Main Criticisms of Qualitative Research
•Subjectivity leads to procedural problems
•Replicability is very difficult
•Unreliable
•Researcher bias is built in and unavoidable
•In-depth, comprehensive approach to
data gathering limits scope
•Labor intensive
•Time consuming
•Expensive
•Very unreliable
•(See Haralambos Methodology Chapter)
Changes in the Socio-Political System (GLOBAL)
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Marketization and global capitalism
Problems of Gender identities
Unjust social relations - class
Problems of National identities
Imposed knowledge
The oppression of minorities
organized violence
The hegemonic ranslational institutions and the
control of nation states and social actors
• Global surveillance, issues of privacy and the
manipulation of identities and social practices
through global information and communication
technologies
• Incivility
Changes in the Socio-Political System
(GLOBAL)/Intellectual and Academic
• 1980s Postmodernism
• Representations – it was understood that
researchers/people created reality through their
representational, textual and interpretive
practices – the emergence of the discourse turn
(text, action, sounds, images) associated with
Foucault and Derrida
• How to (Re)present information The merging of
social science and the humanities
• Politics of doing research
• Ethics and doing funded research
• Purpose – What is the purpose of the social
sciences?
Changes in the Socio-Political System (GLOBAL)
• Need for deeper and rich understanding of social
and political life
• Need for in-depth Examination of Phenomena
(greater insights and depth) - Provide thick
descriptions of a phenomena
• Extracts meaning from data
• Examine and answer complex questions that can be
impossible with quantitative methods
• Need for a tool which explore new areas of social
and political life
• Need for a holistic approach
understanding/interpreting and explaining social life
build new theories – new association between
variables and deconstruct existing ones.
Changes/Revolutions in the
nature of Qualitative Research
• The emergence of new theories
–Hermeneutics
–Critical Inquiry
–Feminism
–Postmodernism
Changes/Revolutions in the
nature of Qualitative Research
• The emergence of new methodologies
– Grounded theory
– Heuristic inquiry
– Action research
– Discourse analysis/Critical Discourse
Analysis
– Feminist/Critical/Postcolonial and
Postmodern Ethnography
Changes in the nature of
Qualitative Research
• The emergence of new data collection and data
analysis tools – to verify and make possible the
reproduction of a research project –
trustworthiness
• Trustworthiness includes elements such as
credibility, confirmability,
transferability/Replicability (Lincoln and Guba,
1985).
• Reflexivity
Trustworthiness
Naturalistic terms
credibility
Transferability/ Replicability
dependability
confirmability
Credibility
• Prolonged Engagement
• Persistent Observation
• Conduct peer consultations with colleagues – get
their
• interpretations of the data
• Discuss issues such as the theoretical and
accessible population, sampling frame and the
actual sample, methodology, methods, the
theoretical framework and the framing of the study
• Use data (methods) triangulation
• use of multiple methods
• Use different data sources to study a phenomena
• Member Checks
Transferability and Dependability
Can the research be replicated else where (is it reliable)?
• Transferability or replicability is concerned with the
readiness of both researchers and users of research
findings to optimize the utilization of research
elsewhere.
• Such an undertaking is dependent on "solid descriptive
data," or "thick description" (See Gertz Photocopy docuspot) which the interview procedure for this study
provided.
• This was also facilitated through the use of the Audit
Trail where the researcher thus establishes a trackable
and documentable process (Lincoln and Guba, 1985).
• Replicability was enhanced through the use of a Case
Study Protocol and the Case Study Database (Refer
to docuspot photocopy).
Confirmability
Are the findings a product of the focus of the
inquiry and not the biases of the researcher?
• Track data to their sources
• Audit Trail