Qualitative Research

Methods

Presented by Sundus Khalid

 Definitions of Qualitative and Quantitative Research

Quantitative Research Qualitative Research

A type of educational research in
which the researcher decides
what to study, asks specific,
narrow questions, collects
numeric (numbered) data from
participants, analyzes these
numbers using statistics, and
conducts the inquiry in an
unbiased, objective manner.
e.g. we can count the number of sheep on
a farm or measure the gallons of milk
produced by a cow.
A type of educational research in
which the researcher relies on the
views of participants, asks broad,
general questions, collects data
consisting largely of words (or text)
from participants, describes and
analyzes these words for themes,
and conducts the inquiry in a
subjective, biased manner.
e.g. The hair colors of players on a football
team, the color of cars in a parking lot, the
letter grades of students in a classroom

Educational Research 2e: Creswell

 Subjective information or writing is based on personal opinions, interpretations, points of
view, emotions and judgment. Objective information or analysis is fact-based, measurable
and observable.
 Characteristics of Quantitative and Qualitative
Research in the Process of Research
Quantitative Steps in the Qualitative
Characteristics Research Process Characteristics
•Descriptive/Explanatory •Exploratory/
Identifying a Problem Understanding
•Major Role a Central Phenomena
•Justify Problem
Reviewing the Literature •Minor Role
•Justify Problem
•Specific
and Narrow
•General and Broad
•Measurable/Observable Specifying a Purpose •Participants’ Experience
•Pre-determined
•General, emerging form
Instruments Collecting Data •Text or image data
•Numeric Data
•Small Number
•Large numbers
•Text Analysis
•Statistical Analyze and •Description
and Themes
•Description of Trends Interpret Data •Larger Meanings of Findings
•Comparisons/Predictions
•Flexibleand Emerging
•Standard and Fixed
•Objective and Unbiased
Report and Evaluate •Reflexive and Biased

Educational Research 2e: Creswell

Choice of Research Methods

Research methods are split broadly into quantitative and qualitative

methods

your research questions

Which you choose will depend your underlying philosophy of
on research
your preferences and skills
Epistemology (In simple terms, epistemology is the theory of knowledge and deals with how
knowledge is gathered and from which sources)

Social constructionists believe that reality does not

the way in Two main Positivists exist by itself. Instead, it is constructed and given
which you schools are believe that meaning by people. Their focus is therefore on
choose to positivism and the best way feelings, beliefs and thoughts, and how people
investigate social to investigate communicate these. Social constructionism fits
the world constructionis the world is better with a relativist ontology.
m through
objective
methods.
 Some things can’t be measured – or measured
accurately

What’s wrong Doesn’t tell you why

with
quantitative Can be impersonal – no engagement with
research? human behaviours or individuals

Data can be static – snapshots of a point in

time
Static means fixed
 Postpostivism

Social Constructivism
Paradigms/Worldviews
Advocacy/Participator
y
Pragmatism
 • Natural setting (field focused), a source of data for close
interaction
• Researcher as key instrument of data collection
• Multiple data sources in words or images
Characteristi • Analysis of data inductively, recursively, interactively

cs of • Focus on participants' perspectives, their meanings,

their subjective views

Qualitative • Framing of human behavior and belief within a social-

political/historical context or through a cultural lens
Research • Emergent rather than tightly prefigured design
• Fundamentally interpretive inquiry researcher reflects
on her or his role, the role of the reader, and the role of
the participants in shaping the study
• Holistic view of social phenomena
 Qualitative research is used when:

• a problem or issue needs to be explored

When to Use • There is a need of complex, detailed understanding of the

issue
Qualitative • When we want to empower individuals to share their
stories, hear their voices, and minimize the power
Research relationships that often exist between a researcher and the
participants in a study
• when we want to write in a literary, flexible style that
conveys stories, theater, or poems, without the restrictions
of formal academic’ structures of writing.
• When quantitative measures and the statistical analyses
simply do not fit the problem.
Five Qualitative
Approaches to Inquiry
• Narrative research
• Phenomenology
• Grounded theory
• Ethnography
• Case studies
 • Narrative research is a qualitative research,
typically focuses on studying one or two
individuals, gathering data through collection of
1. stories, reporting individual experiences, and
Narrative discussing the meaning of those experiences.
Research • In this, researchers describe the lives of
individuals, collect stories about people`s lives,
write narratives of individual experiences.
• Researchers becomes the interpreter of the
individual`s story.
 • A biographical study is a form of
narrative study in which the researcher
writes and records the experiences of
another person's life.
• Autobiography is written and recorded by

Types of the individuals who are the subject of the

study (Ellis, 2004).

Narrative
• A life history portrays an individual's
entire life, while a personal experience
story is a narrative study of an individual's

Research personal experience found in single or

multiple episodes, private situations, or
communal folklore (Denzin, 1989a).
• An oral history consists of gathering
personal reflections of events and their
causes and effects from one individual or
several individuals (Plummer, 1983).
 • It describes the meaning for several individuals of
their lived experiences of a concept or a phenomenon
(object of human experience).
• Prime focus is on describing what all participants have
in common as they experience a phenomenon (e.g.,
grief is universally experienced).
• This human experience may be phenomena such as
2. insomnia, being left out, anger, grief, or undergoing
Phenomenological coronary artery bypass surgery (Moustakas, 1994)
Research • The procedure of implementing this research requires
the inquirer to collect data from persons who have
experienced the phenomenon and develop a
combined description of the essence( johar) of the
experience for all the individuals. This description
consists of "what" they experienced (textural
description) and "how" they experienced it in terms of
the conditions, situations, or context (structural
description) (Moustakas, 1994).
 • hermeneutical phenomenology
describes research as oriented
towards lived experiences
(phenomenology) and interpreting
these (van Manen, 1990). It is not only
Types of a description, but it is also seen as an
interpretive process in which the
Phenomenology researcher makes an interpretation.
• transcendental or psychological
phenomenology is focused less on the
interpretations of the researcher and
more on a description of the
experiences of participants. The
researcher maintains epoche.
• Epoch means time
 • Grounded theory is a qualitative research design
in which the inquirer generates a general
explanation (a theory) of a process, action, or
3. interaction shaped by the views of many
Grounded participants (Strauss & Corbin, 1998).
• Participants in the study would all have
Theory experienced the process, and the development of
Research the theory might help explain practice or provide
a framework for further research.
• A key idea is that this theory-development does
not come "off the shelf," but rather is generated
or "grounded" in data from participants who
have experienced the process (Strauss & Corbin,
1998).
 • The systematic procedures of Strauss and
Corbin (1990, 1998), the investigator seeks
to systematically develop a theory that
explains process, action, or interaction on
a topic (e.g., the process of developing a
curriculum). The researcher typically
Types of conducts 20 to 30 interviews based on
several visits "to the field" to collect

Grounded
interview data to saturate the categories.
• Instead of embracing the study of a single
process or core category as in the Strauss
Theory and Corbin (1998) approach, Charmaz
advocates for a social constructivist

Studies perspective that includes emphasizing

diverse local worlds, multiple realities, and
the complexities of particular worlds,
views, and actions. Charmaz places more
emphasis on the views, values, beliefs,
feelings, assumptions, and ideologies of
individuals than on the methods of
research.
 • Ethnography is a qualitative design in which the
researcher describes and interprets the shared
4. and learned patterns of values, behaviors, beliefs,
and language of a culture-sharing group (Harris,
Ethnographic( 1968).
nasal nigari) • Ethnography research seeks to learn the culture
of a particular setting or environment. 
Research • Ethnography is a study through direct observing
and interviewing the group participants in their
natural environment rather than in a lab. The
objective of this type of research is to gain
understanding that how users interact with
things in their natural environment.
 ‫پسماندہ‬

• The realist ethnography is also know as

traditional reasearch or approach used by
cultural anthropologists. Realist ethnography
is an objective account of the situation,
typically written in the third person point of
view and reporting objectively on what is

Types of
observed or heard from participants at a site.
• The critical ethnography is a type of

Ethnographi
ethnographic research in which the authors
advocate(baatkartyhy) for the
emancipation(azadi) of groups
es marginalized(pasmanda) in the society
(Thomas, 1993). Critical researchers typically
are politically minded individuals who seek,
through their research, to speak out against
inequality and domination. It studies the
issues of power, empowerment, inequality,
inequity,dominance(tasalaat), repression,
hegemony, and victimization(masail k shikar).
 A qualitative approach in which the investigator
explores a bounded system (a case) or multiple
5. bounded systems (cases) over time, through
Case Study detailed, in-depth data collection involving multiple
sources of information (e.g., observations,
Research interviews, audiovisual material, and documents
and reports), and reports a case description and
case-based themes.
 Types of qualitative case studies are
distinguished by the size of the bounded case,
such as whether the case involves one
individual, several individuals, a group, an
entire program, or an activity.
They may also be distinguished in terms of the
intent of the case analysis. Three variations

Types of
exist in terms of intent:
1. In a single instrumental case study (Stake,

Case Study
1995), the researcher focuses on an issue
or concern, and then selects one bounded
case to illustrate this issue.

Research 2. In a collective case study (or multiple case

study), the one issue or concern is again
selected, but the inquirer selects multiple
case studies to illustrate the issue.
3. An intrinsic case study in which the focus
is on the case itself (e.g., evaluating a
program, or studying a student having
difficulty (Stake, 1995) because the case
presents an unusual or unique situation.
Comparison of Five Approaches