constructionist grounded theory procedures with an initial focus on the documentary as a ‘whole’. The methodological steps, rigour and the resulting categories of survivors’ suffering (‘overwhelmed by losses’, ‘relational disruption’, ‘living a forced identity’ and ‘denial of justice and equity’) are discussed in the light of the damage a disaster causes to survivors’ experiences of self and s...
TL;DR: An example process for recruiting, interviewing, and hiring community researchers is presented as a starting place for capacity building and for laying the foundation for data collection and analysis in health-related community projects.
Abstract: Community-engaged approaches to research and practice continue to show success in addressing health equity and making long-term change for partnership relationships and structures of power. The usefulness of these approaches is either diminished or bolstered by community trust, which can be challenging for partnerships to achieve. In this research note we present an example process for recruiting, interviewing, and hiring community researchers as a starting place for capacity building and for laying the foundation for data collection and analysis in health-related community projects.
TL;DR: The authors found that laughter is the most frequently transcribed paralinguistic feature in social research interview transcripts, occurring even where the transcriber gives no other indication of how words were said.
Abstract: Laughter is the most frequently transcribed paralinguistic feature in social research interview transcripts, occurring even where the transcriber gives no other indication of how words were said. I...
TL;DR: In this article, the focus is on the researcher-gatekeeper dialogue by unravelling spaces of inclusion and exclusion among partners in the research, and they give voice to one particular gatekeeper, in an attempt to understand the power gatekeepers and researchers have and can exercise both together and within their own domains.
Abstract: This article discusses collaborations among participants in research on Adivasi (indigenous) women in Odisha, India. The focus is on the researcher–gatekeeper dialogue by unravelling spaces of inclusion and exclusion among partners in the research. We give voice to one particular gatekeeper, in an attempt to understand the power gatekeepers and researchers have and can exercise both together and within their own domains. The authors conclude that regardless of how much effort is made to create a level playing field, inequality continues to exist among participants. Hence, it becomes important to understand the role and power of each participant in a research process as well as their contribution to creating spaces of inclusion.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors present strategies to assess the linguistic skills of the interpreter and to understand his or her social position and subjectivity, highlighting the need to acknowledge that meaning can be filtered by interpretation and requiring that critical reflection be broadened to encompass interpreters in cross language research.
Abstract: Arriving in a foreign country with little knowledge of local languages presents the researcher with significant linguistic challenges. Our in-country contacts may suggest potential interpreters for us to hire, but how do we know if these interpreters can fluently speak the languages of our participants? Can we, lacking fluency in local languages, understand when the social position and lived experiences of our interpreter modify the discourses we seek to analyse? Drawing from my human geography research experience in Uganda, this article aims to share strategies to assess the linguistic skills of the interpreter and to understand his or her social position and subjectivity. Uniquely, this paper highlights differences in interpretation and links these differences to the assistants’ social position and subjectivity, highlighting the need to acknowledge that meaning can be filtered by interpretation and requiring that critical reflection be broadened to encompass interpreters in cross-language research.
TL;DR: In this article, a collection of cases from video recordings of naturally occurring interaction in institutional settings, where members display an orientation to the presence of the recording equipment was analyzed, and it was found that participants do remain aware of recording activity, but that they publicly display when they are attending to it.
Abstract: This article analyses a collection of cases from video recordings of naturally occurring interaction in institutional settings, where members display an orientation to the presence of the recording equipment. Such instances have been treated elsewhere as evidence of contamination of the ecology of the setting. The findings suggest that participants do remain aware of the recording activity, but that they publicly display when they are attending to it. Indeed, it is used as one resource to occasion identity work as competent, knowledgeable members of a particular institutional community, displaying to one another their understanding of the research aims, and their knowledge of how these kinds of data are constituted. Investigating how observational research is oriented to and constituted by the observed allows for a better understanding of what at that moment and in that setting is deemed recording-appropriate or -inappropriate conduct, and offers a more nuanced perspective on how data are co-constituted.
TL;DR: In this paper, a series of collaborative studies led by the author where co-investigation with peer-researchers has played a central role is described, not least the ethical concerns which have to be addressed when working with commonly marginalized people, whatever their age.
Abstract: This article reflects on a series of collaborative studies led by the author where co-investigation with peer-researchers has played a central role. The first concerns work with young people, trained to enable them to participate as peer-researchers in a child mobility study in Ghana, Malawi and South Africa; the second a research project on youth and mobile phones, in which some of those young peer-researchers have a continued involvement; the third a study of older people’s mobility in Tanzania, conducted in collaboration with an international NGO. Experience in these projects illustrates the complexities of co-investigation, not least the ethical concerns which have to be addressed when working with commonly marginalized people, whatever their age, but it also highlights the potential rewards which such collaborations can bring to individual peer-researchers, to academic research quality and, in the longer term, towards better policy and practice.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors propose the notion of marginalised elites to examine highly skilled migrant women, a group that has been neglected by feminist participatory research, and ask what principles and me...
Abstract: This article proposes the notion of ‘marginalised elites’ to examine highly skilled migrant women, a group that has been neglected by feminist participatory research. It asks what principles and me...
TL;DR: In this article, a participatory research project involving immigrant organizations and professional parenting support services in Amsterdam, Netherlands, combined local development aims with co-generative knowledge and mutual learning to produce socially and scientifically relevant knowledge.
Abstract: This article presents a participatory research project involving immigrant organizations and professional parenting support services in Amsterdam, Netherlands. The project combined local development aims with co-generative knowledge and mutual learning to produce socially and scientifically relevant knowledge. By using participatory components as ‘windows of understanding’ in a broader non-participatory research, previously excluded perspectives were included in knowledge production, while also producing local change. An analysis of the challenges and positive outcomes offers a methodological reflection that can contribute to future developments in participatory action research (PAR).
TL;DR: In this paper, a small group of preteen boys and girls with diagnosed eating disorders discussed their ideas and attitudes about healthy bodies in individual interviews, but the data yielded little of significance in relation to body and health discourses, or to gender differences.
Abstract: This article, part of a larger study, began with an inquiry into the ways a small group of preteen boys and girls with diagnosed eating disorders discussed their ideas and attitudes about healthy bodies in individual interviews. Despite applying some of the usual analytic procedures, the data yielded little of significance in relation to body and health discourses, or to gender differences. We therefore wondered whether our underlying epistemological lenses and methodological toolkit had prevented us from seeing and hearing what was happening with this particular cohort. By shifting from a predominantly feminist post-structuralist, socio-cultural approach to one more inflected with varieties of feminist post-humanism and post-qualitative thinking, the data came differently into focus, and invited closer consideration. Employing a diffractive analysis then allowed some fresh, unexpected salience in the data to become more apparent.
TL;DR: In this paper, an interviewing technique that could be used when interviewing elite policy-making respondents who fear repercussions for divulging information and who, as a result, either become too emotionally unstable to allow for rapport or begin to resist disclosing information is presented.
Abstract: This article promotes an interviewing technique that could be used when interviewing elite policy-making respondents who fear repercussions for divulging information and who, as a result, either become too emotionally unstable to allow for rapport or begin to resist disclosing information. Based on two independent research projects in Bulgaria and Cyprus, the article advocates the active use of a new type of research participant, the intermediary. This relatively new interview participant is used to introduce and vouch for the credibility of the researcher. The paper argues their inclusion in the interview decreases a respondent’s resistance by improving rapport and by preventing concealment of information. They achieve the former by: creating an aura of trust, by providing emotional support to the respondent and by converting the interview to a friendly conversation. They achieve the latter by intervening at the moments when they consider the respondent is deliberately or unintentionally withholding info...
TL;DR: The Pathways-to-Resilience Study as discussed by the authors addressed this by inviting Canadian, Chinese, and Taiwanese youth to participate in the study. But they did not consider their lived experiences of what facilitates positive adjustment to hardship.
Abstract: Theories of youth resilience neglect youths’ lived experiences of what facilitates positive adjustment to hardship. The Pathways-to-Resilience Study addressed this by inviting Canadian, Chinese, Co...