'Corpus Construction' as an alternative logic of sampling

1
'Corpus Construction' as an alternative logic of
sampling

• INFO 272. Qualitative Research Methods

2
Corpus Construction
3
Corpus Construction

• Defining the sites and subjects of in situ work
• Making decisions about your field site(s) how a
  social phenomenon of interest is mapped out onto
  spatial terrain
• Selecting people to follow, observe and/or
  interview
• Selecting media / artifacts from the setting for
  further analysis

4
Competence and Innovation

• Competence (Bauer and Gaskell)
• Systematic
• Issues of public accountability
• Innovation (Becker)
• Challenge conventional thinking

5
Doing Innovative Research

• Starting Where You Are (Lofland and Lofland)
• Commitment and Curiosity
• Access and getting in
• Willingness to go where others wont
• The inconvenient and uncomfortable
• The illegitimate

6
Approaches

• Total enumeration (census)
• Statistical random sample
• Snowball sample (iteration again)
• Convenience sample (bad)

7
Random vs. Systematic

• Corpus Construction
• Typifies unknown attributes
• Systematic selection to some alternative
  rationale (not a convenience sample)

• Random Statistical Sampling
• Distribution of already known attributes
• Sample has a distribution of criterion
  population as a whole
• Popular misconception the greater the in the
  sample, the more accurate

8
Unknowable Populations

• Many populations of individuals are knowable,
  however
• What about actions?
• What about situations?
• Open systems (i.e. language) infinite
  populations

9
Mapping the Unknowable
Social strata, functions and categories (known)
Representations (unknown) Varieties
of Belief Attitudes Opinions Stereotypes Ideologi
es Worldviews Habits Practices
Bauer and Gaskell
10
Mapping the Unknowable

• Iteration til Saturation
• Dont collect too much data logistical limits

11
Reporting Practices

• Public accountability
• A description of the materials
• A characterization of the topic
• The initially defined social strata
• The social strata added later
• Evidence for saturation
• Timeline of data collection cycles
• Place of data collection

12
How to carry this into in situ, inductive,
qualitative research

• Who am I missing?
• Looking out for social strata, categories that
  define the social setting (and variations)

13
Problems of Social Strata in Cross-Cultural
Research
14
Demographic Form
15
Extending Selection Strategies Sampling for
Innovation

• Identify the case that is likely to upset your
  thinking and look for it (the counter-example)
  e.g. morphine, opium, heroin addicts
• If someone says it has already been studied, its
  probably time to study it again.
• Studying the non-serious and the boring

16
Description as Sampling

• a selection from what is observed we do this
  implicitly Becker
• done well creates new categories and ideas that
  get around conventional thinking

17
Selecting Field Sites

• Some work is clearly sited
• Some is not (amorphous social settings) and
  therefore locating such work will be more
  involved
• Sites may be open or closed

18
In Conclusion - Generalizability?

• The problem of unknowable populations
• Rather than representativeness seeking range
  and variation in the social phenomenon under
  study
• To what effect? Challenging notions of what is
  natural or universal about a phenomenon
• Social critique not predictive control (remember
  Habermas)

19
For Thursday

• Read Lofland and Lofland section on logging data
• Read UC guidelines for protection of human
  subjects