Page 109 - DLIS401_METHODOLOGY_OF_RESEARCH_AND_STATISTICAL_TECHNIQUES

Methodology of Research and Statistical Techniques

Notes to a particular phenomenon (qualitative research). It is therefore likely that your ‘mixed’
approach will take a qualitative approach some of the time and a quantitative approach at
others. It depends on where you are in the research process.
A misconception, and source of confusion for many people, is the belief that qualitative research
generates just qualitative data (text, words, opinions, etc) and that quantitative research generates
just quantitative data (numbers). Sometimes this is the case, but both types of data can be
generated by each approach. For instance, a postal questionnaire or structured ‘interview
(quantitative research) will often gather factual information, for example, age, salary, length
of service (quantitative data) – but may also seek opinions and attitudes (qualitative data).
A second misconception is that statistical techniques are only applicable for quantitative data.
Once again, this is not so. There are many statistical techniques that can be applied to qualitative
data, such as ratings scales, that has been generated by a quantitative research approach.
Unfortunately, many people are worried about numbers, and in particular about statistics, and
everything that word implies. Quantitative research and the analysis of quantitative data is
consequently something to be avoided. But as we have indicated above, this is rarely possible
because qualitative data can also be analysed using statistics. An understanding of basic statistical
terms and ideas and the ability to carry out some statistical analysis (elementary or otherwise)
is essential for most researchers. Also competence in these techniques, even at a basic level,
is a useful skill in its own right.
A third misconception is that qualitative data analysis is easy. There are many ways of conducting
qualitative research and thus many ways of analysing the resulting (qualitative) data. For
example, having conducted an interview, transcription and organisation of data are the first
stages of analysis. This would then be continued by systematically analysing the transcripts,
grouping together comments on similar themes and attempting to interpret them and draw
conclusions.
We deal with data that can be analysed statistically (quantitative data and some types of
qualitative data) in the section called quantitative data analysis. We cover data that cannot, or
is very difficult, to analyse statistically in the section called qualitative data analysis.

7.1.4 Qualitative Data Analysis
Qualitative data is subjective, rich, and in-depth information normally presented in the form
of words. In undergraduate dissertations, the most common form of qualitative data is derived
from semi-structured or unstructured interviews, although other sources can include observations,
life histories and journals and documents of all kinds including newspapers.

Qualitative data from interviews can be analysed for content (content analysis) or for the
language used (discourse analysis). Qualitative data is difficult to analyse and often opportunities
to achieve high marks are lost because the data is treated casually and without rigour. Here
we concentrate on the content analysis of data from interviews.
Theory

When using a quantitative methodology, you are normally testing theory through the testing
of a hypothesis. In qualitative research, you are either exploring the application of a theory or
model in a different context or are hoping for a theory or a model to emerge from the data.
In other words, although you may have some ideas about your topic, you are also looking for
ideas, concepts and attitudes often from experts or practitioners in the field.

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