SOAD9206 Social Work Research in Practice Settings

Lecture 2: The Research Questionand questionnaires

Terms you will come across in the literature:

• Qualitative• Quantitative

• Mixed methods

• Deductive • Inductive

Deductive Approach hypothesis

• Theory ‘testing’• “Theorising comes before

research and research then functions to produce empirical evidence to test or refute theories” (May 1997:30)

• Research aims at validating an hypothesis

Build up theory

Test theory

Deductive hypothesis examples

• Passive smoking has a negative impact on health

• Obesity puts people at greater risk of diabetes

• CBT helps people manage mild depression

• Unemployment has a negative impact on health

Inductive Approach Research Question

• Theory Building• one that examines

particular aspects of social life and creates theory in relation to previous data

• Seeks to generate theoretical propositions from the data collected

Observation??

research

theory

Inductive research question examples

• What are the social issues affecting people with diabetes?

• What are the needs of residents in the area?

• How do people experience our social work service in X location?

• What are the issues associated with fuel poverty?

• With inductive approaches, we are at an advantage in social work because we are immersed in the work

– It is best to begin, I think, by reminding you, the beginning student, that the most admirable thinkers within the scholarly community you have chosen to join do not split their work from their lives… What this means is that you must learn to use your life experience in your intellectual work: continually to examine and interpret it. In this sense craftsmanship is the centre of yourself and you are personally involved in every intellectual product upon which you may work.

- C. Wright Mills, The Sociological

Imagination

The research question… is what exactly?

• The question which will guide all aspects of the research, from its inception to dissemination

• narrows down the field of interest• Is very, very specific

Narrowing down is crucial in creating a research question

• Need to consider– Who– What– Why– When– How and so on…

time

Adapted from Dunk-West 2013, p. 132

Things to consider when creating the research question… (D’Cruz & Jones 2006)

• Why and how the research has come about

• The ‘you’ in the asking (D’Cruz & Jones; Alston & Bowles 1998)

• Who gets to ask the questions?• Constraints such as budget, time,

availability of participants (Sarantakos 2005, p. 131)

Research Question

• The investigator uses research to answer a specific, or a number of specific questions using a participant sample

• What are the current experiences of newly arrived refugee children in South Australia?

• We will now move on to consider a particular method –questionnaires– and how to ask questions within them…

• In social work we are used to asking questions, building rapport and so on these skills are transferrable to researchquestionnaire construction is a very demanding task which requires not only methodological competence but also extensive experience with research in general and questioning techniques in particular” (Sarantakos 2013, p. 241).

Questionnaires

• Questionnaires can produce both quantitative and qualitative data

• The quantitative derives from asking straightforward questions

• The qualitative is more of an exploration of general views

Hypothesis: university resources meet student requirements

5- point Likert scale:

• ‘I am happy with the library facilities’1 2 3 4 5

Strongly strongly agree agree neutral disagree

disagree

Research question: how do students experience university resources?

Example of qualitative question:

• In your own words, please tell us how you have experienced university resources (including the library, student areas and so on):

______________________________________________________________________________________________________

Questionnaire Methodologies

In what social context is the questionnaireutilised?

• Face-to-face• Telephone • Online• Emailed to respondent by the researcher• Interview (structured)

Questionnaire Methodologies

Sampling within the different contexts:

• Face-to-face: could be self-selecting, snowball, opportunity

• Telephone: Will generally be opportunity, random

• Websites: Self-selecting, often in response to advertisement

Advantages of questionnaires• What is good about the questionnaire

method?

• It is quick• It is cheap• It tackles what we want to measure fairly well,

as long as it is reliable and valid• Useful for reaching large numbers of

participants• Good coverage, particularly online

Problems with questionnaires• What is not so good about the questionnaire

method?• Participants can be put off long questionnaires• May not tap into true opinions (biases, validity)• May not reflect experience very well at all if

there are no qualitative questions (qualitative critique)

• Balance of power (researcher-participant)

Problems with questionnairesSocial desirability bias

• Showing how much you know

• Our empathy, helping behaviour example- we want to show we are nice, empathic, helpful people

• Does this truly reflect how we are as people?

Problems with questionnairesResponse Acquiescence:

• Just saying ‘yes’ to everything!

• General tendency to agree rather than disagree

• Can happen when questionnaires are very long

Problems with questionnaires

The balance of power

• Particular issue in face-to-face, interview style questionnaires

• The possibility of power imbalance leading to biased responses

Resolving power imbalances

To help resolve the balance of power the researcher should always:

• Spend time building rapport (similar to initial counselling sessions)- tuning in, empathy, use social work skills

Resolving power imbalances

Resolving the imbalance of power

Treating the participant as a colleague not a subject of experimentation (respect)- what researchers should always remember is that the people they have asked are probably the ‘experts’ as they have been chosen for a specific reason in the first place

Problems with question types

• Problems with question types:

• Some questions can be poorly worded• They can lead or confuse participants• This in turn leads participants to leave

sections blank and their overall questionnaire is worthless for data analysis

Problems with question types

• Double-barrelled- ‘I believe whaling and seal culling should be banned’

• Which does the researcher want to know about- whaling or seal culling?

• Here two questions are effectively being asked in one

• There is the possibility the participant has very different views about the two areas of whaling and seal culling

Problems with question types

Overly complex questions:

• Often too long

• Rule of thumb: Keep questions below 10-15 words

Problems with question types

Jargon:

• Using words which the participants may be unsure of, simply because they do not study your subject

E.g. ‘institutionalisation’

Problems with question types

Using negatives, particularly double negatives:

‘I do not think that Tony Abbott was incorrect in his environmental policies’

Problems with question types

Highly emotive language:

• ‘It is a disgrace that social workers do not receive the money they rightly deserve’

Problems with question types

Leading questions:

• As it sounds, the researcher leads the participants to ‘the answer’

• ‘Don’t you think the needs of people would be better served if social workers had more money?’

Problems with question types

Invasion of privacy

• ‘Do you have a criminal record?’

Problems with question types• ‘Balance of scaled items’ (Coolican,

2004)

• ‘How much have you enjoyed the course?’

• Very much, quite a lot, a lot, a little, not much, didn’t like it at all

Problems with question types

Sensitivity of scale items to level of measurement (Coolican, 2004)

Research example: want to know the degree to which participants believe either a female victim is PARTLY responsible for the attack by wearing provocative clothing, whilst alone in a street

Problems with question types

• Researcher asks the question:

• Who do you think is more responsible:

• The man OR• The woman?

Problems with question types• Better question:• On a scale of 1-10 (not responsible at all- entirely responsible), how

responsible for the attack do you feel was:

The man1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

The woman1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Example of methods, including questionnaire

• http://www.open.ac.uk/researchprojects/enduringlove/methods