Data-collection in Qualitative Research Essay

This Chapter is ab tabu rules and techniques in data-collection during a soft look into. We mentioned earlier that qualitative research is eclectic. That is, the choice of techniques is myrmecophilous on the needs of the research. Although this should be true for al to the highest degree all affectionate research, it is particularly so with qualitative research in that the appropriate method or techniques is often identified and adopted during the research. Qualitative research is in like manner multi-modal. The detective may adopt a variety of research techniques, or a combination of such, as long as they argon reassert by the needs. The discussion below is therefore not to identify a set of techniques unique to qualitative research, precisely quite a, to precede the methods and techniques close ordinarily employ in qualitative research, and the issues related to such use.We shall introduce the methods and techniques in three broad categories contemplations, inter views and view of documents. These argon in like manner the basic methods used in cultural anthropology (Bernard, 198862). Indeed, the discussions about qualitative research in teaching can be viewed as a particular upshot in cultural anthropology. ruminationsObservation usually means the tecs moment to get word out what people do (Bernard, 198862). It is incompatible from other methods in that data occur not necessarily in response to the investigators stimulus.Observation may be obtrusive or unobtrusive. A researcher may simply sit in the corner of a give lessons playground and observe how students be pee during breaks. He may to a fault stand by the school gate and observe how students behave at the school gate. much(prenominal) cases of observation may be seen as unobtrusive. In other cases, the researchers may not apply any stimuli, but their posture per se may have some influence on the scene. The around common ex adenosine monophosphatele in this category is scho olroom observation. Although the researcher may just sit quietly at the corner of a classroom, the aim of the researcher may change the classroom climate. It is, nonetheless, put away observation.Observation is a basic technique used in almost all qualitative research. Even if other methods or techniques are used, the researcher remains the most essential sensor or instrument and hence observation evermore counts (McCracken, 198818-20). For warning, when interviewing is used, a qualitative researcher alike takes into account the tonic or facial expressions of the viewer, because they help interpret the verbal responses. Such expressions are scarcely sentienced by observation.If the interview is done in the field, thence the environs of the interview site also will meaningful data for the research. The surroundings can only be depicted through observation. Hence observation is indispensable in almost all occasions of qualitative research. However, the enclosure observ ation may some fourth sableensions go beyond what is seen. It also pertains to what is heard, and as yet sometimes what is smelled. Case 4.1 provides one of such examples.Case 4.1 Classroom Observation SchemeIn the IIEP project on basic upbringing, Leung designed for the Chinese research a scheme for classroom observation. Classroom was taken as one of the environmental factors affecting students learning. The scheme was designed after Leung stayed in local schools for two days. The scheme did not confine itself to the performance of the teacher, although that was a part. The figure on the next page shows one of the six sections of the scheme.unlike writers have diverse ways of classifying observations. Without running into juggling of definitions, we shall briefly introduce observations as histrion observations and non-participant observations. More detailed classification of observations can be found in Bernard (1988), Goetz and LeCompte (1984) and Patton (1990).Participant ObservationParticipant observation is mayhap the most typical of qualitative research. Some authors even use participant observation as a synonym for ethnographical research. Different writers may have slightly different definitions of participant observation. The followers description by Fetterman is perhaps the most agreeable to most researchers.Participant observation is submersion in a culture. Ideally, the ethnographer lives and works in the companionship for six months to a socio-economic class or more, learning the language and seeing patterns of behaviour e rattlingplace time. Long-term residence helps the researcher internalize the basic beliefs, fears, hopes and expectations of the people below field of view. (198945)Immersion of the participant can either be straight or noncontinuous. The three classical cases we quoted in Chapter 1 all include familiarity in the continuous mode. Lis film of classroom sociology (Cases 3.8 and 3.9) refer one years continuous residence. In the second and three year she went to the school three days a week. She combined continuous with noncontinuous participant observations. Fetterman used noncontinuous participation when he was doing qualitative evaluation of procreational programmes.Case 4.2 Noncontinuous VisitsIn two ethnographic studies, of dropouts and of gifted children, Fetterman visited the programmes for only a few weeks every couple of months all over a three-year period. The visits were intense. They included classroom observation, informal interviews, occasional(prenominal) substitute teaching,interaction with community members, and the use of several(a) other research techniques, including long-distance phone-calls, dinner with students families, and time spent hanging out in the hallways and parking lot with students sculpture classes. (Fetterman, 198946-7) II. Environment of the classroom1. The classroom is on the _____ floor of the school building.2. The classroom is near( ) resid ential area ( ) factories( ) road(s) ( ) field( ) marketplace( ) others _______________________________________3. The number of windows which provide lighting and ventilation to the classroom ( ) satisfies the involve standard( ) is below the required standard4. The main artificial lighting facility in the classroom is ( ) florescent tubes total no.__________________( ) light bulbs total no.__________________5. Condition of lighting during the lesson ( ) bright ( ) dim ( ) dark6. Ventilation in the classroom( ) well ventilated ( ) moss-grown ( ) suffocating7. Quality of air in the classroom( ) refreshing ( ) a bit smelly ( ) stingy8. Environments for listening( ) very quiet ( ) occasional noise ( ) noisy9. Classrooms floor structure( ) cover ( ) log ( ) mud ( ) carpet10. Classrooms floor civilise( ) clean ( ) some litter ( ) full of rubbish11. Classrooms wall conditions( ) smooth & clean ( ) some stains ( ) dirty & damaged12. Classrooms area _____________m2 area/person ___ __ m2.13. spot use in classroom( ) looks spatial ( ) fairly crowded ( ) very crowded14. Furniture and other article arrangements in the classroom ( ) natty and tidy ( ) messy1Figure 1 Classroom Observation Scheme (Designed by Leung Yat-ming) Whytes cognize in the Italian slum (Case 2) is perhaps the hot to ideal in participant observation. He stayed in the community for two years. He experienced the life of a member of the Italian slum. In Whytes case, native membership allows the researcher the highest level of participant observation. most(prenominal) researchers are denied such an opportunity, often because of constraints in time and resources, as we have discussed at length in Chapter 3. Under all sorts of constraints, at top hat the researcher lives as much as mathematical with and in the alike(p) manner as the individuals under investigation (Goetz and LeCompte, 1984 109). In these circumstances, the researchers may not claim that they was doing ethnography, but it is legitimate to apply ethnographic approach and techniques to the study (Fetterman, 198947). Participant observation in its broad esthesis therefore tolerates different lengths of time and different degrees of depth. thither is a full range of possible modes of participant observation, what Wolcott calls ethnographer sans1 ethnography (Wolcott, 1984 177).The most frequent case in education is that a researcher may stay in a school and become a teacher in that school. The researcher identity may or may not be disguised. The researcher may then, as a participant, observe teachers behaviours in teaching, in meetings, in conversations, and so forth.Sometimes, the researcher is readily a member of the community (say, a school) and may still carry out research as a participant observer. However, in this case, the researcher should be aware of his/her knowledge of the community and should be unadventurous that such knowledge would not lead to preoccupations about the school under research. In cases where the researchers have successfully gained membership (as Whyte did in the Italian slum), the property amidst a native member and the researcher-as-participant begins to blur. This insider-outsider dialectics will be advertize discussed later.Nonparticipant ObservationStrictly speaking, nonparticipant observation involves merely watching what is happening and record events on the spot. In the qualitative orientation, because of the non-intervention principle, strict nonparticipant observation should involve no interaction between the observer and the observed. Goetz and LeCompte assert that in the strict sense nonparticipant observation exists only where interactions are viewed through hidden photographic camera and vertical flute or through one-way mirror (1984 143).Dabbs (198241), for example, used hidden camera in Atlanta at a plaza in gallium State University, and studied an informal group that a great deal gathered during the break of the day break. There are examples of using hidden impression-cameras in school toilets to study drug problem among students, or to use unnoticed audio recording device to study student interactions. The use of audio or video recording device often invites concern in ethnical considerations. Such problems are similar to those arising in using one-way mirrors in interviews or psychological experiments. Such cases are rare in policy-related research.Another case of nonparticipant observation with ethical problem is disguised observation, or covert observation. A typical example is Humphreys (1975) study on homosexual activities. He did not accede in such activities, but offered to act as watch queen, warning his informants when someone approached the toilet. Another famous example is Van Maanens covert study of police. He became practically a police recruit. Over more than a decade, he slipped in and out of the police in various research roles (Van Maanen, 1982). Covert observations are once agai n rare in research which is related to educational decision-making.Hidden camera or recorder and covert observation occur only exceptionally.  close author would accept the watching of audience behaviour during a basketball game (Fetterman, 198947) or the watching of pedestrian behaviour over a street as acceptable examples of nonparticipant observations. Interaction between the researcher and the mixer community under study is often unavoidable. We have again discussed this at length in Chapter 3 under the notion of researcher intervention. If we recognize the problem of intervention as a matter of degrees, then the sign between participant observation and nonparticipant observation begins to blur. The general principle crossways the board is that the researchers should minimize their interactions with the informants and focus attention unobtrusively on the burgeon forth of events (Goetz and LeCompte, 1984143).Wolcotts study of school principal (Case 3) was perhaps the mo st intensive type of nonparticipant observation that one could find in the realm of education. (He also used other supplementary methods as mentioned in Case 3). He did live with the school for two years, but he did not participate as a school principal which was his subject of study. He see his role as one of participant-as-observer (Wolcott, 19847). So was Lis study (Case 3.8) of classroom sociology in her first year.She did stay with the school as a teacher but she never became a student which was her subject of study. The following two years of her study, however, was not nonparticipant observation because she applied experimental measures. During the UNICEF research in Liaoning, the basic method I used was interviewing and not nonparticipant observation, but I did have, at times, nonparticipant observation when debates occurred between the local planners and the provincial planners (Case 3.7), or when planners chat among themselves about their past experience in the field.The most frequently employed nonparticipant observation which is relevant to educational decision-making is perhaps observation at meetings. Typically, the researcher attends a meeting as an observer. The researcher tries to be as unobtrusive as possible and records everything that happens during the meeting. When Wolcott did his study on the school principal, he was present at all meetings unless he was told otherwise (Wolcott, 19844). The following was my experience of a non-participant observation in China.Case 4.3 A Validation SeminarI realized during the UNICEF research in Liaoning (Case 4) that one essential step in the planning for basic education in China was validation. When drafting of an education plan was complete, the draft plan had to undergo scrutiny in what is cognize as a validation seminar. In essence, all those related to the plan, including leaders at all levels, representatives of all relevant government departments, experts from all areas are invited to discuss. Relevant documents are sent to the participants well in advance. They are then asked to comment on the plan during the validation exercise. Only validated plans are submitted to relevant machinery for legislation. The validation seminar for Liaoning was unfortunately held before the UNICEF research. I got an opportunity, however, a year after in 1988, when the Shanghai educational plan was to undergo validation.The array of the meeting agreed to send me an invitation. I attended the meeting in the name of an external expert, although I made clear to the drove that my major task was not to contribute. They agreed. During the meeting, I was able to observe the roles of the various actors during the meeting. I was also able to talk to individual participants during tea breaks and meals to deduct their background and their general views about educational planning. I was able to do a number of things over the two-day meeting (a) to classify the over 40 participants into technocrats, b ureaucrats, policy-makers and academics (b) to understand the different extents in which the participants contributed to the modification of the plan (c) the disparity in capacity among participants in terms of information and expertise (d) the inter-relations between the different categories of actors and (e) the function of the validation exercise. In the end, I concluded that validation was a way of legitimation, which employed both technical (expert judgement) and political (participation) means to accession the acceptability of the plan before it went for legal endorsement. The political aspect came to me as a surprise. It indicated a change in the notion of rationality among Chinese planners and policy-makers.InterviewingInterviewing is widely used in qualitative research. Compared with observation, it is more economical in time, but may achieve less in understanding the culture. The deliverance in time, however, makes ethnographic interviewing almost the most widely used te chnique in policy-related research.Interviewing is trying to understand what people think through their speech. There are different types of interviews, often classified by the degrees of control over the interview. Along this line, we shall briefly introduce three types of interviewing informal interviewing, unstructured interviewing, semi-structured interviewing, and officially structured interviewing. We shall also briefly introduce key-informant interviewing and focus groups which are peculiar(prenominal) types of ethnographic interviewing.Qualitative research of course has no monopoly over interviewing. Interviewing is also frequently used in research of other traditions. The difference between ethnographic interviewing and interviewing in other traditions lies mainly in two areas the interviewer-interviewee relationship and the aims of interviews. Ethnographic interviewees, or informants, are teachers rather than subjects to the researcher, they are leaders rather than follo wers in the interview. The major aim of the interview should not be seeking responses to specific questions, but initiating the informant to unfold data.Readers may find more detailed discussions about ethnographic interviewing in Spradley (1979) who provides perhaps the most insightful account of the subject. In-depth discussions about ethnographic interviewing can also be found in Bernard (1988), Patton (1990), Fetterman (1989) and Powney and Watts (1987).Informal InterviewingInformal interviewing entails no control. It is usually conversations that the researcher recall after staying in the field. It is different from observation in that it is interactive. That is, the informant speaks to the researcher. By its own nature, informal interviewing is the most ethnographic in the sense that it is not responding to any formal question. It is part of the self-unfolding process.