I collected qualitative interviews in 2017 on child prelacteal feeding practices in Pakistan and then I analyzed Pakistan DHS data-2013 for further exploration and triangulation of the study findings in 2018. Now there is a bit confusing for mentioning the research design in the paper that either it is sequential explanatory or sequential exploratory research design?
Hello,
Both designs you mentioned are discussed in this article
Hayes, B., Bonner, A., & Douglas, C. (2013). An introduction to mixed methods research for nephrology nurses. Renal Society of Australasia Journal, 9(1), 8-14.
In Google scholar you can find related discussions by entering the following search phrase:
"sequential exploratory" "sequential explanatory"
Note that this is an AND logic based query, so | sign is not used between the search terms.
Sequential explanatory designs take the form QUANT --> qual, where the goal for the qualitative portion is to help understand the quantitative results. Hence, this is basically the reverse of what you did.
In practice, sequential exploratory designs almost always refer to the development of quantitative instruments and program interventions (qual --> QUANT). If you want to label your design as either exploratory or explanatory, this comes closer.
But I would recommend you consider QUAL --> quant as what you did. Basically, this amount to the classic use of qualitative results to generate hypotheses for evaluation with quantitative data. Unfortunately this design does not have a well recognized name, but I have written about it in this article:
Article From Themes to Hypotheses: Following Up With Quantitative Methods
Thank you so much David L Morgan and Juha for you suggestion and great references
I am not quite certain about your paper that follows the mixed method; either it is sequential explanatory or sequential exploratory research design. Mixed method follows from the pragmatic or a realism research philosophy which takes aspects from both positivist and interpretive positions. However, seems to me in your study, your qualitative data (interviews in 2017) which deal with exploratory part of your research, are seemingly predominating over explanatory part (Quan.). As the result your explanatory part (Quan.) for your study (DHS data) is only a complementary for more exploration and validation of your qualitative findings. Let’s bear in mind; having quantitative data in exploration qualitative research design does not necessarily means mixed method.
Mixed methods research contains many more possible options than just exploratory and explanatory sequential designs. Just because the design QUAL --> quant does not have a widely recognized name does not mean that it isn't mixed methods. In particular, the Journal of Mixed Method Research defines mixed methods as any well-integrated combination of both qualitative and quantitative data.
It is also with noting that the exploratory and explanatory sequential design are both quantitatively driven (i.e., large QUANT and small qual). As an alternative, there has recently been quite a bit of interest in qualitatively driven mixed methods, which would include a QUAL --> quant design.
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