QUALITATIVE DESIGNS FOR RESEARCH AND

EVALUATION PRESENTATION BY: SUSAN CHUNICK, DIRECTOR, DEPARTMENT OF EVALUATION AND RESEARCH SERVICES

NOVEMBER 7, 2017; 1:00 -4:00PM

DOGWOOD ROOM, 4TH FLOOR

SLIDES BY: DR. MARIAN KRAWCZYK, PHD

POST-DOC FELLOW, CENTRE FOR HEALTH EVALUATION AND OUTCOME SCIENCES & TRINITY WESTERN UNIVERSITY

LORD KELVIN ADAM SMITH LEADERSHIP FELLOW, END OF LIFE STUDIES, UNIVERSITY OF GLASGOW

OBJECTIVES

• To become aware of the most common qualitative research designs/methods • N.B. Qualitative methods may be used in evaluation! • To become aware of major theoretical approaches in qualitative research • To gain understanding of required components of qualitative research

• To understand the role of the researcher in qualitative research

• NOT about how to conduct an interview or focus groups

WORKSHOP OUTLINE

• Defining qualitative research

• Common types of qualitative research

• Qualitative study designs – methodology

• Capturing data – methods

• Qualitative analysis and report writing

WHAT IS QUALITATIVE RESEARCH?

“Qualitative research is multimethod in focus, involving an interpretive, naturalistic approach to its subject matter. This means that qualitative researchers study things in their natural settings, attempting to make sense of, or interpret phenomena in terms of the meanings people bring to them.

WHAT IS QUALITATIVE RESEARCH? (CONT.)

Qualitative research involves the studied use a variety of empirical materials – case study, personal experience, introspective, life story, interview, observational, historical, interactional and visual texts – that describe routine and problematic moments and meanings in individuals' lives." (Denzin, NK & Lincoln, YS, 2004, p. 2).

WHAT KINDS OF QUESTIONS DOES IT SEEK TO ANSWER? Qualitative research is concerned with the social aspects of our world and seeks to answer questions about:

• Why people behave the way they do

• How opinions and attitudes are formed

• How people are affected by the events that go on around them

• How and why cultures have developed in the way they have

• The differences between social groups

GOAL OF QUALITATIVE RESEARCH

“The goal of qualitative research is the development of concepts which help us to understand social phenomena in natural (rather than experimental) settings, giving due emphasis to the meanings, experiences, and views of all the participants.”

Pope. BMJ. 1995

12 MAJOR (IDEAL) CHARACTERISTICS OF QUALITATIVE RESEARCH (PATTON. 2002. QUALITATIVE RESEARCH AND EVALUATION METHODS)

CHARACTERISTICS

• Naturalistic inquiry • Studying real-world situations as they unfold naturally

• Emergent design flexibility • Openness to adapting inquiry as understanding deepens and/or situations change

• Purposeful sampling • Sampling is aimed at insight about the phenomenon, not empirical generalization

from a sample to a population

CHARACTERISTICS

• Qualitative data • Observations that yield detailed, thick description.

• Personal experience and engagement • Direct and sustained contact with the people, situation, and phenomenon under study;

the researcher’s personal experiences and insights are a part of the inquiry and to understanding the phenomena.

CHARACTERISTICS

• Empathic neutrality and mindfulness • Understanding without judgment (neutrality); showing openness, sensitivity,

respect, awareness, responsiveness, and being fully present (mindfulness)

• Dynamic systems • Attention to process, situational and system dynamics; assumes change as

ongoing

CHARACTERISTICS

• Individual case orientation • First level of analysis as respecting, and capturing the details of the individual

cases being studied

• Inductive analysis and create synthesis • Immersion in the details and specifics of the data to discover important patterns,

themes, and interrelationships; ends in creative (and collaborative) synthesis

• Holistic perspective • Phenomenon under study is understood as a complex system that is more than

the sum of its parts

CHARACTERISTICS

• Context sensitivity • Places findings in a social, historical, and temporal context; careful of

generalizations across time and space

• Voice, perspective, and reflexivity • Understanding and depicting the world authentically in all its complexity

while being self-analytical, politically aware, and reflexive in consciousness (no problem!)

LUCKY #13

• The difference between a competent qualitative researcher and a good qualitative researcher is that the latter includes understandings that emerge from meanings generated by the individuals under study.

• Partial “knowing alongside with” not “knowing better” or “objective truth”

DIFFERENCES BETWEEN QUALITATIVE & QUANTITATIVE

Quantitative • Test theories

• Known variables

• Statistical sampling

• Larger sample

• Standardized instruments

• Deductive

Qualitative • Build theories

• Unknown variables

• Theoretical sampling

• Smaller sample

• Observations, interviews

• Inductive

DIFFERENCES BETWEEN QUALITATIVE & QUANTITATIVE

Quantitative • To predict causal

relationships

• Highly structured methods

• Close-ended questions

• Data format: Numerical

• Study design stable

Qualitative • To describe and explain

relationships

• Semi-structured methods

• Open-ended questions

• Data format: Textual

• Study design flexible

GROUP EXERCISE 1: RESEARCH BINGO! 5 minutes

Statistical Analysis Close-Ended Questions Small Sample Size

Known Variables Study Design Flexible Observations, interviews

Naturalistic Inquiry Theory Building Inductive

Statistical Analysis (Quant)

Close-Ended Questions (Quant)

Small Sample Size (Qual)

Known Variables (Quant)

Study Design Flexible (Qual)

Observations, interviews

(Qual) Naturalistic Inquiry

(Qual) Theory Building

(Qual) Inductive

(Qual)

WHEN TO CONDUCT QUALITATIVE RESEARCH

WHEN TO CONDUCT QUALITATIVE RESEARCH

• Your research goal is to explore a topic or an idea

• When you want to explore topics in more breadth and depth than quantitative research

• You want to gain insight into a target audience’s lifestyle, culture, motivations, behaviours etc.

• You want to understand the reasons behind the results of quantitative research/evaluation (very useful for evaluation)

• You want to get input from key informants or others

WHEN TO CONDUCT QUALITATIVE RESEARCH

• Understand context • How economic, political, cultural, social, environmental and organizational factors

influence health

• Understand people • How people make sense of their health and disease

• Understand interaction • How the various actors in health care interact with each other

QUALITATIVE OR QUANTITATIVE?

Taken from Hancock. 2002. An Introduction to Qualitative Research.

QUALITATIVE OR QUANTITATIVE?

Quantitative

Qualitative

QUALITATIVE STUDY DESIGNS

A DEFINITIONAL SIDEBAR

Methodology • Techniques (“actions”) for gathering data

• The various ways of proceeding in gathering information

• Focus groups, interviews, observation, etc.

• Methods and how they are used are shaped by methodology

• The “way”

Methods • Interpretive philosophical framework

• The principles that guide research practice

• Explains why we use specific methods

• Often discipline specific

• Different methodologies will generate different types of knowledge, which are not always compatible

• The “why”

METHODOLOGICAL GROUNDING IN SOCIAL SCIENCE

• Ontological (The nature of reality): Researchers embrace the idea of multiple realities and report on these multiple realities by exploring multiple forms of evidence from different individuals’ perspectives and experiences.

• Epistemological (How researchers know what they know): Researchers try to get as close as possible to participants being studied. Subjective evidence is assembled based on individual views from research conducted in the field.

• Axiological (The role of values in research): Researchers make their values known in the study and actively reports their values and biases as well as the value-laden nature of information gathered from the field.

Cresswell. (2012). Qualitative inquiry and research design.

A PRACTICAL CONSIDERATION - SAMPLING

Convenience: Selection of the most accessible subjects. Purposeful: Investigator actively selects the most productive sample to answer the

research question. Intellectual strategy based on researcher’s knowledge, literature, evidence.

Theoretical: Sampling is theory-based. Building theories, elaborating on theories by selecting participants that will add to study.

Who you can sample will shape your study design

Saturation

COMMON APPROACHES WITHIN QUALITATIVE RESEARCH

Many types* • Phenomenology • Ethnography • Grounded theory • Discourse analysis • Case studies

Also consider • Mixed methods

* Many researchers use more than one approach (triangulation)

PHENOMENOLOGY - METHODOLOGY

• The goal of phenomenological research is to describe a "lived experience" of a phenomenon.

• A phenomenological research study tries to answer the question “What is it like to experience XXX?”

• The objective of phenomenology is the direct investigation and description of phenomena as consciously experienced, without theories about their causal explanations or their objective reality.

• It seeks to understand how people individually construct meaning of an experience.

PHENOMENOLOGY - METHODS

• Involves a small number of subjects to develop patterns and relationships of meaning and experiences.

• You can use an interview to gather the participants' descriptions of their experience, or the participants' written or oral self-report, or even their aesthetic expressions (e.g. art, narratives, or poetry).

PHENOMENOLOGY - METHODS

• Bracketing • Process of identifying and holding to the side any preconceived beliefs and opinions

that one may have about the phenomenon that is being researched.

• Intuiting & Analyzing • Involves coding, categorising and making sense of the essential meanings of the

phenomenon, where common themes or essences begin to emerge.

• Describing • To communicate and to offer distinct, critical description in written and verbal form.

EXAMPLES

• Martins, Diane Cocozza. "Experiences of homeless people in the health care delivery system: a descriptive phenomenological study." Public health nursing 25.5 (2008): 420-430.

• Fallah, Rahele, et al. "Post-traumatic growth in breast cancer patients: a qualitative phenomenological study." Middle East Journal of Cancer 3.2 & 3 (2012): 35-44.

• Orme, Jacquie, et al. "The experiences of patients undergoing blood transfusion in a day hospice." International journal of palliative nursing 19.4 (2013): 171-176.

ETHNOGRAPHY - METHODOLOGY

• The goal is to systematically explore cultural phenomena, where the researcher observes society from the point of view of the subject of the study.

• It is as holistic study – the goal is to produce research that incorporates the views of the participants (emic) as well as the views of the researcher (etic).

• Emphasis is on relationships.

• Useful when wanting to describe how a cultural group works and to explore their beliefs, language, behaviours (also issues faced by the group)

ETHNOGRAPHY - METHODS

• Focus can be of the entire group or a subpart of it.

• Begin by examining people in interaction in ordinary settings and discerns pervasive patterns.

• Involves extensive field work : day-to day, face-to-face contact with participants. It is time intensive.

• Data collection is mainly by observations, informal conversations, formal interviews, symbols, artefacts, and other sources of data (including text).

ETHNOGRAPHY - METHODS

• The resulting field study or a case report reflects the knowledge and the system of meanings in the lives of a cultural group

• Unlike phenomenology, ethnographic analysis also involves the researchers’ interpretation of the functions and meanings of human actions

• Therefore requires an inclusion of researcher reflexivity • Focus on describing the culture of a group in very detailed and complex

manner • Can be presented in multiple formats

EXAMPLES • Taxis, K., and N. Barber. "Causes of intravenous medication errors: an

ethnographic study." Quality and Safety in Health Care 12.5 (2003): 343-347.

• Tardy, Rebecca W. "“But I Am a Good Mom” The Social Construction of Motherhood through Health-Care Conversations." Journal of Contemporary Ethnography 29.4 (2000): 433-473.

• Harrowing, Jean N., and Judy Mill. "Moral distress among Ugandan nurses providing HIV care: a critical ethnography." International journal of nursing studies 47.6 (2010): 723-731.

GROUNDED THEORY - METHODOLOGY • Suitable to the study of any behaviour that has an interactional element to it.

• Multiple analytic frameworks

• A set of rigorous research procedures leading to the emergence of conceptual

categories

• Term describes both a research “method” (a particular research process) as well as “outcome” (generates a theory grounded in data)

GROUNDED THEORY - METHODS

• Identify your area of interest

• Collect data

• Open coding

• Data collection, analysis, and emergent interpretation occur simultaneously.

• Writing memos: Writing down the hows/whys of your emerging codes

• Selective coding and theoretical sampling: Focus on core categories

• Sort memos and find theoretical code(s): Main code emerges

• Read literature

GROUNDED THEORY - METHODS

• The final outcome offers an explanation of the phenomenon under examination, and should be traceable back through the data.

• Can be used with either qualitative or quantitative data of any type (e.g. video, images, text, observations, spoken word, etc.)

• Commonly used both implicitly and explicitly in most qualitative research.

EXAMPLES

• Thorne, Sally E., and Barbara L. Paterson. "Health care professional support for self-care management in chronic illness: insights from diabetes research." Patient education and counseling 42.1 (2001): 81-90.

• Larsson, Inga E., et al. "Patient participation in nursing care from a patient perspective: a Grounded Theory study." Scandinavian journal of caring sciences 21.3 (2007): 313-320.

• Attree, Moira. "Patients’ and relatives’ experiences and perspectives of ‘good’ and ‘not so good’ quality care." Journal of advanced nursing 33.4 (2001): 456-466.

CASE STUDY - METHODOLOGY

• Useful when there is a unique or interesting story to be told.

• To provide context to other data (such as outcome data), offering a more complete picture of what happened in the program and why.

• A case is a bounded system (e.g. a person, a group, an activity, or a process).

• In-depth investigation of a single or small number of “instances” (cases), over a period of time.

CASE STUDY - METHODS

Type Explanatory Exploratory Descriptive Multi-case Intrinsic Instrumental

Purpose To explain the presumed causal links in real-life interventions that are too complex for survey or experimental strategies.

To explore situations in which the actions being observed have no clear, single set of pre-determined outcomes.

To describe a phenomenon and the real-life context in which it occurred.

To explore differences within and between cases. The goal is to replicate findings across cases.

To better understand the case. The case itself is of interest.

To provides insight into an issue or helps to refine a theory. The case itself is of secondary interest.

Baxter & Jack (2008)

EXAMPLES

• Grol, Richard, and Jeremy Grimshaw. "From best evidence to best practice: effective implementation of change in patients' care." The lancet 362.9391 (2003): 1225-1230. (Primary care physicians)

• Waldman, J. Deane, et al. "The shocking cost of turnover in health care." Health care management review 29.1 (2004): 2-7. (Medical center)

• Craig, Peter, et al. "Developing and evaluating complex interventions: the new Medical Research Council guidance." Bmj 337 (2008). (Rural Zimbabwe)

DISCOURSE ANALYSIS - METHODOLOGY

• Considers what people mean by what they say

• Looks at the way language presents different views of the world and different understandings

• Examines how discourse is shaped by relationships between people, social identities, and relations

• Takes us into the social and cultural settings of language use to help us understand particular language choices

• Moves beyond description to explanation of the “rules of the game” that language users draw on in their every day interaction

DISCOURSE ANALYSIS - METHODS

• Examines the relationships between linguistic and non-linguistic behaviour

• An interest in the properties of ‘naturally occurring’ language use by real language users

• A focus on larger units than isolated words and sentences of analysis, towards a study of action and interaction

• Includes non-verbal aspects of interaction and communication: gestures, images, film, the internet, and multimedia

Wodack & Meyer (2008)

DISCOURSE ANALYSIS - METHODS

• Define “discourse”: which form(s) of communication; cultural context; social practices; critical or no

• Definition will shape your methods of analysis

• Conversation analysis, narrative analysis, critical discourse analysis, cross-cultural comparison, etc.

• Often use more than one form of method/analysis

EXAMPLES

• Heartfield, Mane. "Nursing documentation and nursing practice: a discourse analysis." Journal of Advanced Nursing 24.1 (1996): 98-103.

• Hallett, Christine E., et al. "Community nurses’ perceptions of patient ‘compliance’ in wound care: a discourse analysis." Journal of Advanced Nursing 32.1 (2000): 115-123.

• Hazelton, Michael. "Reporting mental health: a discourse analysis of mental health-related news in two Australian newspapers." The Australian and New Zealand journal of mental health nursing 6.2 (1997): 73-89.

COMMUNITY BASED, PARTICIPATORY, AND ACTION RESEARCH - METHODOLOGY

• A partnership approach to research that equitably involves diverse community members, organizational representatives, and researchers in all aspects of the research process

• Seeks to understand the world by trying to change it, collaboratively and following reflection

• Goal is to increase and integrate the knowledge gained with interventions, policy, and social change to improve the health and quality of life of community members

• Not a unified body of ideas and methods but rather a pluralistic orientation to knowledge making and social change

COMMUNITY BASED, PARTICIPATORY, AND ACTION RESEARCH - METHODS

• All partners contribute expertise and share decision making and ownership

• The research and analysis necessary relies on interviews, experience, knowledge of the community, and an understanding of the issue or intervention from the inside, rather than on academic or professional skills

• Report and recommendations - Outcomes are embodied (increased capacity) as much as report-based

• Follow up: Attempt to bring about appropriate action on the issue or intervention

EXAMPLES • Giachello, Aida L., et al. "Reducing diabetes health disparities through community-based

participatory action research: the Chicago Southeast Diabetes Community Action Coalition." Public health reports 118.4 (2003): 309.

• Cristancho, Sergio, et al. "Listening to rural Hispanic immigrants in the Midwest: a community-based participatory assessment of major barriers to health care access and use." Qualitative health research 18.5 (2008): 633-646.

• Baker, Tamara A., and Caroline C. Wang. "Photovoice: Use of a participatory action research method to explore the chronic pain experience in older adults." Qualitative Health Research 16.10 (2006): 1405-1413.

• ** Dr. Sonia Singh – Fraser Health: Developing, Implementing, and Evaluating Falls Prevention Programs With Aboriginal Communities Using Participatory Research Methods - Part 1: Community Engagement and Development of Research Partnership

MIXED METHODS - METHODOLOGY

• Involves collecting, analyzing, and integrating (or mixing) quantitative and qualitative research (and data) in a single study or a longitudinal program of inquiry.

• Data need to “mix” in some way so that together they form a more complete picture than when standing alone.

• Need to address productive tensions between methods (actions) and methodologies

(underlying philosophy). • Encourages collaboration between professions and disciplinary fields. • Increasingly popular in health care research.

MIXED METHODS - METHODS

• Design can orient to either or both perspectives.

• Sample sizes vary based on methods used.

• Data collection can involve any technique available to researchers.

• Interpretation is continual and can influence stages in the research process.

Mixed Methods – Design Strategies

Sequential Explanatory

Sequential Exploratory

Sequential Transformation

Concurrent Triangulation

Concurrent Nested

Concurrent Transformative

Character Collection and analysis of quant data; qual secondary

Initial phase of qual data collection and analysis followed by a phase of quant data collection and analysis

Collection and analysis of either data first. Results are integrated in the interpretation phase.

Two or more methods used to confirm, findings within a study. Data collection is concurrent

Gives priority to one of the methods and guides the project, while another is embedded

A theoretical perspective reflected in the purpose of the study to guide all methodological choices

Purpose Qual results assist in explaining and interpreting quant findings

To explore a phenomenon; may also be useful when developing and testing a new instrument

To employ the methods that best serve a theoretical perspective

To overcome a weakness in using one method

To address a different question/ perspective than the dominant method

To evaluate a theoretical perspective at different levels of analysis

(Creswell, 2003)

EXAMPLES • Katz, Marra G., et al. "Patient literacy and question-asking behavior during the medical encounter:

a mixed-methods analysis." Journal of general internal medicine 22.6 (2007): 782-786.

• Laws, Rachel A., et al. "Should I and can I? A mixed methods study of clinician beliefs and attitudes in the management of lifestyle risk factors in primary health care." BMC Health Serv Res 8.1 (2008): 44.

• **Fraser Health affiliated researcher: Stirling Bryan, PhD: Listening to voices not often heard: An exploration of research needs of South Asian knee replacement patients

What method?

Why?

Existing research Benefits

Limitations

Practicalities

Steps to choosing qualitative research

method(s)

Type Phenomenology Ethnography Case Study Grounded Theory

Discourse Analysis

CPAR Mixed Methods

Goal Understand essence of (individual) experience

In-depth cultural understanding of group

To highlight individual cases and/or relationship between; provide context to other data

Develop theory grounded in data

Examines relationship between language and contexts

Seeks to understand the world by trying to collaboratively change it

To overcome limitations of a single methodology

Participants Individuals who experienced a phenomenon of interest

Both community/ group and researcher

One or more “cases”

Individuals, objects, documents

Relationships, objects, documents

Community/ group, researcher, and other relevant parties

Individuals or groups

Sampling Small (1-20) Any size, usually defined by context

One or several Theoretical Small number participants/ texts

Community/ group unit

Vary based on methods used

Outcome Multi format Multi format Primarily text Primarily text Primarily text Social change Text and statistics

EXERCISE 2: MAPPING METHODS 10 minutes

ANSWERS

• Dahlberg, Karin, Les Todres, and Kathleen Galvin. "Lifeworld-led healthcare is more than patient-led care: An existential view of well-being." Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy 12.3 (2009): 265-271. (Phenomenology)

• Bacsu, Juanita R., et al. "Healthy aging in place: Supporting rural seniors’ health needs." Online Journal of Rural Nursing and Health Care 12.2 (2012): 77-87. (Ethnography)

• Burnard, Philip. "A method of analysing interview transcripts in qualitative research." Nurse education today 11.6 (1991): 461-466. (Grounded Theory)

• Moran, G. S., and Peter Fonagy. "Psychoanalysis and diabetic control: A single-case study." British Journal of Medical Psychology 60.4 (1987): 357-372.

• Loewe, Ronald, et al. "Doctor talk and diabetes: towards an analysis of the clinical construction of chronic illness." Social Science & Medicine 47.9 (1998): 1267-1276. (Discourse Analysis)

• Minore, Bruce, et al. "Addressing the realties of health care in northern aboriginal communities through participatory action research." Journal of Interprofessional Care 18.4 (2004): 360-368.

• Dickson, Victoria Vaughan, Christopher S. Lee, and Barbara Riegel. "How do cognitive function and knowledge affect heart failure self-care?." Journal of mixed methods research 5.2 (2011): 167-189.

CHOOSING WAYS TO CAPTURE DATA

(PARTICIPANT) OBSERVATION

• Anthropology: To gain a close and intimate familiarity with a given group of individuals and their practices through an intensive involvement with people in their cultural environment, usually over an extended period of time (no problem!)

• Useful for “thick description”: The detailed account of field experiences in which the researcher makes explicit the patterns of cultural and social relationships and puts them in context

• Fieldnotes: The systematic description of events, behaviors, and artifacts in the social setting chosen for study (it’s messy!)

(PARTICIPANT) OBSERVATION

• What kind of observer will you be? (passive, moderate, active)

• Challenges: Boundary blurring, impression management, need for personal reflexivity, “front stage” behaviour, ethical considerations, time commitment, can be/feel overwhelming

FOCUS GROUPS

• A group of interacting individuals having some common interest or characteristics, brought together by a moderator, who uses the group and its interaction as a way to gain information about a specific or focused issue

• Useful in understanding how or why people hold certain beliefs about a topic or program of interest

FOCUS GROUPS

• One group = One unit of analysis

• Several groups needed for validity

• Challenges: Group dynamics, organizational requirements, developing questionnaire

INTERVIEW

• Informal: Researcher is required to recollect discussion

• Unstructured: Researcher allows interview to proceed at respondent’s pace and subjects to vary by interviewee (to an extent)

• Semi-structured: Researcher uses an interview guide, but respondent is given freedom to respond

• Structured: Researcher uses identical situation and adheres to interview schedule

INTERVIEW

• Useful to explore in-depth the views, experiences, beliefs and motivations of individual participants

• Challenges: Guiding the interview, sensitive topics, interviewer “bias”, developing questionnaire

TEXTUAL ANALYSIS

• Systematic analysis of texts: documents, oral communication, and graphics (including other non-linguistic artifacts)

• Use existing texts

• Similarities and differences with “discourse analysis”; huge range of approaches

• Chart notes, policies, brochures, websites (intraweb), conference proceedings, media, photographs and images

TEXTUAL ANALYSIS

• Useful to try and obtain a sense of the ways in which, in particular cultures at particular times, people make sense of the world around them. (“Thick description”)

• Challenges: Defining methodological approach, defining boundaries

TRIANGULATION

• Analyzing a research question from multiple perspectives is to arrive at consistency across data sources or approaches

• Combining multiple observers, theories, methods, and empirical materials, to overcome the weakness or intrinsic biases and the problems that come from single method, single-observer and single-theory studies

• Used in both qualitative and quantitative research design

QUALITATIVE ANALYSIS

ANALYSIS

• The range of processes and procedures whereby we move from data that have been collected into some form of explanation, understanding, or interpretation of the people and situations we are investigating.

• Analysis based on an interpretive philosophy.

• Idea is to examine the meaningful and symbolic content of qualitative data.

ANALYSIS

• Deductive approach • Using your research question to group the data then look for similarities or

differences • Used when time, resources are limited (and dependent on methodology)

• Inductive approach • Using emergent framework to group the data and then look for relationships

• “Tacking back and forth” between approaches

POINTS OF ANALYTIC FOCUS

• The primary message content • The attitude of the speaker • Whether content is meant to represent individual or group-shared ideas • The degree which content/speaker is representing actual vs. hypothetical

experience

Criteria Issues Solutions

Credibility (= internal validity) “Truth” value Prolonged and persistent observation. Triangulation, peer debriefing, member checks, deviant case analysis

Transferability (= external validity) Applicability Thick description, referential adequacy, reflexive journal, saturation

Dependability (= reliability) Consistency Dependability audit, reflexive journal

Conformability (= objectivity) Neutrality Conformability audit, reflexive journal

TERMINOLOGY

• Coding: The approach of attaching labels to lines of text so that the researcher can group and compare similar or related pieces of information.

• Coding sorts: Compilation of similarly coded blocks of texts from different sources into a single file or report (also known as “bucket” coding)

• Indexing: Processes that generate a word list comprising all the substantive words and their locations within the texts, entered into a program (Nvivo, Atlas.ti)

TERMINOLOGY

• Characteristic: A single item or event in a text; smallest unit of analysis

• Themes: Idea categories that emerge from grouping of lower-level data points

• Theory: An interrelated set of concepts, definitions and propositions that present a systematic review of events or situations by specifying relations between variables (i.e. categories)

GROUP EXERCISE 3 – CODING AND DEVELOPING ANALYSIS

#1 Focus

• Attitudes

• Emotions

• Ideas

• Words

• Relationships

• Themes

#2 Steps

• Read through first

• Sentence coding

• Organize your codes

• Share with partner

• Refine codes

GROUP THREE EXERCISE DISCUSSION

ANALYTIC SOFTWARE

• It is possible to conduct qualitative analysis without software

• Can be used in all phases of data collection, analysis, and reporting

• Pros and cons

EXAMPLES OF ANALYTIC SOFTWARE

QUALITATIVE REPORTING – WHO, WHAT, WHEN, WHERE, WHY & HOW

Focus • Academic: Conceptual

framework/theories, methodology and interpretation

• Practitioners: Concrete suggestions for better practice, policy recommendations

• Lay readers: Problem solving, reform on practice/policy

Format • Research report

• Academic journal article

• Report to donor

• Evaluation report

• Community capacity building

• Non-traditional

• Multi-media

ETHICS • Main obligation: To ensure are all well-informed

• Purpose, risks and benefits, expectations of participation, how results will be used, reporting back, ownership of data

• Non-coercive (often captive and/or vulnerable populations) • Need to examine historical, political, economic and cultural aspects of your participants

• Work for mutual benefit of all • The application of medical research ethics to qualitative research can be awkward (at best)

WHEN IN DOUBT – ASK & COLLABORATE • Fraser Health’s Department of Evaluation and Research Services

• http://www.fraserhealth.ca/health-professionals/research-and-evaluation/

• Next workshop offering: Focus Groups and Interviews: May 16, 2018.

Marisa

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Department of Evaluation and Research Services

Thank You!

November 12, 2017 | Central City, Surrey BC

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