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2 a survey of qualitative data collection methods

to live in the social world is to experience and refl ect upon it daily. But to understand it deeply from a researcher’s perspective requires that we collect suffi cient evidence to document the pat- terns, categories, and meanings that humans have created. Th is documentation helps us to systematically and credibly examine, extract, and construct from the complexity of living its essences and essentials in order to exist in a better world. But there are also times when the complexities and ambiguities of being human are exactly what we need to document and report to contemplate the messy mysteries of it.

Some qualitative research studies may employ only one data collection method, such as interviewing participants, because the personal histories and worldviews of individuals will best answer the researcher’s questions. Other studies will incorporate at least three diff erent methods, such as interviews, participant observa- tion, and written surveys, to gather a broader spectrum of evidence and perspectives to enhance the credibility and trustworthiness of an analysis. Other studies may not include interaction with partici- pants at all, relying solely instead on the examination of documents, artifacts, and other material products humans have created.

Saldana, J. (2011). Fundamentals of qualitative research. ProQuest Ebook Central <a onclick=window.open('http://ebookcentral.proquest.com','_blank') href='http://ebookcentral.proquest.com' target='_blank' style='cursor: pointer;'>http://ebookcentral.proquest.com</a> Created from lehman-ebooks on 2020-11-30 13:42:04.

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During data collection, you’ll certainly use several tools of the trade such as notepads and pens, laptop computers, digital voice recorders, and so on to document your fi eldwork. But it is the researcher him- or herself who is generally regarded as the pri- mary data collection instrument in qualitative research. Methods are not just seemingly mechanical techniques such as observing, writing, counting, and transcribing; methods also include your cognitive and aff ective processes such as inferring, intuiting, empa- thizing, and evaluating. Th ese, too, can and should be documented because what you think, feel, and do during the entire research process are data as well.

Th is chapter surveys several data collection methods most oft en used by qualitative researchers. It is deliberately placed before the chapter on qualitative research design, fi rst to acquaint you with the technical vocabulary of the fi eld, and later to consider the meth- ods’ appropriateness for your particular project’s purpose, research questions, and proposed representational and presentational forms. Also keep in mind that virtually all of the methods described in this chapter assume that you have secured any necessary institutional approvals and individual participant consent beforehand to con- duct the study and collect the data (see Chapter 3).

Interviewing Participants

Many, if not most, qualitative research studies rely on interviews with participants. Th e data collection method is an eff ective way of soliciting and documenting, in their own words, an individual’s or group’s perspectives, feelings, opinions, values, attitudes, and beliefs about their personal experiences and social world, in addi- tion to factual information about their lives. Your research topic, purpose, and questions form the basis for the subjects you cover and types of questions you ask during an interview, but the impro- vised conversation may also generate unexpected areas and insights for further inquiry.

Interview formats can range from highly structured, consisting of a set of prepared and specifi c questions to be asked in a particular order of each participant, to unstructured, consisting of nothing more than a general list of topics for possible exploration. Interviews can be prearranged but also happen spontaneously, such as when

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an opportunity arises to speak to a participant aft er you’ve observed her at work, and a span of ten minutes or so becomes available for a brief chat. Interviews can be conducted with just one person, sev- eral individuals separately, a couple, a family, or a larger number of people organized as a focus group. Depending on several factors, participants can be interviewed once or several times across the fi eldwork period.

Selecting Participants to Interview

Determine which specifi c persons are appropriate for interviews and those most likely to provide substantive answers and responses to your inquiries. Of course, if your project is a case study of one particular individual, that selection is a given. But if your fi eld- work is at a site where there are several people from which to choose, consider whose perspectives will best represent the diverse landscape of the social and cultural setting. For example, if your fi eldwork is at a public school, individual interviews could be con- ducted with teachers and children from all grade levels, children’s parents, the administrative staff (including the principal and secre- taries), the service staff (such as janitors, cafeteria workers, and bus drivers), the school district’s board members and superintendent, and others related in tangential to embedded ways to the setting’s daily operations.

Of course, limited time, budget, and researcher energies will not enable you to interview everyone involved with the culture of schooling. Th us, sampling — the strategic, referred, random, and/or serendipitous selection of participants — will be used for relevant research purposes to collect a representatively broad to tightly focused overview of perspectives. If your research questions deal with a specifi c subset of a population, such as gender, ethnicity, age group, sexual orientation, occupation, status, or those with par- ticular background experiences or histories, soliciting volunteers from among those cohorts is the obvious approach.

But how many participants are “enough” to fi nd out what you want to learn? Th ere are varying opinions on this. Studying the single individual case in depth makes for a rich profi le, but the individual is not always representative of the population at large. Some studies have compared two diverse individuals separately

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to compare and contrast their perspectives. A small group of three to six people provides a broader spectrum of data for analysis, while others attest that, for selected methodologies, a minimum of ten to twenty participants is needed to insure more credible and trustworthy fi ndings. Still others will recommend that you contin- uously interview people only until you’re learning nothing new. At the opposite end of the spectrum, a large-scale project with a staff of research team members may interview hundreds of individuals across several years to assess longitudinal participant change. How many participants are “enough” can depend on many factors, but as long as you have suffi cient interview data, whether from one person or twenty, you’ll then have a suffi cient corpus for analysis.

A caveat on convenience sampling: Some beginning qualitative researchers want to know if they can ask their friends to serve as participants in their projects. Th is request perhaps stems from the need to feel secure working on a new endeavor with people they already know and can easily access. But I do not recommend it. Depending on the topic, you may put your friends in awkward situations during interviews and observations. You might also make too many assumptions about what you feel you already know about your friends. And, you lose out on some valuable expe- rience on what is takes to gain entry to a new site and to secure all necessary permissions and arrangements for fi eldwork. Th e opti- mal choice is to research people you’ve never met before, or those with whom you’re merely acquainted, and in specifi c locations and settings you have not visited or studied in depth. A famous ethno- graphic saying goes, “Make the strange familiar and the familiar strange,” meaning that our goal is to come to new and intimate awareness and understanding about unfamiliar and taken-for- granted aspects of social life. Studying good friends you already know contributes little to your growth as a qualitative researcher.

Preparing for the Interview

Attend to the logistical matters of the preplanned interview. Contact or connect with your participant to negotiate an interview date, start and end time, and specifi c location — all at the participant’s convenience. Th e day and time block should be one in which the participant will not feel fatigued or rushed, if possible. Th e specifi c

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location chosen should be free of noisy distractions, one that per- mits relative privacy to talk, and one that makes the participant feel comfortable and secure. If the space, such as a breakout room, needs to be scheduled with an administrator or facilities manager, the interviewer should attend to this detail and get some type of confi rmation that the room is available and reserved for the date and time block. Contact your participant at least one day before the interview by phone and/or e-mail (if the participant has access to this technology) as a courtesy reminder, or to reschedule, if nec- essary, in case the participant needs to change the date, time, or location. Th ough not always necessary, it is sometimes useful to tell the participant ahead of time what will generally be covered at the interview.

Available time during interviews is most oft en limited, so every question asked should serve some purpose toward the research agenda. A fi rst-time interview with a participant may go more smoothly if you develop a set of questions and prompts beforehand. Some methodologists have labeled this an interview protocol . Th e interview questions are most oft en diff erent from the research questions but should derive from them to keep the study grounded. Generally, good interview questions solicit participant perspec- tives and stories. For example, if one of your study’s research ques- tions is: “What is the relationship between an individual and a pet?,” some possible interview questions and prompts suggested by the research question might read:

• “What kind of pet do you have?” • “Tell me about [pet’s name].” • “What is he/she like?” • “What kinds of daily routines do you do with and for

[pet’s name]?”

Notice that “owning” a pet is a construct deliberately excluded from the questions, since “ownership” suggests a relationship that may not be held within the worldview of the participant. Prewriting some sample questions beforehand attunes you to careful language choices during the interview. Th ese questions will hopefully gen- erate responses that are inference laden — meaning that the answers provided by the participant clue you in as to how the individual perceives and takes care of his/her pet, and suggests a repertoire of

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particular values, attitudes, and beliefs. Of course, sometimes the best question to ask is the one you yourself are trying to answer. Th us, an interview question directly related to the research ques- tion might read:

• “How would you describe the relationship between you and [pet’s name]?”

Preparing “I’ve heard” questions, strategically posed aft er the participant has given you her initial responses, enables you to compare your interviewee’s perceptions with those of others:

• “I’ve heard that some people are ‘cat people.’ What is a ‘cat person’ to you?”

• “I’ve heard some people say, ‘My pet is like my child.’ What do you think of that?”

“What if ” questions may also generate answers that provide more dimension to your research questions and solicit deeper per- spectives from participants:

• “What would you do if, heaven forbid, your pet needed a thousand dollar operation to fi x something that was wrong with it? What would determine whether you would spend that much on your pet?”

Th ree of the most common problems I’ve observed in novice interviewers are: constructing closed-ended questions, asking multiple questions as a single prompt, and asking either/or ques- tions. A closed-ended question is one that potentially generates or requires nothing more than a one-word response. Th ere are times when a simple “yes” or “no” is indeed appropriate as an answer, but there may be a tendency to ask too many of them in one sitting, expecting the respondent to automatically elaborate on the topic. An example of a closed-ended question is:

• “Do you take your dog regularly to a vet?”

Even though the respondent may answer “yes,” this requires the researcher to ask a follow-up question. Transforming this into a more open-ended question or prompt is relatively simple and better guarantees a more elaborate response — that is, richer data:

• “Talk about your dog’s health maintenance with your vet.” Saldana, J. (2011). Fundamentals of qualitative research. ProQuest Ebook Central <a onclick=window.open('http://ebookcentral.proquest.com','_blank') href='http://ebookcentral.proquest.com' target='_blank' style='cursor: pointer;'>http://ebookcentral.proquest.com</a> Created from lehman-ebooks on 2020-11-30 13:42:04.

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Th e second problem, asking too many questions at once, can overwhelm an interviewee. A cluster of related, yet too many, ques- tions might read like this:

• “What kind of health care does your dog have? Is she pretty healthy most of the time? Does she have any kinds of recurring problems? Is she ‘high maintenance’?”

If the questions have been prewritten in advance, this problem usually does not happen. Most oft en this issue occurs during the course of the interview when the researcher gets nervous and tries to make it easier for the respondent by improvising alternatives when, in fact, it only makes it worse. A more elegant initiating prompt might be, as noted above,

• “Talk about your dog’s health maintenance with your vet.”

Whatever responses the interviewee gives (number of visits per year, special health issues, etc.) can be followed up with impro- vised questions.

Th e third problem, asking either/or questions, may inadvert- ently set up the respondent with limited choices and may even inhibit genuine answers:

• “Do you take your dog to the vet regularly or only on an as-needed basis?”

• “Does your cat stay around you, or does he tend to keep to himself?”

Sometimes these either/or questions may be inadvertently pre- planned or improvised during the course of the interview. Listening to and transcribing your recording of the event, which includes your own questions and responses, will attune you to any shaky questioning habits.

One recommendation to assess the quality of your prepared questions is to ask them out loud to yourself, then answer the ques- tion you just asked (assuming you have some background experi- ences with or knowledge of the topic). We write our questions on paper, but sometimes we do not voice out loud the possible answers we may receive. If possible, pilot test your interview protocol with someone not involved with the study.

For some interviews, it may be appropriate to use pictures or other items to stimulate participant response. For example, in my

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studies on how children respond to theatre aft er they see a play production, I show them a selected number of photographs of key moments from the performance as a way of assisting their recall and generating participant dialogue. In one of my interviews with teachers about newly written standards, I showed them the fi rst few pages of an offi cial state department of education document and asked them for their initial reactions. And for one of my lon- gitudinal studies, I showed my case participant some artifacts (school materials, videoclips, etc.) from his past that I had saved for almost a decade and asked him what memories they evoked. If appropriate to your study, these visual and tactile prompts tend to stimulate rich response and can sometimes be more eff ective than questions alone.

If the interview is a second or third follow-up exchange from a previous interview, review the recordings and/or transcripts beforehand to formulate new questions or new topics for explora- tion suggested by the data. Something interesting you’d like to know more about, or something that was unclear the fi rst time that needs elaboration, might also generate new and more specifi c follow-up questions.

Finally, before the interview, test your recording equipment to insure it works. Make certain you bring the equipment’s power cord and/or extra batteries in case they’re needed.

Documenting the Interview

Recent technology has made relatively inexpensive digital voice recorders available, though analog microcassette tape recorders are still in use by some. Digital recordings enable downloading onto computer hard drives or onto disks for later transcription and/or transfer into word processing or qualitative data analytic soft ware (discussed later). Videorecording the interview can pro- vide you with more nuances and inferences by analyzing the par- ticipant’s facial expressions and body language. Videorecording small group interviews greatly assists the transcriber to determine who says what passage of conversation. Some participants, how- ever, may feel extremely self-conscious with this equipment present during the process. I have found that voice recording most one-person interviews is suffi cient for qualitative data collection

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purposes, while the documentation of small group interviews or focus groups, particularly with child and adolescent participants, is much easier with a digital videorecording.

Video- or audiorecorded interviews are eventually transformed into written transcripts and/or digitally downloaded into soft ware programs to document and analyze the data. However, there may be those rare but occasional circumstances when capturing verba- tim conversation is not possible. And, unfortunately, sometimes our best eff orts to record an interview are waylaid by technological malfunctions. Th us, your written recollections and reconstruc- tions of what was said become the data record. It is highly recom- mended that you bring to the interview a notepad and pen to jot down key words and phrases spoken by the participant, and personal notes and memos to self.

Conducting the Interview

Th ere can be underlying and unspoken power dynamics between a researcher and a participant during the interview. Some of this stems from what might be perceived as an “expert” persona on the researcher’s part and thus an enhanced status, while the partici- pant might be perceived as an “expert” persona who has informa- tion the researcher wants and needs. Add to this the possible diff erences between the interviewer and interviewee’s ages, gen- ders, ethnicities, social classes, educational backgrounds, and so on, and power relationships and imbalances can potentially increase exponentially.

I advocate that the researcher always enter the interview with an attitude of courtesy and respect. Th e goal is to establish an atmos- phere and working relationship of comfort, security, and equity. Th e participant is doing the researcher a great favor by giving of his or her time and experiences. I attempt to treat my interviewees, regardless of setting, as if they are important invited guests to my home. Also, in daily life we speak diff erently to particular people depending on our assumed roles and social contexts. How we speak to a parent is diff erent from the way we speak to a best friend, to an employer, to our own children, and so on. We should also adopt appropriate tones with our participants. I consider all my interviewees as experts in what they know, but the way I interact

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with an adult participant is diff erent from the way I interact with a child. As an older male in my mid-fi ft ies, I can never have the same kind of interactions and relationship with a child partici- pant as a twenty-fi ve-year-old female might. So, I play a more “grandfatherly” role with youth rather than trying to “act like a kid.”

Th e researcher is always a sympathetic and empathetic listener, someone who does not pass judgment on what the participant says, but one who provides a forum for a voice to be heard. Depending on the topic of the interview and the rapport and level of trust established, some participants may disclose honestly and unabashedly what they think and feel, or reveal questionable actions from their past. Others may wish to give a more favorable impres- sion of self that nothing is wrong and everything is fi ne. Children in particular may off er to the researcher what they think is the “right answer” or what they think the interviewer wants to hear. Attune yourself to the nuances of voice and body language to dis- cern whether participants are being truthful with their responses — not to challenge them directly, but to steer the course of your questioning to get at honest perceptions, opinions, feelings, and value systems.

On the date of the scheduled interview, arrive at the location with suffi cient time before it starts to insure that the space is avail- able. If necessary, rearrange any furnishings in the room, such as chairs and tables, to enable conversation. Bring bottles of water for both you and the participant in case anyone gets thirsty.

At the beginning of the interview, thank the participant for his or her time and willingness to be interviewed. Confi rm the end time of the interview or how much time your participant can off er (which may be diff erent from what the participant originally told you) and honor that end time or time limit. Proceed to any neces- sary permissions documents that may need to be reviewed and signed. Ask for permission to turn on the voice recorder and test it to insure that all’s in working order.

In my fi rst ethnographic project in a public school, I was “up front” with my teacher participant by stating that I was learning how to conduct research. Th e statements below were a deliberate attempt to bring her into the backstage knowledge of what I was doing. Th ough the transcript may read as if I were deliberately

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playing dumb, it was a sincere attempt to establish a sense of how the interview process works and to disestablish any misperceived power relationship:

JOHNNY: I’ve been learning techniques of interviewing in my research methods class, and I’m supposed to describe the purpose and my agenda of the interview. And, so what I wanted to do was to talk about some of the things I’ve been observing that I kind of have questions about — like, for example, the speech tournament, and some of the assignments that you’ve been doing in classes. ‘Cause, I’ve observed things but I don’t know, for example, your reactions to some of the things like that. NANCY: OK. JOHNNY: The tape recorder can be turned off at any time when you feel you don’t want anything on tape. And also, I’m supposed to be taking notes during the interview. I’ve never done that before, and I don’t know what I’m supposed to jot down, but if you see me writing down something it’s because something strikes me to ask you a little later and I don’t want to forget …

I recommend that you, too, let the participant know the back- stage operations of interview mechanics, and the purpose of your study. It demystifi es the process and potentially creates a more equitable relationship.

If this is the fi rst interview or early contact with your partici- pant, and if there is a need to get any essential background infor- mation relevant to the study (such as his or her length of employment, educational background, current circumstances or conditions, and so on), take care of these matters at the beginning before proceeding into more in-depth or sensitive matters. Th e request for and sharing of basic information is a good warm-up for both parties before the heart of the interview.

Again, depending on the topic of your study, some interview questions will generate extended responses, while others will need a back-and-forth exchange with affi rmations, questions, or prompt- ing. In the excerpt below, the principal of an inner-city, lower- income, predominantly Hispanic school in the United States, talks to the interviewer (I) about her occasional substitute teaching for her staff , and one of the case study teachers, Nancy. All utterances from the audiorecording are included below to demonstrate the

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actual conversation that was exchanged. Notice the interviewer’s brief responses throughout:

PRINCIPAL: I think that teaching through games is important. You know, the reason there’s joy here at the school is because I’m insisting on it — you know, that learning will be joyful. And I go into the drama class periodically and teach them some games. I: Uh-huh. PRINCIPAL: Um, I’ve been doing that because Nancy’s been off-campus with the speech contest. I: Right. PRINCIPAL: And, you know, so I’ve been going and taking her class so that she could get some lunch or whatever. I: Oh, I didn’t know that. PRINCIPAL: And I’ve been doing a game called “Detective” with the junior high kids. It’s a mirroring game — you probably know it — you stand in the circle and, and you mirror and you try to, uh, get fast enough so nobody can tell who’s the leader. I: Right. PRINCIPAL: And then you put someone in the middle who tries to detect the leader. I: That’s fascinating, I didn’t know that you would sub for those classes. PRINCIPAL: Oh, yeah, I sub for all the classes here. If a teacher is late or, um, needs to make an appointment or something like that, I’m normally available to do that. I: Do you do that just to, just out of your own heart? PRINCIPAL: I just do it because it just needs to be done. But, you know, I also use it as a way to show, the kids love to do that. Obviously there’s a lot to be learned from mirroring and following directions and that kind of way. And I know a lot of theatre games. I ran, as I said, all those workshops for several years … I: Right. PRINCIPAL: … hired people, you know, monitored them, the whole bit.

It is not necessary for the researcher to provide continuous verbal utterances throughout the interview. In fact, it can become distracting for the participant if used excessively.

In the interview transcript excerpt below, Nancy, a second-year, grades K–8 White teacher in a predominantly Hispanic school in the United States, is being interviewed about her job. Like the interview excerpt above, notice how naturalistic, erratic speech

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patterns have been retained in the transcription. Th is question evoked an extended response that did not need interviewer inter- vention or probes:

I: What kinds of things do you notice about this particular Hispanic population that’s different from a White population, like the kind maybe you had at Johnson Junior High School [during your student teaching internship]? NANCY: Um, for the girls there’s a lot more, there’s a lot of pressure to conform, conform to, um, tradition, conform to what their nana or tata or mom or, you know, might think they should do to conform to be the girl that can have the quinceañera , you know? There’s a lot of tradition, um, in their lives. And they want that, but yet they want it, you know, to be this modern type of teenager, woman, you know, going into womanhood. Um, and I see them struggle with that. I see them struggle with, especially, with especially the girls, like I think, struggling with wanting to succeed, but not wanting to be overly successful, if that makes any sense. They might be the fi rst one and, and, they may have lived in here forever, but they might be the fi rst one who’ve gotten through eighth grade, or who hasn’t gotten pregnant before, you know, the age of 15. And, um, I don’t know if that necessarily has to do with the different race, I don’t think so, I remember, uh, it does in a way, um, I mean I know it does, but I remember some, you know, White kids at Johnson who, who were, you know, they were gonna be 15, they were ready to be pregnant too, you know? It’s, it’s, but it’s, it does in a way, I know it does in a way, you know, have to do with this, with the tradition, and the way she’ll differ there.

As the interview proceeds, take brief jottings to remind you of key words or phrases, or to write new questions and probes for follow-up. If the respondent raises interesting issues or insights that suggest further inquiry, these too can be noted for follow-up and probing (“Tell me some more about _____.”). Avoid inserting your own extended commentary whenever possible; talk little and listen more.

Depending on the topic, or questions that may inadvertently trigger unanticipated responses, a few participants may ask whether they’ve suffi ciently answered the question, venture into negative moods, or become emotionally distressed during the interview. Some of them may apologize for their reactions and try to quickly recover, while others may feel the need to continue talking about something important to them. As an interviewer,

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you may feel awkward with or uncomfortable about your partici- pant’s heightened states, but it is important to maintain and pro- vide a sense of security. Do not ignore or discount the distress; provide encouragement and supportive comments that the feel- ings expressed are valid, that you appreciate the honesty, and that you are there to listen and not to judge.

At the end of the interview, thank the participant for his or her time but keep the voice recorder running. During the closure period, sometimes small-talk proceeds, and the participant may bring up additional thoughts worth documenting on the equipment.

Transcribing the Interview

If possible, immediately aft er the interview, listen to the voice recording from beginning to end to refresh yourself with the con- tents. Play the session on your way home or to your next task. If you are able to take some written notes as you listen, jot down anything that strikes you as an important passage, an insight that got made in your head, a connection to a larger issue, recommenda- tions for follow-up questions, and so on. Also as soon as possible, back up the voice recording for security and begin transcribing the document.

Some researchers hire professional transcribers to transform the interview’s audiorecording into a written text. If funding is available and time is a limited resource, employing these profes- sionals to do the work for you is certainly an option. But by not transcribing an interview you yourself have conducted and will presumably analyze, you lose the opportunity to become intimately familiar with literally every word that was exchanged between you and the participant. Plus, transcribers may not accurately docu- ment the interview event, especially if the recording is of question- able quality. Some methodologists feel that the transcription process is analysis; others state that transcription is a vital warm-up for more in-depth analytic work. I propose that transcribing the interviews you yourself have conducted provides you with cogni- tive ownership of and potentially strong insights about your data.

Virtually everyone who has transcribed an interview comments on how tedious the task is. By the time this book comes to print, voice recognition soft ware that is able to word process multiple

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voices on a single recording may be available to relieve some of the drudgery, but criticism has been levied toward technical accuracy. I now use voice recognition soft ware calibrated to my own voice and speak aloud what my participant has said as I listen to the recording to get it automatically transcribed as a word processing fi le. I can always go back and correct any soft ware errors that were made. Plus, the method is a way of taking even deeper ownership of the inter- view data by actually voicing what the participant himself said.

Depending on your research questions, goals, and experience, it is not necessary to transcribe the entire interview, just the high- lights or what directly addresses your inquiry. I summarize the portions of the interview I am not transcribing verbatim to inform me of what the contents are in case I need to return to the original recording for additional data:

I: What do you think were some of your reasons for the break-up with your fi rst partner? LISA: His drug use was the biggest reason, especially since it was done behind my back, there was just no trust there … [LISA describes how one of her former colleagues got fi red due to an inferred but unproven association with a drug user.] Anyway, yeah, so I just don’t want any kind of relationship with a guy who’s gonna be using drugs and wasting away his money on that kind of shit. It’s bad news all the way around …

Transcribe the entire interview verbatim, of course, if you are conducting such genres as conversation or discourse analysis, which analyzes the detailed nuances of language.

It is also unnecessary to include informal or broken speech such as “uhs,” “ums,” and infl uent strings of speech such as “there was, uh, there was a kind of a, well, a, a,” and so on, unless you need verbatim transcription detail, or feel the erratic speech patterns are inference laden. Use your jottings or the recording to note any spe- cial vocal dynamics by the participant such as signifi cant pauses and word stress. Apply rich text features to portions of the tran- script that stand out to you by italicizing, bolding, or highlighting salient words or passages. Use the conventions of dramatic litera- ture’s stage directions, which are placed in parentheses and in ital- ics, for signifi cant vocal cues, gestures, and body language:

I: You said earlier that you felt there was nothing left for you in your last relationship, so you ended it. What was it that ended it?

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LISA: Hmm. (Extended pause; she looks sideways as she thinks.) I think it started out OK but got worse, much worse , as it went on. Um (moderate pause) , I think I realized that it really wasn’t what I wanted in a relationship, you know? (Nods her head, looks back at me.)

As transcripts are composed, insights and ideas for analytic follow-up may occur to you. Get these thoughts documented in analytic memos (see Chapter 4) or as footnotes or comments on the transcript itself. Interview transcript analysis will be discussed later. Now, the discussion turns to a second major method of data collection.

Participant Observation

Participant observation is a method whose legacy is rooted in the ethnographic research traditions of anthropological studies. Originally, fi eldwork was conducted in foreign countries to observe and carefully document a people’s culture — their patterns of living. Contemporary ethnography now takes place in urban and rural settings, school classrooms, business offi ces, major organizations, and cyberspace. Th e goal is to capture people’s naturalistic actions, reactions, and interactions, and to infer their ways of thinking and feeling. Our written documentation of these human processes of what we say and do, traditionally labeled fi eldnotes , is taken over an extended period of time to insure that we are present to witness the mundane, the typical, and the occasionally extraordinary events that compose human life. Th ese researcher-constructed patterns of social action inform us in ways that we may be unable to gather solely from interviews or other data collection methods.

An interview can be an informative yet nonetheless artifi cial method of learning about an individual or a group of people. Participant observation is primarily the researcher’s take on social action, whereas the interview is the participant’s take. It is by watching people during their routines of daily living that we can supplement the data corpus with another way of knowing. What a participant says to us in an interview about his perspectives, and what we actually observe him doing in everyday life, may or may not corroborate. And what we observe as natural social action

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may intrigue but nevertheless puzzle us. So, participant observa- tion can also function as a prelude to interviewing those we wish to speak with regarding what we saw and heard, and what we want to know more about.

Positionality in Participant Observation

Th ink of what it’s like when you fi rst arrive to a new place, such as a restaurant, university campus, city, country, and so on. Your senses may be a bit overwhelmed as they take in and interpret the unfamiliar surroundings. You move perhaps excitedly but hesitantly at fi rst through the strange environment, unsure of where things are and the customary or expected ways of acting. You observe carefully to try to fi t in, to look for what is familiar among the unfamiliar, and to not make any mistakes lest you appear foolish to others. Sometimes you’ll talk to people who appear as if they belong there, asking questions of them in hopes of getting the information you want and need. One of them may be very friendly to you, and your initial inquiry may soon turn into an extended conversation in which you learn much more about the individual and the new setting. You may even discover that you have quite a bit in common. What you are doing is becoming acquainted with a culture. It may feel awkward at fi rst, but aft er a few return visits or days in that place, your familiarity enables you to navigate more comfortably and confi dently through the social setting, and to participate in it as would another member of the group already established in that environment.

Th is simulation is comparable to ethnographic fi eldwork — the systematic, selective observation and documentation of participants’ actions, reactions, and interactions in their natural social settings. Your research position within this process can vary, and your location (both physical and conceptual) may determine how much and what kinds of data you collect. Th ere is a spectrum of researcher participation in a culture that he or she observes, ranging from an off -to-the-side, “fl y on the wall” perspective, to being fully immersed in the daily activities alongside the people studied (Adler & Adler, 1987 ). Th e various positions along this continuum each have pros and cons for the qualitative researcher. A peripheral lens provides the investigator with a wide angle to assess the small

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details as well as the bigger picture, while documenting in written form the participants’ actions as they occur. At the other end of the continuum, complete participation in the same ways of working and living as the culture under study provides the researcher with experiential knowledge that can more deeply enhance one’s under- standings of social life. Formal fi eldnotes are not documented as life happens but in refl ective “down time.” Th ink of the diff erence between these two positions as comparable to sitting and watching a fi lm as an audience member, to performing as an actor in the fi lm itself. Th ere is, of course, a midrange position in which par- ticipation in the culture’s activities is active but selective, and not as immersed as someone totally embedded in the social group. Th e continuum available also suggests that your location and participation can vary from day to day, depending on the nature and site of the fi eldwork, plus how the diff erent positions can help address your research topic and questions.

Observing Social Life

Newcomers to fi eldwork and fi eldnote taking may feel over- whelmed at fi rst, wondering what to document from the vast array of social details unfolding quickly before them. Acknowledge that you cannot possibly record everything, so as fi eldwork progresses, shift your observational focus like a camera. On one day, observe the general scheme of things; on another day, focus on a particular space or a particular group of people; on another day, record solely what an intriguing individual case does and says; and on yet another day, survey the surrounding neighborhood or environ- ment of the primary fi eld site.

Also, you cannot document everything that happens in a social setting regardless of time spent in the fi eld. Th ere is a selective focus based on your research topic, research questions, or what emerges as salient in the participants’ daily activities. Th e focus of your observations may also narrow as the study proceeds and a few issues rise to surface as core ideas for continued observation and documentation. Some methodologists have categorized what types of human patterns qualitative researchers might observe, but these are just recommended guidelines, not necessarily a fi xed set of areas that must be observed. Gobo ( 2008 ) provides one such list

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of general areas for participant observation (and interview topics as well):

• behaviors, social relations, meetings, interactions, networks; • situations and events; • rules and social conventions; • ceremonies and rituals; • beliefs, attitudes, values, stereotypes, opinions; • emotions, motivations; • cultural products (such as pictures, paintings, movies,

theatre plays, television programs); • documents and texts (historical, literary, journalistic)

(adapted from Gobo, 2008 , p. 203)

Th e above list is a good array of eff ective categories for detailed observations. But since my personal epistemology is life as per- formance, I tend to look for three things in humans as character- participants in their social dramas: action , reaction , and interaction . Action refers not just to what individuals do but also what they say. Reaction is how an individual responds to what is said and done by others. And interaction refers to the reverberative nature of action and reaction in process — in other words, distinct units of action– reaction exchanges. (Th eoretically, everything a person does and says is both an action and reaction. When my alarm clock beeps in the morning, my waking up is a reaction to the loud sound, but waking up is also an action unto itself. Most oft en one of these constructs — action or reaction — plays a more prominent role in what I observe in others and interpret.) My written fi eldnotes do not necessarily divide or code life into these three distinct forms of social drama. Th e idea serves as a constant to attune myself to the intricate interconnectedness of people during their back-and-forth exchanges of talk, habits of listening, and bodies in motion — from subtle facial expressions to revealing gestures.

Most humans become leery, suspicious, nervous, and some even paranoid, when they are cognizant of being observed. Th eir feel- ings seem justifi ed if there is a stranger sitting off to the side glanc- ing at them occasionally and writing furiously on a notepad. Th ough researchers may claim to be observing “natural” social life as it is improvised before us, if our participants have granted us permission to be present in their spaces, actions may be changed

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to appear at one’s best — such as what most people do when they knowingly are about to be photographed; we pose and try to look good for the camera. Aft er a few days of observation, though, the novelty hopefully wears off , and what we observe about humans becomes more lifelike and genuine.

The Field Site

Th e classic retort to the question of what makes a successful res- taurant is, “Location, location, location.” Th e same might be said of what contributes to successful participant observation fi eldwork. Location or the fi eld site alone is not suffi cient, but it is most cer- tainly a critical component for gathering good data. For example, in the interview questions above about a person’s relationship with his or her pet, it would be ideal to observe participants in actual exchanges with their animals. Observing how other humans inter- act with pets at such places as pet stores, animal shelters, veteri- nary clinics, public parks, and so on, in addition to private homes, better informs a study.

Th e topic and research questions of your project suggest the site or sites for your fi eldwork. But this assumes that you have received permissions, when necessary, from key participants you will observe and/or the institutions at which they gather (e.g., a school, private home, business place, hospital, and so on). Observations at rela- tively private settings, such as a school classroom or health clinic, require permission from its administrative gatekeepers to conduct your research (e.g., a principal, a director of human subjects research). Generally, publicly accessible gathering places such as restaurants, stadiums, shopping malls, and so on, do not need per- mission from every person there, but you may still need your employing institution’s Institutional Review Board approval to con- duct the study and to observe in natural public social settings. (More on these permissions matters will be discussed in Chapter 3.)

Writing Fieldnotes

Initial fi eldnotes are your written documentation of participant observation. Th ey can be developed from live observation or

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extracted from a videorecording you’ve made on site. Th ey are quickly composed, handwritten jottings of what your senses take in, how bodies move in space, and occasional rich quotes of what participants say.

Perspectives vary on how fi eldnotes should be composed, and the methods described here are just one way to document social life in action. Write what you observe as descriptively as possible in the present tense, noting a select number of relevant details (“signifi cant trivia,” as I call them). Separate the “facts” from your personal inferences, comments, subjective responses, and inter- pretations of action by noting them in separate paragraphs labeled “OCs” or observer’s comments (Bogdan & Biklen, 2007 , pp. 163–164). Bogdan & Biklen also recommend titling each set of fi eldnotes with a phrase that seems to capture the spirit of the observation.

Writing descriptively better assures that you are documenting social action, reaction, and interaction in a trustworthy manner for data analysis. Th e OCs are personal opportunities to render introspective meaning to what is observed. Th e subjective is cer- tainly data, but subjectivity alone does not make a credible and trustworthy account of social life.

Below is an example of how the factual description of action is followed by related OCs. Participant observation takes place at a magnet school for the arts in an inner-city neighborhood in the United States. Note the descriptive documentation such as the day, date, location, and time frame:

Th ursday, April 12, 2007, Martinez School, 1:00–1:30 p.m.: “Assembly Let-Down”

In the cafeteria, the custodian is still mopping up the fl oors while children are already seated around the perimeter of the space, leaving a large open square in the center of the room. Children are still entering through one of the double doors leading into the cafeteria. Available space on the fl oor is lim- ited, and the seated children are asked to move up to provide more room.

OC: Ah, yes, school assemblies, I remember them well. I really didn’t like them very much. It hurts to sit on a cold linoleum fl oor for a long time.

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A junior high school–level class enters and one girl says to another, “Let’s go sit over there, by the boys.”

OC: Hormones! Assemblies seem like a great time to socialize in addition to being shuttled there for the “offi cial purpose.”

Th ere is much talking at 1:15 p.m. — the scheduled time for a Native American dance presentation. Th e dancer is not present, and Mrs. Almanza, the dance teacher, is talking with a thin fi ft een-year-old girl dressed in faded jeans and tight stretch top. Th e music teacher sets up speakers, microphones (“Test, test … ”), and other sound equipment.

OC: So, where’s the dancer? Pretty unprofessional role mode- ling to not be there since this is a performing arts magnet school. Calm down, he might have gotten stuck in traffi c.

At a few minutes aft er 1:15 p.m., Mrs. Almanza takes the microphone and announces that the dancer is not here yet but “on his way.” She introduces Pari, a former student of Martinez School, now attending Robeson High School in Valley City. Th e thin teenager takes the microphone and introduces herself as a Filipino who can sing “in English, Spanish, Mandarin,” and her Filipino dialect.

OC: I’m impressed! I love the way they reinforced speaking multiple languages as an asset rather than a defi ciency.

Pari says that she will be singing until the dancer arrives. Her fi rst song, “Bambaleo,” is in Spanish. Th e music teacher plays a cassette tape as she sings with a clear voice. She smiles and wiggles her hips in rhythm to the salsa-like music; smiles and slight laughter emanate from children. Halfway through the song, the audience claps to the beat. Two junior high boys sitting on a metal counter start doing a synchronized hand routine to the music.

OC: Where did they get that routine from? Is that some kind of music videochoreography? Some “in-thing” they know and do regularly? Check it out later.

Th e song ends and the audience — which is now almost every child and teacher at the school — applauds. Th e dancer has

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not yet arrived. Mrs. Almanza speaks into the microphone, “Th ank you, Pari, that was fantastic!” She looks at the stu- dents and says, “Give her some more applause!” Th e students do so and cheer, whistle, and shout “Yay!”

OC: Well, if the resources you need are not there, you make do with what you have. Th is seems to be the ethic of living in this neighborhood. But it was a resourceful move.

OCs in the excerpt above were separated from the descriptive text, plus indented and italicized. Some researchers separate OCs further by assigning the passages a diff erent colored font or high- lighting the text in yellow on a word-processed page. Also note that direct quotes were placed in quotation marks. One of the most common errors of beginning fi eld workers is neglecting to occa- sionally document what was said by the participants themselves.

Aft er you’ve observed in the fi eld for a few hours or the day, leave and fi nd some private space to expand on what you’ve jotted, or to revise or add any particular details. Th is time can also be used to generate some initial analytic memos on what you saw and heard (see Chapter 4). Each session or day’s handwritten fi eldnotes should be transferred to a word-processed document and expanded further as soon as possible before the memories of the experience decay. Like interview transcription, several researchers note how tedious the task can be. But the opportunity exists to make new discoveries and insights about the data as they are written.

Taking fi eldnotes on a laptop computer as you observe certainly makes the documentation and analytic processes easier and faster, and I recommend it highly when possible. But depending on the site, the sound of laptop keyboard “clicking” can be distracting for the participants. I have found it useful to occasionally video- and/ or audiorecord a session if the participants have given me permis- sion to do so. Th e detail enables me to review it privately to supple- ment and elaborate on my written fi eldnotes, to quote more precisely what participants said, and to document any exchanges of dialogue for more extensive analysis. Depending on the group observed, there will be an awkward breaking-in period with a vid- eocamera in the space recording their actions and talk. Natural social action will be aff ected until the participants become accus- tomed to the device.

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A fi eldwork task that heightens your awareness of the partici- pants’ environment is drawing a diagram of the primary spaces in which you observe. Sketch a bird’s-eye view of fl oor plans or out- door environments, to scale as much as possible, noting such features of indoor spaces like doorway widths, number of windows (if any), and furnishings (see Figure 2.1 for a university weight room ground plan).

When possible, specify general clusters and foot traffi c patterns of people within the space. Include in your fi eldnotes supplemen- tal descriptions on such features as ceiling height, quality of light- ing, maintenance of the space, wall colors, and a general inventory of key artifacts. Occasional digital photographs of the fi eld site and its participants also provide you with captured moments for more extensive observation and analysis of social details when they are embedded into your fi eldnote document fi le. A more extensive set of fi eldnotes in provided in Chapter 4 as an addi- tional example.

Finally, always avoid passing judgment in the fi eld. I recall years ago being observed as a novice teacher and seeing the note taker shake her head and make a loud dissatisfi ed sigh at something I said. Almost thirty years later, I cannot recall what I said in the classroom that provoked the reaction, but I will never forget her demoralizing response. If you have an issue with something you see or hear in the fi eld, keep it private while observing and articu- late your thoughts and feelings in your fi eldnotes or an analytic memo. Th e exception to this, of course, is if you feel something needs your immediate action, such as children physically hurting each other, or a participant in emotional distress needing empa- thetic assistance.

Documents

Th ough contemporary social life has the moniker “the digital age,” humans still produce and circulate astounding amounts of hard copy materials, depending on the physical site you study. Th ese documents contain texts and images that refl ect and metaphori- cally represent their creators’ ideologies and value systems. A doc- ument’s purpose can vary from the offi cial to the commercial to the referential to the personal, and each one, if carefully studied

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and interpreted, suggests and reveals more than it contains at fi rst glance.

At the fi eld site, or in consultation with the participants you interview, look for and review any documents that are publicly accessible and, only with their permission, those archived in fi les, storage, or kept in personal spaces. Note the general contents of these items, where they were accessed, and, if there are many, keep a tally of the number of subtopics addressed. Log in your fi eldnotes any particularly striking or inference-laden passages or images to you. When possible, keep a copy of key documents or scan them as part of your data corpus for future reference and analysis.

Below is a fi eldnote example about the types of documents on display in a main offi ce reception area of an inner-city school serv- ing a predominantly lower-income Hispanic population in the United States. Note how the descriptive entry is accompanied with

Figure 2.1. A pencil-sketch fl oor plan diagram of a university weight room.

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an “OC” aft erward that refl ects on the documents’ contents, mean- ings, and their relationship to the particular site:

On a rack in the Family Resource Center are brochures and fl iers, in both English and Spanish, about assistance pro- grams available to students and their parents. Th e general school fl ier listed the services they provide: “food boxes, clothing, drug and gang prevention, volunteer neighborhood clean-up association, adult basic education, English as a Second Language classes.”

Some of the surrounding agencies and organizations with their literature in the school racks include: Helping House, the United Way, the Metro South Community Mental Health Center, and the State Department of Economic Security’s Family Assistance Administration. Th e government agency brochures list somewhat complex procedures, regulations, and requirements for assistance. Other types of services off ered for families include immigration services and other social services such as domestic violence shelters. A state- ment from the immigration services brochure reads that the agency “assists those seeking to enter the mainstream of American life by providing … and by encouraging and main- taining cultural values and traditions.”

OC: Th is lower-income school needs to deal with the realities of the people living in the “hood.” Some of the teachers here call themselves “social workers,” and the literature seems to support that, as you would probably never see a fl ier for food boxes and clothing publicly posted in a literature rack at an upper-middle class school offi ce in this city. Th ere you might see brochures for summer camps and enrichment programs.

I was struck by how complex the criteria and procedures were for getting governmental assistance. Why does it have to be so diffi cult to get help from public institutions that are in place to help its citi- zens in need? Th ere may also be issues with literacy and the conse- quent frustration of trying to jump through all the red-tape hoops.

Th e secretarial staff of the school more than likely places the literature in the racks, but who initiates getting the brochures

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to the school itself? Th e staff social worker? Th e principal? Are they brought by the agencies themselves to this site? Talk to the school staff to fi nd out who decides what gets displayed.

Documents consist not only of previously produced materials but also works created specifi cally for a study. Participants might be asked to voluntarily maintain logs, journals, or diaries as a method of gathering additional refl exive data. But this task can be burden- some on them, especially if they are busy professionals such as teach- ers or social workers. I recall reading several published research reports that described the failure of participants to turn in anything substantive when they were asked to keep supplemental records. Some researchers are exploring how electronic messaging and online social networking sites can make participant documentation easier to get small units of spontaneous thoughts from participants.

Media Materials

Media materials data could be the sole focus of some qualitative studies — for example, the content analysis of a collection of Internet sites — or just one of several types of qualitative data gath- ered for a broader study — for example, an investigation of how adolescents develop and maintain friendships through their sec- ondary school years. Th e latter could collect data through indi- vidual and focus group interviews, participant observation at schools and social functions, and samples of text messages and e-mail sent to peers.

Digital culture has indeed produced new sources of data for qualitative researchers. Internet sites, e-mail, instant/text messages, chat room dialogue, tweets, blogs, vlogs, and other forms of media communication produced or accessed by participants (assuming they are able to) provide electronic footprints, traces, and signa- tures. A participant who maintains a Facebook page, for example, reveals an autobiographical portrait about him- or herself through the text that’s included and excluded, what visual images or links appear, what group memberships are held, and so on. Text mes- sages and tweets are small bites of output information that exhibit initiated action and interactive reaction to human–digital input.

Th ese forms of data are a bit more slippery to review unless the participant voluntarily posts for open Internet access or directly

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communicates with the researcher through these media. Collection and analysis of these materials are somewhat comparable to the processes for paper documents, but now there are electronic and digital contexts to consider. If, for example, the participant chooses to post personal musings through a video/vlog rather than a type- written blog, what does that say about the individual who feels that the visual broadcast of self is preferable to written text to be silently read by others? How oft en is text messaging conducted, and to whom? If chat rooms are visited, which themed rooms are they, and what do those themes say about the interests of the individual, particularly if a unique screen name and false online identity have been created? Th ere are divergent opinions about the ethics of researching what is noncopyrighted and publicly posted online to virtually anyone. Debate continues as to whether such open acces- sibility requires the creator’s permission to use his material for a study, or whether we can assume that public posting, by default, means free public access and use.

Virtually every researcher today relies on technology in one form or another to conduct the business of inquiry. Electronic media are no longer just tools, they are also the construction mate- rials of our work. As technology rapidly evolves and becomes more accessible to and integral with the general population’s daily cul- ture, we should not consider it a given and therefore just part of everyday life, but a phenomenon that literally infl uences and aff ects modes of human communication and the quality of intra- and interpersonal relationships in virtual and hybrid spaces. As digital data from the fi eld and from our participants are gathered, take special note of their sources, contents, and forms, for they are potentially rich and inference-laden units analyzed for their sig- nifi cance for the sender and receiver.

Material Culture

Participant observation focuses primarily on human action, reac- tion, and interaction yet will also document the objects and arti- facts that participants handle and that surround them within a fi eld setting. A brief discussion of material cultural is warranted to insure that the researcher does not overlook an important and revealing component of social life and thus qualitative data.

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Regardless of income, all humans possess or utilize material objects of various kinds for daily living (if not survival), occupa- tion, and leisure. Whether the artifacts were made by the partici- pant, given to her, or purchased and acquired by her, the possessions inform the researcher of what is important or part of her cultural world.

If we adopt a dramaturgical perspective that perceives life as performance, this suggests that we closely examine what “props” people use and own in their “settings.” One of my female students conducting a case study with an adolescent girl held an interview, with parental permission, in the girl’s bedroom. Th e interviewer was able to ask about various objects and posters that hung on the wall, prized mementos placed on a dresser, and even the décor. Th e items in the bedroom and its overall look seemed to refl ect the young girl’s personality, and the adult interviewing the teenager about her personal and semiprivate space was able to gain valuable insights on what was important and treasured. One adolescent stu- dent I observed pinned various buttons with political and social statements onto his backpack; two of them read, “Ask yourself questions” and “At fi rst they burn books; eventually they burn people.” I inferred from the messages on those buttons the student’s social consciousness, value systems, and worldview.

Also, it is not only the objects within a space, but also the way they are stored and organized that can tell us much about the people who have primary responsibility for maintaining them. For exam- ple, I observed several teachers’ classrooms at one particular ele- mentary school. I noticed that the organization and appearance of the room refl ected the individual teacher’s management and instruc- tional style. If the teacher was a fi rm disciplinarian with children, well organized with her curriculum, and clear and straightforward with her lectures, the clean and organized décor of the room refl ected those same personal qualities. If the teacher was inconsist- ent with her disciplinary strategies, satisfactory yet unimaginative with her curriculum delivery, and a bit scattered in her lecture style, the disorganization of the room also refl ected that “scatteredness.” Teachers with warm and nurturing personalities maintained warm and nurturing physical spaces and décor. A very strict teacher who did not want children’s desks moved for any reason maintained a linear, minimalist, and clean physical environment.

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60 : FUNDAMENTALS OF QUALITATIVE RESEARCH

Since my background is theatre, one of my specialties is stage costuming — designing appropriate attire for characters from the world of the play. Costumers are taught to use line, color, texture, silhouette, and other visual elements strategically to suggest the character’s personality to an audience. Th ese artistic skills also create an attunement to real people’s clothing choices and their connotations. I read and infer an individual’s personality from such aspects of daily dress as the clothing’s fi t, colors and patterns, fabrics, designer labels, accessories, and so on. I assert that most people today have an intuitive “fashion literacy,” and qualitative researchers can make some fairly astute observations about what people wear, why they wear what they do, and what their clothing choices reveal about them.

We needn’t make a detailed inventory of each and every single object within the fi eld setting or owned by the participant. We can infer a general “look” and “feel” suggested by the site, supported with a few fi eldnote details about the furnishings, lighting, colors, cleanliness, and so on. We can also take a close-up and selected review of key objects and artifacts that seem to hold special mean- ing for the participants, or that strike the researcher as signifi cant items within their social world.

Arts-Based Expression

Visual products created by participants can also be used as data. Artwork in the form of drawings, collages, and other media are extensions of the participant’s self and ethos. Several research projects have reported successful outcomes with child and adult participants documenting what is important to them through pho- tography or video of their everyday worlds. An interview with the participant about what she has created is essential to decode the artwork’s subtle and hidden meanings, rather than interpreting the product on your own. Visual products can either enhance other types of data collected about the participant or serve as the primary data collection method when the participant is unable to contrib- ute or the researcher is unable to collect substantive verbal data.

Another art form that generates signifi cant data is improvisa- tional drama, which may also include creative movement and other nonverbal modes of expression. Th rough dramatic simulation,

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A SURVEY OF QUALITATIVE DATA COLLECTION METHODS : 61

participants place themselves in “what if ” scenarios, using their bodies and voices to communicate what they may be unable to put into words, or what they may fi nd easier to reveal using role play in fi ctional circumstances. Photographs and videorecordings of participants’ dramatic work are helpful to more carefully analyze the dynamics and subtleties of dialogue, gesture, and movement, and the refl ective processing of their own work aft erward through group discussion.

Related Research Literature

Hopefully before and during the study, you’ve been reviewing the related literature in your fi eld and topic of inquiry. Not only are previously published research reports useful as foundations and preparatory guidance (discussed further in Chapter 3), but they are also potential sources of data to support and enhance your analysis. Sometimes comparable studies can corroborate your own fi ndings during fi eldwork. At other times they may off er some- thing diff erent from what you’ve observed in your participants. But perhaps most important is the opportunity for your work to build on and expand the fi ndings of others, or to approach a previ- ously studied phenomenon from a new perspective.

Th e long-established literature review in academic research, with its entrenched status as an obligatory ritual or rite of passage for researchers, has been reconceived as an opportunity to collect a pool of preexisting data that not only infl uences the preparatory design of a study but one that also becomes an active part of a data corpus for analysis. Referring to and integrating the literature on an as-needed or as-appropriate basis into fi eldnotes and analytic memos, as well as the fi nal report, initiates connection with others’ work, placing one’s own research in nested contexts.

Quantitative Data

Qualitative researchers should not shy away from researching and including any statistical information relevant to their studies. Th is is not to suggest that mixed methods studies should always be the norm, but sometimes numbers can add insight, texture, and context to the repository of qualitative data in a report. For example,

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62 : FUNDAMENTALS OF QUALITATIVE RESEARCH

Saunders ( 2008 ) reports on the dilemmas of United States citizens without accessible and aff ordable health care by fi rst reviewing and contextualizing the numbers before the participants’ stories are presented:

Th e number of people without health insurance is HUGE — 46.6 million … . Th at represents 15.9 % of US residents — over one in seven. Let’s try to imagine that number. It’s greater than the populations of California, Missouri, and Alabama combined (U.S. Census, 2006). It would take over 900 major league baseball stadiums fi lled to the hilt to fi t all of the people without health insurance. If every mile while going cross-country represented an uninsured person, you could travel over 7,000 times from California to New York round trip. (p. 529)

But statistics in a report do not always have to be sweeping in scope. Th e smaller numbers we deal with on a daily basis can pro- vide points of reference for understanding diff erent situations. Below, a Canadian health care worker relates the costs associated with meals at a nursing home for the elderly as she refl ects on her coff ee house purchase:

I laugh out loud when I realize that what I’ve paid — $4.65 with tax, for my grande tazo chai crème, my Saturday aft er shopping treat — is 16 cents more than our per day resident food budget. Yeah, that’s right — three meals a day, with a choice between two entrees at each meal in fi ve diff erent textures: regular, mince, puree, dental soft , and chopped. Plus, snacks with a beverage at 10:00, at 2:00, and before bed at 8:00. Plus, tea and cookies during the night for the wan- derers. All that for $4.49 per resident per day. It’s gone up 23 cents since 1993. Ten years and an increase in 23 cents per day per person. How much do you fi gure Starbucks has put up their prices in ten years? (McIntyre, 2009 , n.p.)

As you conduct your fi eldwork, attend not just to the quali - ties but devote some slices of time to the quantities of related matters — how many, how much, how oft en, how frequently, how infrequently, what increases, what decreases, and so on.

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Managing Data

I advise the following as one method for maintaining the data corpus for small-scale qualitative studies only . Enter anything and everything that’s related to your study in chronological order, as gathered, in one large word processing fi le. Multiple back-up fi les include the separate interview transcripts, separate fi eldnotes, sep- arate analytic memos, and so on, as a precautionary measure. But everything related to a single study is copied and kept in one large master fi le. I’ve found that this single document serves as my working corpus and helps me access and search for what I need faster than separate fi le maintenance. Rich text features such as bolding, italicizing, font sizing, coloring, and highlighting, plus the use of multiple headings and subheadings, assist me with at-a-glance retrieval as I scroll and search. Th e cut-and-paste function of word processing programs enables categorization of data into appropriate sections. For example, a fi eldnote passage with a related interview excerpt and an analytic memo can be clustered together as a unit, and these separate units eventually join together into an appropri- ate sequence that becomes the skeletal outline and storyline of the study. Th e master document itself, through time, is eventually edited and transformed into the fi nal report.

Th e fi nal recommendations are to carefully protect your data by saving and backing-up your electronic fi les multiple times, keep- ing any hard copy materials safely fi led with back-up copies stored in a separate location, and keeping your data private and confi den- tial for ethical compliance. Th e research literature is occasionally peppered with stories of valuable, irreplaceable, and hard-earned data irretrievably lost due to technological failure, human error, and unexpected circumstances.

Closure

Th e data collection strategies reviewed above are only as good as their investigator. Th e quality of a qualitative study depends on both the information gathered and how it is analytically applied. Th e next chapter explores how these diff erent methods might be confi gured and combined for a particular qualitative study’s research design and consequent analysis.

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