Qualitative research is, in a nutshell, a research method that emphasizes looking at variables in the natural setting in which the research is conducted. Honestly, it is still a little foreign to me so I had to look at a lot of several websites that described what it was to come up with that definition. Traditional research would be considered quantitative research. That is where you focus predominantly on the results vs. the qualitative research that looks at the interaction between the variables. (Qualitative research appears to be primarily in the field of social sciences.) For example, suppose I wanted to examine how a group of twenty people progressed over the course of a year when they exercised regularly for a year. Quantitative research may show you the physical and mental results. It would show that those that exercised had more energy, lower blood pressure, less depression, better performance at work, etc. Qualitative research, however, would look at the conditions in when the experiment was conducted. I don't mean that it would examine the weather or time of day or anything like that. It would be more like examining how the same conditions may have a different effect on different people even though they were in the same situation or how minor changes would influence their decisions. The thought that comes to mind to me is the scene in the original "Jurrasic Park" movie where Dr. Malcom is talking about his chaos theory. Even that is still not qualitative research but it is the closest comparison that I can really make.
Our reading assignment over qualitative research identified eight main characteristics of qualitative research. The following list can be retrieved from http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejournals/JTE/v9n1/hoepfl.html.
1. Qualitative research uses the natural setting as the source of data.
2. The researcher acts as the "human instrument" of data collection.
3. Qualitative researchers predominantly use inductive data analysis.
4. Qualitative research reports are descriptive.
5. Qualitative research has an interpretive character, aimed at discovering the meaning events have for the individuals who experience them, and the interpretations of those meanings by the researcher.
6. Qualitative researchers pay attention to the idiosyncratic as well as the pervasive, seeking the uniqueness of each case.
7. Qualitative research has an emergent (as opposed to predetermined) design, and researchers focus on this emerging process as well as the outcomes or product of the research.
8. Qualitative research is judged using special criteria for trustworthiness.
(Sanders, 1997)
It is actually quite fortuitous that we are being introduced to this concept at this point in the class. As I previously mentioned, we are moving into the research project phase. The research project in this class is very different from what we are used to doing. We aren't just researching a theory or program or statistics. Instead, we are researching something that is relevant to us as it applies to developing our critical thinking and leadership skills. I think that my topic is really being boiled down to obstacles to critical thinking that I face. Just as those obstacles can mutate and shift, so, too, can qualitative research. It doesn't have a predetermined path. It focuses on the humanism and the spirit of the subject instead of just looking at the end result. That all matches the pattern of the development of the obstacles that we all face with critical thinking.
One interesting story about qualitative research from my week - On Tuesday, I had printed out the article that we were to read on qualitative research to read on my commute to work. I had to go to our headquarters in Brooklyn for training so I had about an hour on the subway. I can only imagine how my face must have looked to my fellow commuters. Honestly, this is a very deep subject and the article read like a technical order complete with "big words". I read the article twice on my commute just to make sure that I understood. Well...I didn't. However, when I got to my company headquarters for the training, we were ushered into the conference room where we were introduced to the team that came in to give the class. It was all of that touchy-feely personality stuff. The main woman, Dr. Tobias, was a social scientist. After the class, I was chit-chatting with her a little and I wanted to sound smart so I said, "I bet that they get all of these results through qualitative research" and she said, "That is EXACTLY what this is". That is when I had to be honest with her that I didn't know what I was really talking about and she was kind enough to break it down for me. What we were doing was not just training but also qualitative research. We were being observed in our natural setting. What we were saying wasn't anywhere near as important as how we were reacting to one another based on our environment. When she explained it, I finally had my "ah-HA!" moment and I began to realize what qualitative research actually is. But truly, I am just beginning to realize it. This is still a foreign concept to me but I am very interested in exploring it more.
No comments:
Post a Comment