Hi Everyone!
When we carry out qualitative research, we often mention a specific design, such as case study, narrative research, phenomenology and so forth. Do you think it is OK to design, carry out and report your study without reference to any specific qualitative research designs and just to say, "This is a qualitative study"? How appropriate is this? And are there any sources that support the use of such a study without a specific qualitative design?
Specifying a study design is not the same as linking your study to a broad methodological approach, such as "case study, narrative research, phenomenology and so forth." Instead, a study design should begin with a research question or goal, and then specify the procedures that you will use to address your goal(s).
Undoubtedly the most common type of design in qualitative research is to collect your data using semi-structured interviews and then apply thematic analysis. Within that broad approach, you need to specify who you will interview and why, what questions you will ask and why, etc. etc.
Hi, Arif Bakla
Qualitative research is a broad subject with diverse backgrounds and schools. It also has a certain soft and dynamic nature in general. One may encounter criticism focused on claims about "vagueness" and lack of rigour.
Thus it appears especially important to specify the features, processes, criteria and background of the approach to be followed. In other words, one should create trustworthiness concerning the study at hand. A qualitative researcher should not imitate the features and rhetoric of quantitative approaches but build his or her arguments from qualitative point of view. The concept of trustworthiness itself is a good example of that. Triangulation (e.g. the combinations of qualitative and quantitative) in turn, is an another topic.
I hope this helps.
Hi, Arif Bakla
I agree with Juha Kamarainen .
I think it is important to indicate which study design was used in the research. It is very difficult to invent a new design, therefore I recommend accommodating your research within an existing design.
Here you have a paper about the types of qualitative designs. I hope it helps you.
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0011000006287390?casa_token=08QL_AdHLfwAAAAA:-jyc2bELvP_O7mysplK0qb3uyM7nZkMX9Rf_jDBXDVwQ_vr2W4ARpXPV1NweSeTTCYLgltQQK6Ik
Regards!
It is important to indicate what kind of qualitative design was used. Each design has its own procedures to observe. For example, hermenuetic phenomenology is different from realistic phenomenology although both are phenomenology, so with single case is different from multiple case.
Hi Arif Bakla
I agree with Juha Kamarainen as well. You will be scrutinised for being vague because it cannot simply be a qualitative study. You will most definitely be using a specific design within qualitative research. As you ask, you can be broad and say "This is a qualitative study" but you will have to elaborate which qualitative research design you are implementing to substantiate and validate your research. For example: "A qualitative research study was conducted in 2019... data was collected by means of [interviews/questionnaires etc...] and analysed using [grounded theory / narrative theory etc...]."
Specifying a study design is not the same as linking your study to a broad methodological approach, such as "case study, narrative research, phenomenology and so forth." Instead, a study design should begin with a research question or goal, and then specify the procedures that you will use to address your goal(s).
Undoubtedly the most common type of design in qualitative research is to collect your data using semi-structured interviews and then apply thematic analysis. Within that broad approach, you need to specify who you will interview and why, what questions you will ask and why, etc. etc.
I also agree with Juha. However, if the standard qualitative approaches do not quite fit what you want to study, there can be modifications made. The roots of qualitative methods are in the fields of anthropology, psychology, and sociology. Applying them to other disciplines may require adjustments.
I studied the experiences of patients after they recovered from an unconscious/coma event using Phenomenology. Some of the patients reported having paranormal or transpersonal experiences, such as out of body experiences, near-death experiences and others. So I borrowed some interviewing and interpretation information about these experiences from the field of Parasychology.
Hi Arif,
just to add to the points made above by fellow scholars, think about the importance and need to detail your methodological procedures for others to be able to replicate your study in other contexts. If it's unclear what steps a researcher took to gather, analyze and interpret the data, it would be tough for someone reading that particular research output to repeat some aspect(s) of an earlier study's design/research questions/context, etc.
Hope this is helpful.
Best of luck!
I agree with Lyusyena. Detailing the systematic processes of the study is enough for any researcher to conclude on which design was used.
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