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All rights reserved. Another major category we identified in our sample is Grounded Theory. We also read descriptions of its main traits, what it entails and fosters — for instance, an exceptional flexibility, an inductive approach Strauss and Corbin —33; ; Esterberg :7 , an ability to step back and critically analyze situations, recognize tendencies towards bias, think abstractly and be open to criticism, enhance sensitivity towards the words and actions of respondents, and develop a sense of absorption and devotion to the research process Strauss and Corbin :5—6.
Accordingly, we identified discussions of the value of triangulating different methods both using and not using grounded theory , including quantitative ones, and theories to achieve theoretical development most comprehensively in Denzin ; Strauss and Corbin ; Timmermans and Tavory We have also located arguments about how its practice helps to systematize data collection, analysis and presentation of results Glaser and Strauss [] Grounded theory offers a systematic approach which requires researchers to get close to the field; closeness is a requirement of identifying questions and developing new concepts or making further distinctions with regard to old concepts.
In contrast to other qualitative approaches, grounded theory emphasizes the detailed coding process, and the numerous fine-tuned distinctions that the researcher makes during the process.
Within this category, too, we could not find a satisfying discussion of the meaning of qualitative research. In other words no definition emerges from our data, and in our research process we have moved back and forth between our empirical data and the attempt to present a definition. Our concrete strategy, as stated above, is to relate qualitative and quantitative research, or more specifically, qualitative and quantitative work. We use an ideal-typical notion of quantitative research which relies on taken for granted and numbered variables.
This means that the data consists of variables on different scales, such as ordinal, but frequently ratio and absolute scales, and the representation of the numbers to the variables, i. In this section we return to the notion of quality and try to clarify it while presenting our contribution. Broadly, research refers to the activity performed by people trained to obtain knowledge through systematic procedures.
Next, building on our empirical analysis we explain the four notions that we have identified as central to qualitative work: distinctions, process, closeness, and improved understanding. In discussing them, ultimately in relation to one another, we make their meaning even more precise.
Our idea, in short, is that only when these ideas that we present separately for analytic purposes are brought together can we speak of qualitative research. We believe that the possibility of making new distinctions is one the defining characteristics of qualitative research. It clearly sets it apart from quantitative analysis which works with taken-for-granted variables, albeit as mentioned, meta-analyses, for example, factor analysis may result in new variables.
Quality is about what something is or has, which means that the distinction from its environment is crucial. New distinctions by themselves are not enough; just adding concepts only increases complexity without furthering our knowledge. The significance of new distinctions is judged against the communal knowledge of the research community.
To enable this discussion and judgements central elements of rational discussion are required cf. Habermas [] ; Davidsson [ ] to identify what is new and relevant scientific knowledge. When Becker studied deviant behavior and investigated how people became marihuana smokers, he made distinctions between the ways in which people learned how to smoke. Others have stressed the making of distinctions in relation to coding or theorizing. Emerson et al. In the ideal-typical quantitative research only existing and so to speak, given, variables would be used.
If this is the case no new distinction are made. Process does not merely suggest that research takes time. It mainly implies that qualitative new knowledge results from a process that involves several phases, and above all iteration.
The main point is that the categories that the researcher uses, and perhaps takes for granted at the beginning of the research process, usually undergo qualitative changes resulting from what is found. Becker describes how he tested hypotheses and let the jargon of the users develop into theoretical concepts. This happens over time while the study is being conducted, exemplifying what we mean by process. In the research process, a pilot-study may be used to get a first glance of, for example, the field, how to approach it, and what methods can be used, after which the method and theory are chosen or refined before the main study begins.
Thus, the empirical material is often central from the start of the project and frequently leads to adjustments by the researcher. Likewise, during the main study categories are not fixed; the empirical material is seen in light of the theory used, but it is also given the opportunity to kick back, thereby resisting attempts to apply theoretical straightjackets Becker In this process, coding and analysis are interwoven, and thus are often important steps for getting closer to the phenomenon and deciding what to focus on next.
Becker began his research by interviewing musicians close to him, then asking them to refer him to other musicians, and later on doubling his original sample of about 25 to include individuals in other professions Becker Additionally, he made use of some participant observation, documents, and interviews with opiate users made available to him by colleagues.
As his inductive theory of deviance evolved, Becker expanded his sample in order to fine tune it, and test the accuracy and generality of his hypotheses. In addition, he introduced a negative case and discussed the null hypothesis His phasic career model is thus based on a research design that embraces processual work.
Obviously, all research is process-oriented to some degree. The point is that the ideal-typical quantitative process does not imply change of the data, and iteration between data, evidence, hypotheses, empirical work, and theory.
The data, quantified variables, are, in most cases fixed. Merging of data, which of course can be done in a quantitative research process, does not mean new data. Another characteristic that is emphasized in our sample is that qualitative researchers — and in particular ethnographers — can, or as Goffman put it, ought to , get closer to the phenomenon being studied and their data than quantitative researchers for example, Silverman Becker started out his interview study, as we noted, by talking to those he knew in the field of music to get closer to the phenomenon he was studying.
By conducting interviews he got even closer. Had he done more observations, he would undoubtedly have got even closer to the field. By getting and staying so close to their data — be it pictures, text or humans interacting Becker was himself a musician — for a long time, as the research progressively focuses, qualitative researchers are prompted to continually test their hunches, presuppositions and hypotheses.
They test them against a reality that often but certainly not always , and practically, as well as metaphorically, talks back, whether by validating them, or disqualifying their premises — correctly, as well as incorrectly Fine ; Becker This testing nonetheless often leads to new directions for the research.
Becker, for example, says that he was initially reading psychological theories, but when facing the data he develops a theory that looks at, you may say, everything but psychological dispositions to explain the use of marihuana. Especially researchers involved with ethnographic methods have a fairly unique opportunity to dig up and then test in a circular, continuous and temporal way new research questions and findings as the research progresses, and thereby to derive previously unimagined and uncharted distinctions by getting closer to the phenomenon under study.
Let us stress that getting close is by no means restricted to ethnography. The notion of hermeneutic circle and hermeneutics as a general way of understanding implies that we must get close to the details in order to get the big picture. This also means that qualitative researchers can literally also make use of details of pictures as evidence cf. Harper Thus, researchers may get closer both when generating the material or when analyzing it.
Quantitative research, we maintain, in the ideal-typical representation cannot get closer to the data. The data is essentially numbers in tables making up the variables Franzosi The numbers themselves, however, are non-ambiguous.
Thus, in quantitative research, interpretation, if done, is not about the data itself—the numbers—but what the numbers stand for. Becker While distinction, process and getting closer refer to the qualitative work of the researcher, improved understanding refers to its conditions and outcome of this work.
Understanding cuts deeper than explanation, which to some may mean a causally verified correlation between variables. The notion of explanation presupposes the notion of understanding since explanation does not include an idea of how knowledge is gained Manicas : Understanding, we argue, is the core concept of what we call the outcome of the process when research has made use of all the other elements that were integrated in the research.
Understanding, then, has a special status in qualitative research since it refers both to the conditions of knowledge and the outcome of the process.
Understanding can to some extent be seen as the condition of explanation and occurs in a process of interpretation, which naturally refers to meaning Gadamer It is fundamentally connected to knowing, and to the knowing of how to do things Heidegger [] Conceptually the term hermeneutics is used to account for this process.
Heidegger ties hermeneutics to human being and not possible to separate from the understanding of being Here we use it in a broader sense, and more connected to method in general cf.
Seiffert Understanding is the result of a circular process and means that the parts are understood in light of the whole, and vice versa. Understanding presupposes pre-understanding, or in other words, some knowledge of the phenomenon studied.
The pre-understanding, even in the form of prejudices, are in qualitative research process, which we see as iterative, questioned, which gradually or suddenly change due to the iteration of data, evidence and concepts. However, qualitative research generates understanding in the iterative process when the researcher gets closer to the data, e.
Questioning, to ask questions, and put what one assumes—prejudices and presumption—in question, is central to understand something Heidegger [] ; Gadamer — We propose that this iterative process in which the process of understanding occurs is characteristic of qualitative research. Improved understanding means that we obtain scientific knowledge of something that we as a scholarly community did not know before, or that we get to know something better.
It means that we understand more about how parts are related to one another, and to other things we already understand see also Fine and Hallett Understanding is an important condition for qualitative research. It is not enough to identify correlations, make distinctions, and work in a process in which one gets close to the field or phenomena. Understanding is accomplished when the elements are integrated in an iterative process.
It is, moreover, possible to understand many things, and researchers, just like children, may come to understand new things every day as they engage with the world. This subjective condition of understanding — namely, that a person gains a better understanding of something —is easily met. In other words, the understanding gained must be deemed useful by other researchers, so that they can build on it. We thus see understanding from a pragmatic, rather than a subjective or objective perspective.
Improved understanding is related to the question s at hand. Understanding, in order to represent an improvement, must be an improvement in relation to the existing body of knowledge of the scientific community James [ ] And it also added new knowledge about the labeling of deviant behavior as a social process.
Understanding in the phenomenological sense, which is a hallmark of qualitative research, we argue, requires meaning and this meaning is derived from the context, and above all the data being analyzed.
The ideal-typical quantitative research operates with given variables with different numbers. This type of material is not enough to establish meaning at the level that truly justifies understanding. In other words, many social science explanations offer ideas about correlations or even causal relations, but this does not mean that the meaning at the level of the data analyzed, is understood. This leads us to say that there are indeed many explanations that meet the criteria of understanding, for example the explanation of how one becomes a marihuana smoker presented by Becker.
However, we may also understand a phenomenon without explaining it, and we may have potential explanations, or better correlations, that are not really understood. We may speak more generally of quantitative research and its data to clarify what we see as an important distinction. Both qualitative and quantitative research is based on the lifeworld, and all researchers use prejudices and pre-understanding in the research process.
This idea is present in the works of Heidegger and Heisenberg cited in Franzosi Qualitative research, as we argued, involves the interaction and questioning of concepts theory , data, and evidence.
Qualitative research, as defined here, is consequently a combination of two criteria: i how to do things —namely, generating and analyzing empirical material, in an iterative process in which one gets closer by making distinctions, and ii the outcome —improved understanding novel to the scholarly community. Is our definition applicable to our own study? We have defined qualitative research, or qualitative scientific work, in relation to quantitative scientific work.
Given this definition, qualitative research is about questioning the pre-given taken for granted variables, but it is thus also about making new distinctions of any type of phenomenon, for example, by coining new concepts, including the identification of new variables. This process, as we have discussed, is carried out in relation to empirical material, previous research, and thus in relation to theory. Theory and previous research cannot be escaped or bracketed.
According to hermeneutic principles all scientific work is grounded in the lifeworld, and as social scientists we can thus never fully bracket our pre-understanding. We have proposed that quantitative research, as an idealtype, is concerned with pre-determined variables Small Variables are epistemically fixed, but can vary in terms of dimensions, such as frequency or number. Age is an example; as a variable it can take on different numbers.
In relation to quantitative research, qualitative research does not reduce its material to number and variables. If this is done the process of comes to a halt, the researcher gets more distanced from her data, and it makes it no longer possible to make new distinctions that increase our understanding. We have above discussed the components of our definition in relation to quantitative research.
Our conclusion is that in the research that is called quantitative there are frequent and necessary qualitative elements. This is not to deny dissimilarities, or the different epistemic and ontic presuppositions that may be more or less strongly associated with the two different strands see Goertz and Mahoney Our point is nonetheless that prejudices and preconceptions about researchers are unproductive, and that as other researchers have argued, differences may be exaggerated e.
Several things follow from our findings. The most important result is the relation to quantitative research. In our analysis we have separated qualitative research from quantitative research.
Our definition captures the elements, and how they, when combined in practice, generate understanding. As many of the quotations we have used suggest, one conclusion of our study holds that qualitative approaches are not inherently connected with a specific method.
Swedberg Our results open up for an interaction not characterized by differences, but by different emphasis, and similarities.
Let us take two examples to briefly indicate how qualitative elements can fruitfully be combined with quantitative. Franzosi has discussed the relations between quantitative and qualitative approaches, and more specifically the relation between words and numbers.
He analyzes texts and argues that scientific meaning cannot be reduced to numbers. Franzosi shows how one can go about using qualitative and quantitative methods and data to address scientific questions analyzing violence in Italy at the time when fascism was rising — Aspers studied the meaning of fashion photographers.
He uses an empirical phenomenological approach, and establishes meaning at the level of actors. In a second step this meaning, and the different ideal-typical photographers constructed as a result of participant observation and interviews, are tested using quantitative data from a database; in the first phase to verify the different ideal-types, in the second phase to use these types to establish new knowledge about the types. In both of these cases—and more examples can be found—authors move from qualitative data and try to keep the meaning established when using the quantitative data.
A second main result of our study is that a definition, and we provided one, offers a way for research to clarify, and even evaluate, what is done. Hence, our definition can guide researchers and students, informing them on how to think about concrete research problems they face, and to show what it means to get closer in a process in which new distinctions are made. The definition can also be used to evaluate the results, given that it is a standard of evaluation cf.
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