Dear  Rahman,

You may have a look at my research paper in which i formulate and used path for mixed method. I added the link below

Article Social Isolation within Family: An Analysis of Old Age Citizens

 Thanks Shahzad. I have had a look at that paper. I see that you did a mixed method research. That however still doesn't answer the question of the difference between mixed method and multimethod. Would you like to contribute to the discussion please? 

The distinction is that mixed methods combines qualitative and quantitative methods, while multi-methods uses two qualitative methods (in principle, multi-methods research could also use two quantitative methods, but no one I know uses this label for multiple quantitative methods).

Here is a quotation from Creswell's chapter in the 2nd edition of the Handbook of Mixed Methods Research:

"Writers in mixed methods are also careful to distinguish 'multi-method studies' in which multiple types of qualitative or quantitative data are collected (see Creswell & Plano Clark, 2007) from 'mixed methods studies' that incorporate collecting both qualitative and quantitative data." (p. 273)

Yes David, you have clearly pointed out the distinction. And, obviously, the intent of using multi or mixed method also differs. 

On the other hand, there's also methodological triangulation to distinguish from mixed method, which I would say is to reflect from a theoretical and methodological perspective the strengths and weaknesses of each method used under the light of the research question given. The aim is of course to offset a weakness by a strength of another. I think Norman Deniz is the one to read about this, still.

One could argue that this triangulation gives the justification for the use of multiple methods, either mixed or multimethod design.

Article The Research Act: A Theoretical Introduction to Sociological Methods

Hi Yves, 

Jick (1979) wrote about the application of Denzin's triangulation in mixed methods research. There have been other purpose for mixed methods research of course. Though I think to conduct a mixed methods research for the purpose of triangulation, one would have to be quite experienced. I used to think that it was academic snobbery when people claim that inexperienced researchers such as myself would not be able to conduct certain types of mixed methods research - but looking at the credibility issues, I would say that experience is definitely needed. At the moment I would consider mixed methods for inductive reasons, but I'm not confident enough for triangulation. Do you have any opinion on this? 

http://faculty.washington.edu/swhiting/pols502/Jick.pdf

Hi Sa,

well I would like to point out that not experience is a must, but the understanding of epistemologic and ontologic theoretical framework and settings. You can perfectly rely on the experience and expertise of other researchers and quote their judgement on the advances and caveats of a specific research method. But in my opinion what you need to be aware of is their epistemologic set. e. g. if you follow Guba and Lincoln, triangulation is only possible within positivist theories. If you don't follow this paradigm, it might be a bad choice to do so. So it's not so much about the experience, from my point of view.

Richardson on the other and argues to drop triangulation in favour of a methodological crystallisation because of the epistemological questions not solvable for postmodern and (post)(de)constructivist theorists. Again,this might imply hard conflicts and a certain debate for your research's results.

To sum it up a bit, depending on your research question(s) and the epistemological set you are working in, it might lead to a lot of credibility issues and discussions. you will always have to justify the methods mixed each and every one anyway, but triangulation is also something that needs to be based on very good arguments and if you are not aware of the current debates in epistemology it might become very difficult.

What I wanted to point out before is: mixed method is not by any means solely to be justified by the advantages and disadvantages of the methods mixed. Mixing methods is something you usually conduct because the methods promise to show you different aspects of the faix sociaux and therefore are immanent. They are not justified by the methodologies themselves.

Article Fourth generation evaluation / Egon G. Guba, Yvonna S. Lincoln

Book Writing: A Method of Inquiry

In the later editions of his book, Denzin basically repudiated most of his original stand on triangulation. In particular, he used  ontological and epistemology arguments from Lincoln & Guba to claim that the results from qualitative and quantitative methods could not be compared in a meaningful way.

More recently, pragmatist and critical realist approaches treat such arguments as seriously out of date. Sadly, Lincoln & Guba's misreading of both Kuhn and the general literature on the sociology of knowledge probably set the field back at least a decade. In particular, Kuhn did not define paradigms in terms of ontology and epistemology, and in the Postscript to the second edition of "Structure..." he explicitly rejected this approach. Apparently Lincoln & Guba never read that portion of his work.

As a result we have statements like Yves' that "mixed method is not by any means solely to be justified by the advantages and disadvantages of the methods mixed." are part of the problem. This amounts to saying, "Yes, of course you can do that in practice, but my theory forbids it." There many indeed be a contradiction there, but it is not a problem with successful practice; instead, it is a problem with poorly defined theory.

At the moment, my observation of current definitions of mixed methods is this way. On the one hand we have Morse placing distinctions between multiple methods and mixed methods based on the non-integration/integration of methods used in data collection and analysis:

• Mixed method design – incorporation of various qualitative and quantitative strategies within a single project that may have either qualitative or quantitative theoretical drive. The “imported” strategies are supplemental to the major or core method and serve to enlighten or provide clues that are followed up within the core method
• Multi-method design – this is the conduct of two or more research methods, each conducted rigorously and complete in itself, in one project. The results are then triangulated to form a complete whole. (Source: Morse, 2003)

From my understanding, Morse does not explicitly define mixed methods as a type of research design that MUST incorporate both quantitative and qualitative components.

On the other hand we have Creswell etc. who defines mixed methods as a method that incorporates quantitative AND qualitative components. 

I'm also wondering the same thing when Morse questions the reason behind JMMR's decision not to publish QUAL-qual studies. Currently is there only a mainstream definition that is linked to mixed methods, in that it is a research that incorporates BOTH quantitative and qualitative elements? Or is it still sufficient for a researcher to justify a QUAL-qual mixed methods study based on Morse's definition - that it's a mixed methods study because it allows for the integration of different methods ? 

P/S: My philosophical underpinning is pragmatism, thus I try to disregard the ontological/philosophical assumptions of each method employed

Hai i know this is way too long for a comment (one year has passed). Hope you found the answer.

Mixed is more towards Quan/Quali combined method (either sequantial or parallel) due to the norms of the phrase beingvused in numerous writings.

As for multimethodology, is about using multiple methods (more than 2 of course) which comprises of other than those of the mixed, such as for me legal research (interdisciplinary - e.g. law and economics) plus qualitative.

Reason of choosing multimethodlogy; that I need to triangulate both data to give more evidence and validate my findings to add rigor to my research towards answering my research objectives.

So mixed is one part of multimethodology. A small circle within a bigger one.

Wallahhualam.

Sry the link

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=http://www.csas.ed.ac.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0005/66542/Legal_Research_Chynoweth_-_Salford_Uni..pdf&ved=0ahUKEwjYqITRq5LOAhUJOY8KHXShAaMQFgghMAA&usg=AFQjCNFRzWGAwqcfwmajgBW9-1KuNPmOVQ&sig2=rq4JMPL0H4tJBeLSCb6ipQ

Could someone please answer the following questions:

What is the difference between a mixed model research and a mixed method research (both mixed methods)?

Thank you

I, personally do not like to stick with such terminologies, I do my research, trying to solve the problem of the research scientifically, without worrying about which type or classification

 What if I combined case studies with longitudinal approach, is this a multi-method research?

A longitudinal case study uses only one method -- case study.

Great question, S.A. Rahman. Between these two research paradigms, I am currently most familiar with mixed methods (Creswell, 2009; Tashakkori et al., 2010). I use "mixed methods" to refer to research in which both qualitative and quantitative methods are being employed; by "multimethod", I mean any possible combination of the following: qualitative, quantitative, philosophical, theoretical methods. (I have not seen anyone else use multimethod in the latter sense so far, so take this just as my specific interpretation.)

Thank you for the reference to Morse, 2003.

hi. i need know more detail about multi-method study. can help me?

thanks a lot

Hi, late to this thread, however, I am currently struggling with what my PhD research should be classified as and I need to be clear on this for thesis write up which will include a methodological chapter. Currently my research looks like this: a qualitative study using interviews and observations which will be divided into three different chapters (and possible papers) based on the major emergent core ideas. This is then followed by a quantitative study of patient medical records, whose design has been refined throughout the large qualitative study to help address some of the questions that emerged, but also, to help address the overall thesis project questions by enriching the project with quantitative data.

Can anyone provide any guidance. Thank you in advance

Dear all,

I would like to give a contribution to help clarifying the concepts.

Multimethods: "Multimethod research programs are based on a methodological research strategy that includes more than one method of collecting data and or more than one method of analyzing the data. Such methods can be based on qualitative techniques, quantitative techniques, or a mix of both"

in Mills, A. J., Durepos, G., & Wiebe, E. (Eds.). (2010). Encyclopedia of case study research: L-Z; index (Vol. 1). Sage.

Mix-methods: "The combination of methods involve the collection, analysis and integration of quantitative and qualitative data in a single or multiphase study. The term multimethods refers to the mixing of methods by combining two or more qualitative methods in a single research study or by using two or more quantitative methods in a single research study"

in Hesse-Biber, S. N. (2010). Mixed methods research: Merging theory with practice. Guilford Press.

If you ask my opinion, I would say that Hesser-Biber (2010) definition is quite good, although a bit different from Mills et al. (2010).

Multimethods: mix of methods by combining two or more qualitative methods or two or more quantitative methods in a single research study.

Mix-methods: Combination of quantitative and qualitative methods (or sources of data collection) in a single research.

I really hope it helped.

Greetings,

João

Emily, it sounds like you are using a QUAL --> quant design, where the goal of the quantitative methods might be to test hypotheses that you generated through your qualitative study. If so, you might take a look at my article: From Themes to Hypotheses: Following Up With Quantitative Methods, which is available here.

Article From Themes to Hypotheses: Following Up With Quantitative Methods

For my research, I have the same question as the original question on this thread. For a student of a health care intervention and its effect on maternal mortality, I am analyzing quantitative data from electronic medical records, surveys of health workers, and data from focus groups and interviews. I was calling this a mixed methods study and my advisor is asking whether it is truly multiple methods rather than mixed methods. I'm not sure how to answer this.

Dear Laura, according to my understanding you are using several sources of data collection, which are quantitative. To know your research type, you will have to determine how many "methods" you are combining. I would suggest you to make a clear distinction on the sources of data collection, methods and methodology you are using, only then I would determine if the study is mixed- or multi-method. Hope it could help.

Fetters & Molina-Azorin, the editors of the Journal of Mixed Methods Research, recently published a statement on this issues: "After 10 years, it also is timely to revisit the language of mixed methods as well. As editors of JMMR, we make the following distinctions. Multiple methods research refers to all the various combinations of methods that include in a substantive way more than one data collection procedure. Multiple methods research can include two or more exclusively qualitative approaches, Qual plus Qual, two or more quantitative approaches, Quan plus Quan, or a combination of qualitative and quantitative approaches, Qual plus Quan, hence mixed methods research. In our view, mixed methods is one category of multimethods or multiple methods research."

Since Laura Stachel's work included both qualitative and quantitative methods, it would certainly qualify under this definition. I think the more important question, however, is the degree of integration between the two data sets. While have both kinds of data may indeed make a study technically mixed methods, the concern is how the author connects the qualitative and quantitative results.

What if I used pre-test/post-test (quantitative method) to measure the impact of intervention on performance on one hand and interviews and observation (qualitative methods) on the other hand for understanding online interactions in which there is no relevance between quan and qual methods' data. What shall we call this research design and how pragmatism can fit with such design when there is no integration between the quan and qual methods' findings

Syahirah Abdul Rahman can I use the terminology multi mix method design

Good afternoon to everyone.

I'm also trying to define the method* design of my Master's thesis, and I don't know which one to use.

My problem is that I probably need to change the initial idea because of lack of qualitative data collected through open-answer interview.

The initial idea was to use a classical mix-methods study where to compare medical records to patient's point of view. But, as stated above, I probably can't be able to reach all the patients due to legal reasons, I am considering to include a literature review as third dataset. This would mean 3 datasets (medical records, interviews, and literature review), 3 methodologies, and 2 methods (quan and qual).

How may I define it?

Thank you very much in advance.

I don't think that a literature review is a "method" because it does not collect or analyze data. With regard to your qualitative data, is the problem that not enough people answered the open-ended questions, or is the data that they provided too "thin" for a meaningful qualitative analysis?

The problem is that the initial number of participants could be reduced to half or even a third of it.

Interesting discussion!

Unfortunately, my question is coming years after the original question. Anyway, I would also appreciate any help/clarification that I can get for my PhD. So, i'm using three different methods: Q-methodology, qualitative methods and a case study independently to answer different objectives (meaning, the Q-methodology will address one objective, the qualitative method will address a second while the case study will be used for the third).

However, as the Q-methodology is a mixed methods on its own, i'm a bit confused on the position of my study. Do you think this can still be classified as a multi-method as the three different methods are employed in answering three objectives independently (in terms of data collection, collation, analysis and interpretation) mainly to make sense of the general aim of my study.

It is clear that multimethod design belongs to postpositivism and mixed method to pragmatism. The first was introduced in 1960s and the second after 1990s.

Usman Ahmad Modibbo depending on your epistemology... I feel that your case can just be a classic qualitative research which arrives a conclusion using triangulation. It does not necessarily have to be a mixed methods study in this sense. You might wanna read more into qualitative case study designs as they'll allow you to incorporate multiple tools to arrive at a triangulation.

Ravi Teja I would use the terminologies applied by methodology researchers that you are citing. Best-case is to discuss with your supervisor what should be the most appropriate terminology to use as to not confuse other academics.

Wedyan Hammas The term "triangulation" has become rather controversial within the field of mixed methods, and the editors of the Journal of Mixed Methods Research have announced that they will no longer consider articles based on this motivation for combining methods.

Here is a commentary that I wrote in response to that announcement:

Article Commentary—After Triangulation, What Next?

I misunderstood about Mixed Method and Multi-Method. As mentioned other scholars, mixed methods rely on integration between quanti and quali. I have conducted research projects by using different methods; questionnaires, interviews, projective techniques, and netnography in order to triangulate the data. Is this multi-methods?

Can anyone tell me where in the evidence hierarchy does a mix-methods design fall? I am having difficulty finding clear answers.

Martha Magana

Is this of any help:

https://libguides.cedarville.edu/c.php?g=18923&p=106702

See level V

Martha Magana By "evidence hierarchy" to you mean the claim that Random Controlled Trials represent a gold standard while qualitative investigations are low status at best? If so, why would anyone even consider degrading an RCT by adding useless qualitative research?

Sorry for the sarcasm, but I think that it is foolish to create a hierarchy of evidence that exists beyond the research question for a specific study. So, the value of any research design, whether mixed methods or not, depends on its ability to meet the goals of a specific research project.

Martha Magana; yes, I agree with Dr David L Morgan.

The list I gave a link for has a similar 'evidence hierarchy' approach.

I also think that the best design for a particular research question is the one that is appropriate to what is being asked.

Dear all, the difference is the research triad.

Nancy Cartwright's book from Princeton University Press is great, and you can read some chapters online. Available at http://assets.press.princeton.edu/chapters/s11191.pdf

She noted;

"Multimethod research has become very

popular and almost a requirement for book-length studies.

Multimethod can mean many things, but here it means combining

case studies with statistics, qualitative comparative analysis

(QCA), experiments, or game theory models. The purpose of

case studies is to explore causal mechanisms at the heart of

theories. One does case studies because cross-case methods give

little purchase on the causal mechanisms (Mi ) by which X

produces Y. For multimethod researchers, showing a significant

causal effect in a cross-case analysis is not sufficient; one needs to

provide a causal mechanism and evidence for it. Demonstrating

a causal effect is only half the job; the second half involves

specifying the causal mechanism and empirically examining it,

usually through case studies.

Causal mechanisms, cross-case analyses, and case studies

form the research triad; see figure 1.1. This volume rests

on the proposition that commitment to multimethod research

is commitment to the research triad. Multimethod research

typically is conceptualized as qualitative—within-case inference

—along with quantitative cross-case inference. The research

triad adds a third dimension to that, i.e., causal mechanisms.

The research triad is an integrated approach because a commitment

to multimethod research is also a commitment to a

causal mechanism approach to explanation and social science

research."

Thank you everyone for your answers and resources. I apologize for my late response. I did find your resources helpful.

Dear Victor Alexandre G. Teixeira

Do you mean that cross-case inference is a quantitative having meaning that we compare the multiple cases quantitatively to draw inferences?

Just to add to what's already been said above: Going back to the original question, the mixed vs multi-method distinction isn't necessarily about ontological and epistemological stances associated with different methods or approaches to research. Not everyone agrees that a particular method (or combination of methods) is inherently associated with a particular philosophical position. Pragmatism is often associated with mixed methods, but it's not the only possible stance from which to conduct a mixed methods study (e.g. look up mixed methods and critical realism).

I did not get it still. I mean what is the appropriate terminology if one combines different design, for instance cross sectional and case control mixed with qualitative method. I think for qualitative vs quantitative integration based on different theoretical basis, we call it mixed method(Exploratory, Explanatory, Embeded, Transformational ...)type. If one of this is this co-joined with research design variation, what is the appropriate term to use? that means If a researcher wants to answer a question for rear disease in object one, he uses Case control. On the other hand, if he/she plan to see the outcome because of exposure identified in the first objective, may by cross sectional study. Further, he/she want to explain some qualitatively measuring variables in conceptual framework from exposure to outcome. So, what do we call such study?

The editors of the Journal of Mixed Methods Research (see attached) treat multiple or multi-method as any study that combines two or more different methods. From there, mixed methods explicitly combines a qualitative and a quantitative method. So, the other options are qual+qual and quan+quan.

In their terms, "methods" primarily emphasizes the major tools for collecting data -- survey and experiments on the quantitative side; open-ended interviews and participant observation on the qualitative side.

I hope that the following advertisement is okay here. The online course "Mixed-Methods and Multimethod Research" (16 - 20 Aug 2021), taught by Ingo Rohlfing, at the GESIS Summer School in Survey Methodology should be of interest to everybody interested in multimethod research and mixed method research: https://bit.ly/GSS21-C9

From the course description:

"This course deals with mixed-methods and multimethod research (MMR) in the social sciences. We will discuss the broader understanding of combining qualitative and quantitative methods (mixed methods) and the narrower approach of nested analysis. The course aims to reflect the diversity of MMR studies in the discipline to accommodate participants' projects. The relative emphasis we put on specific variants of MMR designs will be adapted to the methods participants are applying in their own research.

The goal of the course is to understand the different varieties in which MMR can be done. We discuss the unique advantages and methodological and practical challenges confronted in mixed-method research. Topics include the variety of mixed-method designs that are available; the use of concepts in the qualitative and quantitative analysis, case selection for qualitative research, the compatibility of theoretical expectations in the qualitative and quantitative analysis. The discussions are illustrated with examples from different fields of political science. By the end of the course, participants will able to realize their own mixed-methods study in a systematic manner, and to critically evaluate published MMR studies."

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Meant to ask the same question of differences between multiple methods and mixed methods. Where are they similar and where do they differ?

It means using two or more of the qualitative methods for research in case of multi methods

In case of mixed methods, it is certainly a combination of both qualitative and quantitative methods together

Thanks for these answers - very helpful