Chapter Seven

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Chapter Seven

• Field Study Approaches

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Field Studies

• Natural Settings
• Direct observations, real behaviour
• Test is whether they ring true to the reader
  and the person observed
• Qualitative research, an emphasis often on an
  accurate description

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Participant Observation Studies

• Intense, usually long term, examination of a
  social group--it might be a particular culture,
  community, or group
• Method used in ethnographic ethnonursing
  studies
• The researcher is involved in the daily lives of
  the group studied

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Participant Observation

• Holistic, qualitative, understand the whole group
• immersion in the setting
• everyday lives of participants
• conclusions emerge from the setting (try to avoid
  preconceptions, let the observations guide you)

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Participant Observation Steps

• Gaining entry
• Establishing rapport
• Recording field notes
• descriptions interpretations of individuals,
  interactions, events
• exact time location of observation should be
  recorded
• emphasis should be placed on reflecting exactly
  what how people say things

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Field Notes

• Use 2 columns to distinguish between description
  interpretation
• A wide column for description of observations
• A narrow column for interpretation of them
• Two kinds of interpretation
• the subjects interpretation of observations
• the observers interpretation of the same event

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Field Notes

• Analyzing the observations
• master field file (original complete file of raw
  data)
• background, history file (subfile that contains
  info from the master file as well as from other
  sources)
• analytic files (subfile related to a specific
  topic or relationship explored in the study)
• key character files(Individual files on key
  players in the group studied)
• Writing the final report

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In-Depth Interviews

• Participants views are recorded and used to give
  them voice in the final report liberal use of
  quotations in final report
• interviews tend to be flexible, go with the flow,
  probe in-depth
• Rose Weitz Living with the stigma of AIDS

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Ethnographic Interviews

• Three key elements are present
• explicit purpose
• ethnographic explanations (those the researcher
  tries out on the respondent to see if they make
  sense)
• ethnographic questions (descriptive questions,
  structural questions, contrast questions)

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Focus Group Interviews

• 6-12 people typically plus facilitator
• dates back to the 40s assessing effectiveness
  of morale boosting radio shows
• 70s onward the market researchers use tool
• 80s onward the academics start doing focus groups
  again

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Focus Groups

• Standard sampling techniques used to get group
• Recorded manually or may be taped and transcribed
• Useful to record names of participants so that
  discussion can be tracked during the analysis
• Analyzed using content analysis

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Focus Groups

• Transcript of discussion is the data
• strengths
• open-ended question posed to a group but no
  particular probing for meaning
• spontaneously deal with issues
• usually reasonably cheap (50 to participate)
• Weaknesses

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Nursing Research Example of Focus Group

• Smoking Among Disadvantaged Women Causes and
  Cessation (Stewart, M.., Gillis, A., Brosky,
  G., et al. (1996).

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Field Experiments

• Researcher intervention occurs in a natural
  setting
• e.g.- greeting stranger as measure of reaction to
  a form of non-conformity
• proxemics
• behavior is observed in natural settings hence
  not contaminated by the artificiality in lab
  experiments

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Naturalistic Observational Studies

• Naturalistic observations (a better term)
• no intervention, simply record behaviour
• seat belt use
• holding door behaviour
• elevator behaviour

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Naturaliatic Observations Examples

• Dressing for winter
• parking violations
• gender smoking
• professor/student participation gender
• seat belt compliance
• speeding Antigonish
• healthy food purchase

• ABM behavior
• termination of conversations
• drinking patterns
• smoking behavior teens
• stop sign
• tipping

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Steps in Doing Study

• restricting observations
• review of literature
• developing hypotheses
• defining terms
• tally sheet/master table/individual tables
• writing report

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Analyzing Qualitative Data

• Researcher must immerse self in the data
• Read re-read the transcripts
• Computer can perform manual cutting, pasting,
  sorting of data
• NUDIST and Ethnograph are two popular software
  program

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Field Studies

• weak on generalizations
• strong on validity (real behavior)
• causal inferencing a challenge
• multivariate a problem
• probing strong with participant observation,
  in-depth interviews, and focus groups
• probing weak with covert observational

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Disadvantages of Computer Analysis

• Analysis must be done a certain way because the
  software dictates it
• Inappropriate use unnecessary coding of data
  simply because the computer is available to do it
• Cost maintenance of hard software
• Researcher must still develop initial organizing
  system

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Advantages of Computer Analysis of Qualitative
Data

• Multiple copies of files, cut paste, move data
  edit
• Can file data in one location
• Locate sort data by cases promptly
• Can locate a piece of text related to certain
  data without reading through transcripts
• Forces researcher to read each line of text to
  consider possible codes nodes for coding

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Content Analysis

• Analytical technique associated with qualitative
  studies
• One is attempting to assess the content of the
  message
• Makes inferences by systematically analyzing
  written or verbal communication

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Basic Decisions in Content Analysis

• Decide on the unit of analysis
• Coefficient of reliability (measure of agreement
  between coders)
• Coef of R of units in identical category
  total of units coded
• Develop a tally sheet

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Advantages of Field Studies

• Provide a holistic understanding of the
  phenomenon
• Provides in-depth descriptions, can probe deeply,
  flexiblity in data collection
• High validity in measures because you are
  recording actual observations
• Direct costs inexpensive but time commitment is
  high

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Limitations of Field Studies

• Inability to tell if emerging patterns are
  representative or peculiar to the group studied
• impossible to replicate
• making verifiable causal inferences is difficult
  because only 1 case is examined