Beginning Qualitative Research

A Philosophical and Practical Guide

Pamela Maykut, Richard Morehouse

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2002
• ISBN:
  9781135720735
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

The authors have focused this book on the serious, beginning, qualitative researcher - theoretically rigorous, yet with an understandable perspective.; The book has three main features. First, it provides a strong theoretical base for the understanding of competing research paradigms. Secondly, it features a "methods" section consistent with the non-linear nature of naturalistic inquiry, yet it allows the beginner to see direction. Thirdly, the authors include examples of actual research studies conducted (and completed) in a single year.

Part I
Building a Philosophic Foundation for Qualitative Research

Chapter 1
Philosophic Underpinnings: An Overview

This book begins with an introduction to the philosophic underpinnings that shape our understanding of the qualitative research enterprise. A philosophic orientation to inquiry will aid you in forming a frame of reference about the nature of qualitative inquiry and help you form a platform upon which to build a hands-on practical guide for conducting a qualitative research project from beginning to end. Our goal in the philosophic section is to get you to think differently about doing research before you begin doing research. This goes against the trend of most books on qualitative research which begin with a presentation of methods for conducting research (Berg, 1989; Bogdan and Taylor, 1975; Burgess, 1985; Patton, 1990), or at most a brief history of qualitative inquiry (Bogdan and Biklen, 1982). On the other hand, Kincheloe (1991) presents a philosophic perspective on qualitative research but frames it more or less exclusively within the context of teacher empowerment and provides little practical help for the beginning researcher. It is our firm belief that a frame of reference built on an understanding of the philosophic underpinning of quantitative and qualitative research is essential for the beginning qualitative researcher.

An understanding of the philosphic assumptions is important as one begins a research project because questions will come up that were not, perhaps could not be, anticipated. These unanticipated questions demand answers, often immediate answers. If a problem occurs while one is gathering data, there is no time to go back and check notes or to review a research article. Our first inclination when facing a new problem is to fall back on what we know best, and what we know best about research are the models presented by traditional science.

While the learning-by-doing approach appears to have the advantage of getting the beginning researcher into a research project quickly and therefore providing a practical way to develop an understanding of research, it also has some serious disadvantages. A philosophic framework is particularly important for the beginning qualitative researcher as differences in the way qualitative and quantitative researchers approach research appear not only on the surface where they can be easily detected, but also on very basic levels that cannot be easily noticed if one does not understand the assumptions that underscore the research practices. Without an understanding of these underpinnings, many of us see any research problems as variations of quantitative inquiry, that is, we think in terms of the null hypothesis, objective data collection, reliability and validity.
Metaphorically, we tend to see new things with the older, more established blueprints in our minds. Another potential problem of not having a sense of the philosophic underpinnings of qualitative and quantitative research is the inability to make a strong case for conducting a qualitative research project in that particular situation and/or setting. If the researcher cannot articulate, at least to herself, the reasons for using qualitative methods in a research project, it is likely that she will be unable to defend the project as a rigorous and valued piece of scholarship. The better one understands the larger picture that qualitative research methods fit into, the better one can conduct research within the research tradition that one is working within. As qualitative research is still a minority voice, it needs strong defenders.

Our experience as researchers and teachers of research has taught us that a philosophic perspective is helpful to the beginning researcher even though they may initially fight the idea of examining philosophical underpinnings of the major research traditions. Beginning qualitative researchers need all the help they can get as they swim against the tide of cultural heritage of how science is done. While the current is less strong than it was a few years ago, it is still powerful. By presenting a philosophic perspective in these first chapters, we hope to reshape your basic frame of reference. We plan to steep you in an alternate point of view, so as to counter-balance the traditional way of answering research questions. Without the philosophic background beginning qualitative researchers are left without the conceptual tools to think through problems and issues as they arise.

Quantitative research is based on observations that are converted into discrete units that can be compared to other units by using statistical analysis. While there may be modifications and variations on this general picture of quantitative research, statistical analysis is an essential part of quantitative research. Qualitative research, on the other hand, generally examines people's words and actions in narrative or descriptive ways more closely representing the situation as experienced by the participants. These surface differences between quantitative and qualitative research are further distinguished by their philosophic underpinnings. Qualitative research is based on a phenomenological position, while quantitative research is based on a positivist position. To explore the differences between qualitative and quantitative inquiry from a philosophic perspective a common philosophic vocabulary is helpful.

Building a Philosophic Vocabulary for Understanding Qualitative and Quantitative Inquiry

A common vocabulary is necessary to explore the philosophic assumptions of the two research positions. Positivism and phenomenology are the two overarching perspectives that shape our understanding of research. The word positivism was first coined by Auguste Comte as early as the 1830s and for Comte positivism was synonymous with science or with positive or observable facts (Stromberg, 1986). Within the larger discussion of the history of science, positivism has come to mean objective inquiry based on measurable variables and provable propositions. The positivist research orientation holds that science is or should be primarily concerned with the explanation and the prediction of observable events (Kincheloe, 1991). It is the insistence on explanation, prediction, and proof that are the hallmarks of positivism.

Phenomenological approach is a focus on understanding the meaning events have for persons being studied (Patton, 1991). The phenomenological approach to inquiry includes qualitative research but also has under its umbrella such areas in inquiry as ethnomethodology, symbolic interactionism, hermeneutic inquiry, grounded theory, naturalist inquiry, and ethnography (Patton, 1991). Phenomenology, like positivism, should be seen in historic context. Two important authors who have articulated the phenomenological position are Maurice MerleauPonty (1962) and Michael Polanyi (1962; 1967; Polanyi and Prosch, 1975). The phenomenological position see the individual and his or her world as co-constituted. In the truest sense, the person is viewed as having no existence apart from the world, and the world as having no existence apart from the person’ (Valle and King, 1978).

To sort out and gain a more detailed picture of the differences, a series of questions is proposed. These questions can be placed into four philosophical categories. The areas of questions concern ontology, epistemology, logic, and teleology. Ontological assumptions concern questions about the nature of reality. One key ontological question is: What is the nature of reality? Epistemological assumptions concern the origins of knowledge. What is the relationship between the knower and the known? What role do values play in understanding? are important epistemological questions. Logic deals with principles of demonstration or verification. Important questions about the logic of inquiry are: Are causal linkages between bits of information possible? What is the possibility of generalization? Teleological questions include: What does research contribute to knowledge? What is the purpose of research?

Table 1.1: Framing research within philosophy

The answers to these questions make up what we call the postulates of the research paradigms. Before examining these postulates two other words need clarification: paradigm and postulates. A paradigm has come to mean a set of overarching and interconnected assumptions about the nature of reality. The word assumptions is key. One must make assumptions, for example, about the nature of reality, because anything that a researcher might do to test what reality is must be based on some understanding of that reality. A philosophic assumption cannot be proved but may be stipulated; these stipulations we call postulates. Our definition of a postulate is an assumption stated positively. A set of postulates make up a paradigm. The paradigm, like the postulates on which it is based, cannot itself be tested; the paradigm provides the basis on which we build our verifiable knowledge.

The relationship between methods, traditions, postulates, and paradigms is a complex one. A paradigm provides the largest framework within which research takes place. It is the world view within which researchers work. Postulates are the individual assumptions that are stipulated to be true. A tradition, as we use the term, consists of more or less like-minded researchers who accept the postulates within the paradigm as working assumptions. Research methods, on the other hand, are many and varied within that tradition. While the research methods are distinctive, the methods share some specific points and more importantly a general orientation within the tradition. In this case, the two competing traditions are the positivist and the phenomenological traditions.

We take a radical position on the nature of qualitative research and its relationship to traditional research arguing that qualitative research is based on a fundamentally different set of postulates than is the dominant or positivist tradition on research. Our position has important implications for research. It means, among other things, that one must carefully match research questions with methods of collecting and analyzing data. One set of postulates constitutes what we call an alternate paradigm and the phenomenological approach to inquiry, while another set of postulates frames the dominant paradigm and positivist approach. In the next chapter, a side-by-side comparison of the positivist and phenomenological approaches to research will be presented along with an overview of the history of the research traditions.

Overview of Philosophical Chapters within the Context of the Rest of the Book

The next chapter provides a comparison of the positivist and the phenomenological positions of inquiry. These positions are placed within historic context to further aid the perspective researcher in understanding the perspective within which they will be working. The detailed comparison for the phenomenological and the positivist approach to inquiry will not only help to distinguish the two traditions from each other but will also highlight the common ground shared by the various methods within the phenomenological tradition.
Further, this comparison will lay the ground work for the specific approach to phenomenological inquiry developed here—a qualitative research method.

Chapter 3 explicates an important philosophic orientation within qualitative research, that is, indwelling. Indwelling is neither philosophy nor method. It is rather what we call a posture. A posture is state or condition in relationship to other persons or situations. A posture in this sense is a way of being. We see the posture of indwelling as central to our understanding of qualitative research.

These two chapters set up a background, develop a common vocabulary, and establish a philosophic basis upon which the methods of doing qualitative research are built. The research methods chapters are practical and straightforward but built on the philosophic basis of the first two chapters.

References

BERG, B. (1989) Qualitative Research Methods for the Social Sciences, Boston, MA:
Allyn and Bacon.

BOGDAN, R. and TAYLOR, S. (1975) Introduction to Qualitative Research Methods: A Phenomenological Approach to the Social Sciences, New York: Wiley.

BOGDAN, R. and BIKLEN, S. (1982) Qualitative Research for Education: An Introduction to Theory and Methods, Boston, MA: Allyn and Bacon.

BURGESS, R. (Ed) (1985) Strategies of Educational Research: Qualitative Methods, London: Falmer.

KINCHELOE, J. (1991) Teachers as Researchers: Qualitative Inquiry as a Path to Empowerment, London: Falmer.

MERLEAU-PONTY, M. (1962) Phenomenology of Perception (SMITH, C. Trans.),
London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. (Originally published 1962).

PATTON, M.J. (1991) ‘Qualitative research on college students: Philosophical and methodological comparisons with the quantitative approach’, Journal of College Student Development 32, pp. 389–96.

POLANYI, M. (1962) Personal knowledge: Toward a Post-critical Philosophy, Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago.

POLANYI, M. (1967) The Tacit Dimension, New York: Anchor Books.

POLANYI, M. and PROSCH, H. (1975) Meaning, Chicago, IL: University of Chicago.

STROMBERG, R. (1986) European Intellectual History since 1789 (4th ed.), Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.

VALLE, R. and KING, M. (Eds) (1978) Existential Phenomenological Alternatives for Psychology, New York: Oxford University.

Chapter 2
Before Beginning Research: A Philosophic Perspective

Why is qualitative research and not quantitative research in the minority status? Why is it necessary to present a philosophic perspective on qualitative research and not on quantitative research? While this is not the place to present an extended history of research, let us just say that when experimental methods were first introduced as a challenge to the scholastic methods, a rigorous and philosophic defense of the experimental methods were required. Qualitative methods still face that challenge, because the philosophic underpinnings are not widely understood. If the underlying philosophy is not understood, the new orientation, in this case qualitative research, is seen as a less rigorous and less valued way of doing inquiry.

For good or ill, the human sciences, as seen by the positivists, have often taken their lead from physics and chemistry. This connection to the natural sciences, from at least the time of Newton, has been dominated by a belief in objective observation, quantifiable data and verifiable truths. Evelyn Fox Keller in Reflections on Gender and Science (1985) argues that this way of doing science is related to a patriarchal view of the world. We support Fox's position that the patriarchal view of science has marginalized all ways of doing science which are not like the ways that natural science has been traditionally done, that is, any non-experimental, non-objective ways of doing science. Recently, this newer view of science has been challenged by new ways of doing natural science (especially physics), feminist theory, and post-modern sensibilities (Habermas, 1989; Heisenberg, 1958; Keller, 1985; West, 1989). These alternate voices have contributed to making qualitative research an acceptable way of doing science. At the same time that these perspectives were beginning to be articulated, other challenges were mounted on the traditional methods within educational research (Campbell, 1975; Stake, 1978).

Historically, qualitative research can be seen as marginalized in both its participants (subjects as defined by traditional science) and by its methodology. We will begin by looking at the participants of early qualitative studies. Cultural anthropologists were among the first and best known qualitative researchers. Unt...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Figures and Tables
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• Part I: Building a Philosophic Foundation for Qualitative Research
• Part II: From Ideas to Outcomes: Conducting Qualitative Research
• Part III: Data Analysis
• Appendix