Hannah Hilfer
Critical Response # 1
Dr. Vigilant
15 September 2014
Critical Response to Lindsey’s “Impact of Homelessness and Shelter Life
on Family Relationships”
Elizabeth W. Lindsey conducted qualitative research on homeless women in her
paper “Impact of Homelessness and Shelter Life on Family Relationships.” According to R.
Burke Johnson’s article titled “Examining the Validity Structure of Qualitative Research”,
this study conducted by Lindsey is, for the most part, valid. He proposed strategies for
conducting valid research and in this paper I plan to test Lindsey’s article against those
strategies.
The first strategy in Johnson’s article is “Researcher as Detective” Lindsey’s work
meets this standard of validity. She did act as a detective by asking questions and giving a
thick description (Geertz, 1973) of shelter-life and rules. However, she does not work very
hard to eliminate opposing hypothesis in her work. This is a problem because it means that
she only includes facts that support her theory with no mention of how there could be bias
in her facts or data.
The second strategy mentioned in Johnson’s article is extended fieldwork. Lindsey’s
research was conducted in two phases. The first phase was a secondary analysis of data
Lindsey herself collected for the Georgia rehabilitation study conducted in 1993-1994.
This would be considered extensive fieldwork because data was collected for about one
year. Elizabeth Lindsey herself also conducted phase two of the study. There was no
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mention of the length of time this period of the research was conducted, so I cannot say
whether or not she meets the requirements of valid research with extended fieldwork.
Johnson’s third strategy is “low interference descriptors.” This means that the
researcher worked diligently to make sure the accounts from participants are as close to
exact as possible. Lindsey used many direct quotes from participants and even sent
summaries of the interviews to the participants for them to review for accuracy. According
to Johnson’s definition of “low interference descriptors”, Lindsey’s article is valid in this
respect.
The fourth strategy of valid research that Johnson includes is “triangulation”.
Triangulation means that the research was “cross-checked” by using multiple other sources
to confirm the hypothesis. Triangulation of data, methods, investigator, and theory are all
important practices if one wants to conduct valid research. Lindsey triangulated the data
collected in phase one with phase two in order to find commonalities in the data. Her
methods of research were also triangulated.
She used elements of the constant
comparative method to analyze data from both phases of data. Lindsey conducted all of the
interviews, but she did use other researchers to interpret the data, so she did have
investigator triangulation in that sense, but I do not think Johnson would consider it valid
unless more than one researcher collected the data analyzed in Lindsey’s article. The last
type of triangulation necessary for valid research is theory triangulation.
Lindsey
mentioned theories of relationships within homeless families in her literature that she used
to base her research question and interview questions off of. This is a valid type of
triangulation.
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The next strategy of Johnsons research validity paper is “participant feedback.”
Lindsey did send her paper to the participants of the study for a final review of validity
before publishing the paper and was open to feedback from the participants. However, it
does not mention much about participant feedback and I wonder how much of the article
could be comprehended by the participants.
The next strategy in Johnson’s article is that the paper has been peer reviewed.
Lindsey’s article meets this requirement which adds to the validity of the research.
“Negative case sampling” is the next strategy. This means that the researcher found
something in the data that was unexpected or not predicated when initially asking the
research question. Lindsey did find a few families that were not impacted highly from
being homeless or living under shelter rules, however negative case sampling was sparse
and if she wanted to add to the validity of her research she should have included more
negative cases to her study.
The twelfth strategy in Johnson’s validity article is “reflexivity.” This means that the
author of the paper explicitly mentions biases and predispositions in respect to the study.
Lindsey did not have a reflexivity section in her paper. This leads readers to question the
validity of her research because without knowing predispositions of the researcher, the
reader is unsure if any questions or methods of research and collecting data contained
biases.
Finally, Johnson’s last strategy of validity is “pattern matching.” Lindsey predicted
certain patterns of impact that homelessness and shelter life would have on families. For
example, she predicted that families would encounter stress and trauma from losing their
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home and control over their own lives. She found this to be true in most cases; thus,
validating her predicted patterns.
The study in phase one consisted of 10 Georgia women who were formerly
homeless and currently stably re-housed for at least 6 months. Key informants from the
shelter nominated individuals to be a part of this study based on the informants’
perception of success re-housing.
When looking at this phase of the study critically, I called in to question the small
sample size (Excellent Point!) and the authors attempt at generalizing the findings. The
sample was not diverse; the women came from only 3 shelters in a metropolitan area in
Georgia. Also, by drawing the sample from the key informant’s perception of successful rehousing this limits the study to women who were hand picked and likely very similar. In
order to make phase 1 more reliable, they should have randomly interviewed many more
women from numerous shelters. (This would enhance “external validity” as well!)
Phase two consisted of seven participants and over represented African American
women with a ratio of six African American women to one Caucasian woman.
Overrepresentation makes generalizing findings next to impossible. This was also a
nominated sample with the same criterion as the women in phase one. Participants in both
studies were limited to single mothers, aged 19-52 years old. This limits the findings and
excludes young homeless mothers and coupled families who may have great input on the
effects of homelessness on family relationships. This phase was conducted in North
Carolina from four shelters in more urban areas than in the first phase of interviews.
In both studies, the interviews were conducted with the mothers and largely
consisted of questions about how the mother perceived the situation. The study did have
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meaningful findings about how shelter life impacts the mothering role and what affects
came with having to follow the rules of the shelter. The interviews also helped to gain an
understanding of the mothers’ emotional states and attitudes about homelessness. A large
portion of the data used to understand family relationships was collected through
interviews with the mothers about their perceptions of their child(ren)’s well being and
emotional state during the period of homelessness. In order to get a more holistic view of
the emotions of the children the interviewers should have gone directly to the children for
the information to avoid bias or denial from the mother who may not fully understand the
impact homelessness had on the child(ren).
In conclusion, Elizabeth W. Lindsey’s research could have significantly added to the
knowledge of the impact homelessness and shelter life has on family relationships and
could be considered valid when held to the criterion put forth by Johnson, however the
small sample size severely limited the findings.
In order to explain the impact
homelessness and shelter life has on family relationships, Lindsey should have triangulated
by collecting data through interviews and surveys from not just women, but also men,
children, and shelter employees. The samples were collected through nominations, not
random. I believe that this leads to an inaccurate view of homelessness because nomination
of participants can be rooted in bias whereas random samples leave out bias and are more
representative of the population. The only women eligible for the study were women who
were single and managed to make it out of the shelter. This led to a sample of women who
were had opportunities to move out of homelessness and hence, probably led to less family
dysfunction.
I think it would be beneficial to the realm of knowledge on family
relationships to also include families that are in a constant state of struggle.
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Furthermore, including only two states and 17 women in the study does not make
the finding generalizable across the country. {Excellent point!} States have different laws
and different social programs so the reason for homelessness among people in different
states may vary and contribute to the well being of families and the relationships between
members.
Another method that made the findings unreliable was that this study relied
heavily on perceptions. Key informant chose individuals to be studied based on their
perceptions of successful individuals and findings of children’s well-being and happiness
were based on the perception of their mother. In order to have sound findings, the
researcher should not have drawn conclusions from these perceptions, but rather should
have talked to potential participants and children to fully understand the struggles they
were dealing with.
The research question was very interesting and very important in order to
understand the situations homeless families are in. Understanding these situations can
lead to social action that works to benefit and give opportunity to individuals who are
struggling to maintain a stable home. In order to understand these situations, more
extensive qualitative research needs to be conducted. Women and men of all ages, stages of
life and location, as well as children should be interviewed to fully understand the impacts
homelessness and shelter life has on family relationships.
References:
Geertz, Clifford. 1973. The Interpretation of Culture. New York Basic Books.
Johnson, Burke R. 1997. Examining the Validity Structure of Qualitative Research.
Education, Vol. 188: 282-292.
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Lindsey, Elizabeth W. 1998. “The Impact of Homelessness and Shelter Life on Family
Relationships.” Family Relations, Vol. 47(3):243-251.
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