Reflections on the past week (Theme 4: Qualitative methods)

This week I’ve learned a lot about qualitative methods, how to use them, and the pros and cons with the different methods. I am going to summarize some parts among other things that we discussed on the seminar and that I think is important and interesting when using qualitative methods.

I think there could be a potential risk with relying on just one or two qualitative methods in many cases. Because most qualitative methods are very thorough they are also niched so to speak, in what they are investigate. For instance; performing surveys that aim to investigate some habits or behavior, of let’s say online gamers or alike, via mail or in a way that you as a researcher are geographically separated from the participants in the survey could depict the actuality in a faulty manner. And so if observations were carried out, as another type of qualitative method, you would maybe get another result as you as a researcher analyzes the reality instead of having other people doing that, thinking about what and how they should answer the questions.

Here we come back to the term “sense-data” that Russel wrote about in his book; when performing qualitative research, I think it is best to use your own senses as much as possible for input data and carry out observations as you then often get the most accurate results for your research as possible. Of course, there are many cases where observations isn’t possible, and also cases where doing surveys at a distance are beneficial, as the participants gets time to think about what to answer etc. and that is many times required. But I think however that one should be careful not to rely on just a single qualitative method to conclude the research since the choice of qualitative method will almost certainly reflect the outcome of the result. It is therefore best, if qualitative methods are chosen, to perform several or at least two different methods for a more accurate picture. Or indeed mixed methods with maybe both qualitative and quantitative research. Anyhow, documentation is key when using qualitative methods, especially for observations; such as recording interviews, taking notes while a task is performed, or recording the screen for HCI research or tasks performed on a computer is vital so that a good analysis and reflection on the result can be carried out afterwards.