LESSON 2:

Importance of Qualitative
Research Across Different
Fields
QUALITATIVE RESEARCH IN EDUCATION:
 Ethnographicstudies of learning &
knowledge in education ask the question
what counts as knowledge and learning in
classrooms to teachers and students.
 Ethnographer is concerned with the social
and cultural dynamics of a school or
classroom.
 Ex:How teaching styles match the learning
styles of students?
QUALITATIVE RESEARCH IN EDUCATION:
 Concluded that ethnographic practice-like any set
of social & cultural practices are ways that people
in a site & react to each other to pursue an agenda:
*research agenda
*educational agenda
*social, cultural & instructional change agenda
 Ex:
How students react to the evaluation of their
academic performance?
QUALITATIVE RESEARCH IN TECHNICAL
COMMUNICATION:
 Determinesthe effective use of technology
in the workplace to ensure smooth flow of
communication
 Research results in order to describe/
illustrate current practices which can take
the forms of E=mail, fax messaging, video
and voice conferencing, intranet &
extranet, jargons and graphics.
QUALITATIVE RESEARCH IN PSYCHOLOGY:
 Psychologyhas been strongly shaped by the
behavioral and cognitive traditions, within
which psychology should seek to
understand & determine an observable,
objective psychological reality.
 Ex: psychologist seek to understand why
some students lack motivation to go to
school and why some students resort to
bullying and the like.
QUALITATIVE RESEARCH IN ADVERTISING:
 It uses a variety of methods & involves an
interpretative , naturalistic approach to whatever
is the focus of study (Denzin and Lincoln, 1994, as
cited in Morrison et al, 2002)
 The character of qualitative research makes it &
its associated methods extremely useful for
uncovering complex consumer insights that can
lead to successful advertising.
 Morrison et al, say that great advertising comes
along from an understanding of consumer’s wants
and needs.
 Uses: Theory and Approach
QUALITATIVE RESEARCH IN ADVERTISING:
 THEORY – refers to an organizing scheme for the
data that place them in orderly patterns and give
meaning and insight into the lives of others. Theory
is not placed before data collection; it comes out of
data and thus referred to as Ground Theory (Glaser
& Strauss, as cited in Morrison et al, 2002)
 APPROACH – researchers begin with inductive
analysis and the, often swing back & forth between
inductive & deductive analysis.
 QUALITATIVE RESEARCH IN SOCIAL WORK:
 To describe the range of ways of reconstructing
experiences from full reliving of the experiences to
its disowning, Shaw and Holland use the terms
“knowledge focus” of ‘awareness” and “alienation”
as originally used by Enosh and Buchbinder (2005).
 Analysis of interview data & narrative:
* Knowledge Defined as direct remembering & reliving, with complete details of the events
Including awareness of emotions & of
* Awareness of mental processes cognitive processes
* Awareness of identity Including awareness of values & the construction of personal
Characteristics of each partner and of the couple as a unit
* Alienation Characterized by a refusal to observe, reflect or remember
QUALITATIVE RESEARCH IN MARKETING:
 Influenced by social research, marketing
researchers embedded projective devices within the
approach of in-depth interview
 Glickand Belk did the quali study in 1862 for the
Coca-Cola Company on “why people think
softdrinks?”
 Other:
“What does desired value change mean to
customers?”
END