Qualitative Data Analysis 1

7/24/2019 Qualitative Data Analysis 1

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Focusing and Bounding

the Collection of DataTH E SUB STANTIVE START

Contrary to what you might have heard, qualitative research

designs do exist. Some are more deliberate than others. At the

proposal stage and in the early planning and start-up stages,

many design decisions are being made some explicitly and

precisely, some implicitly, some unknowingly, and still others

by deault. !he qualitative researcher is beginning to ocus on

the study"s issues, the cases to be studied, the data to be

collected, and how these data will be managed and analy#ed.

!his book is about analysis.$hy are we talking about

design% As &igure '.( suggests, study design decisions can, in

a real sense, be seen as analytica sort o anticipatory data

reductionbecause they constrain later analysis by ruling out

certain variables and relationships and attending to others.

)esign decisions also permit and support later analysis* they

preigure your analytic moves.

Some design decisions are mainly conceptual* the con-

ceptual ramework and research questions, sampling, case

deinition, instrumentadon, and the nature o the data to be

collected. +thers discussed in Chapter (, though they

appear in the guise o management/ issues, are equally

ocusing and bounding* how data will be stored, managed,

and processed* what computer sotware may be used

tosupport the work* and which agreements are made with the

people being studied.

$e cannot deal thoroughly here with qualitative research

design* see the detailed, helpul suggestions made by

0arshall and 1ossman '232. 4n this chapter we discuss the

analytic issues that arise as a study is bounded, ocused, and

organi#ed. $e provide speciic examples, but want to

emphasi#e that these issues must be dealt with uniquely in

any particular study. !hey may be approached loosely or

tightly* in either case, initial design decisions nearly always

lead to redesign. 5ualitative research designs are not

copyable patterns or panaceas that eliminate the need or

building, revising, and choreographing/ your analytic work

6reissle, '22'.


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Tight Versus Loose So!e Trade"offs

6rior to ieldwork, how much shape should a qualitative

research design have% Should there be a preexistent con-

ceptual ramework% A set o research questions% Some

predesigned devices or collecting data% )oes such prior

bounding o the study blind the researcher to important

eatures in the case, or cause misreading o local inorm


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&ocusing and 7ounding the Collection o )atax(

ants" perceptions% )oes lack o bounding and ocusing

lead to indiscriminate data"collection and data overload%

!hese are recurrent questions in qualitative analysis, and they

have started up lively debate. 8et"s try to order the terms o

the debate and to explain our own position.

Any researcher, no matter how unstructured or inductive,

comes to ieldwork withsomeorienting ideas. A sociologist

may ocus on amilies or organi#ations rather than, say, on

rock ormations or anthills and, within that ocus, will look

or data marked by conceptual tags roles, relationships,

routines, norms. 4 that researcher looks at closets or

lunchrooms, it is not with the eyes o an architect or a cook,

but with an interest in what the room and its contents have to

say about the patterns shared by people using it. A

psychologist would orient dierently toward the same

phenomena, 99seeing: motivation, anxiety, communication,

and cognition.

!he conventional image o ield research is one that keeps

prestructured designs to a minimum. 0any social

anthropologists and social phenomenologists consider social

processes to be too complex, too relative, too elusive, or too

exotic to be approached with explicit conceptual rames or

standard instruments. !hey preer a more loosely structured,

emergent, inductively grounded: approach to gathering data;

!he conceptual ramework should emerge rom the ield in

the course o the study* the important research questions will

come clear only gradually* meaningul settings and actors

cannot be selected prior to ieldwork* instruments, i any,

should be derived rom the properties o the setting and itsactors" views o them.

$e go along with this visionup to a point.


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generali#able indings, but they are less case-sensitive and

may entail bending data out o contextual shape to answer a

cross-case analytic question. !he solution may well lie in

avoiding the extremes.

$ith this backdrop, let"s look more closely at the aspects

o a study design involving decisions about ocusing and

bounding the collection o qualitative data in the ield. 4n this

chapter we ocus on conceptual aspects, including developing

a conceptual ramework, ormulating research questions,

deining the case, sampling, and instrumentation. $e turn to

management issues in Chapter (.

A. 7uilding a Conceptual &ramework

Rationale

!heory building relies on a ew general constructs that

subsume a mountain o particulars. Categories such as social

climate,/ cultural scene,/ and role conlict/ are the labels

we put on intellectual bins/ containing many discrete events

and behaviors. Any researcher, no matter how inductive in

approach, knows which bins are likely to be in play in the

study and what is likely to be in them. 7ins come rom theory

and experience and oten rom the general obBectives o the

study envisioned. Setting out bins, naming them, and getting

clearer about their interrelationships lead you to a conceptual

ramework.

)oing that exercise also orces you to be selectivetodecide which variables are most important, which relation-

ships are likely to be most meaningul, and, as a consequence,

what inormation should be collected and analy#edat least

at the outset. 4 multiple researchers are involved, the

ramework helps them study the same phenomenon in ways

that will permit an eventual cross-case analysis.

Brief Descri#tion

A conceptual ramework explains, either graphically or in

narrative orm, the main things to be studiedthe key

actors, constructs or variablesand the presumed rela-

tionships among them. &rameworks can be rudimentary or

elaborate, theory-driven or commonsensical, descriptive or

causal.

Illustrations

8et"s look at a ew examples. &irst, &igure =.' presents a

rudimentary, mostly descriptive ramework rom a large-

scale contract research study !he Detwork, 4nc., '2?2.

!he study"s general obBectives were to examine several

programs aimed at school improvement/ through the dis-

semination o exemplary innovations, toE understand the

reasons or implementation success, and to make policy

recommendations.


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A, 7uilding a Conceptual &ramework n (2

$e see here the ocusing and bounding unction o a

conceptual ramework. Some, not all, actors are going to bestudied, along with some, not all, aspects o their activity.

+nly some relationships will be explored, certain kinds o

outcomes measured, and certain analyses madeat least at

the outset.

Dow or a slightly more complex, more inerential con-

ceptual rame using some o the same variables &igure =.=.4t comes rom the same study. 4t is a reinement o the irst

illustration, with heavier bets being made on the in-

terrelationships. &or example, policymakers/ are hy-

pothesi#ed to inluence linkers/ through the provision o

technical assistance and through interventions in the linkers"

network.

!here are ew two-way arrows in this cut. !he researcher

isFdeciding to collect inormationselectively,at least on the

irst go, to test some hypotheses. Similarly, it looks as i the

Figure 2,2

Second Conceptual &ramework or a Study o the )issemination o @ducational 4nnovations

!he Detwork, 4nc., '2?2

6olicymaker

6olicymaker


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study will ocus more heavily on linker behavior,: adopter

behavior,/ and implementation eectiveness/that is, on

variables coming later in the

Figure 23

Conceptual &ramework or a 0ulticase School 4mprovement/ &ield Study, 4nitial Gersion


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0iles, '23(b, '23I.=

+nce again, we have the bins, labeled as eventse.g.,

prior history with innovations/,settingse.gN community,

district oice... adopting school/,processese.g.,

assistance,/ changes in user perceptions and practices/,

and theoretical constructse.g., organi#ational rules/.

Some o the outcomes are hypothesi#ed e.g., degree o

institutionali#ation/, but most are open-ended perceived

gains and losses/. !he directional arrows ollow time low,

but some bets still- are being made e.g., that most assistance

comes early and that reciprocal changes will occur among

the innovation, its users, and the organi#ation.

7ut the contents o each bin are less predetermined than

in &igure =.'. @ach researcher in the study will have to ind

out what the characteristics/ o the innovations are at the

ield site and how these actors will aect implementation

eectiveness./ !his is still a very general brie.

4t is also a brie that can change en route, as this concep-

tual ramework did. As qualitative researchers collect data,

they revise their rameworksmake them more precise,

replace empirically eeble bins with more meaningul ones,

and reconstrue relationships. Conceptual rameworks are

simply the current version o the researcherFs map o the

territory being investigated. As the explorerFs knowledge o

the terrain improves, the map becomes correspondingly more

dierentiated and integrated, and researchers in a multiple-

case study can coordinate their data collection even more

closely.

Variations


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cate the relationships to be examined initially* some show

one-way inluence, others two-way. !here are purely, de-

scriptive bins curriculum, teachingOleaming styles and more

conceptual labels opportunity structure, survival/

knowledge and strategies. @nsuing, inevitable changes can

be mapped onto this rame, or they can call or a recasting.

Conceptual rameworks can also evol ve and develop out

o ieldwork itsel, 8, 0. Smith and Peith '2?' were

among the irst to do this graphically. 7ox =.= shows anexample drawn rom their study o the creation o a new

school. !he researchers noticed something they called

cloaking o organi#ational activities/keeping internaQ

unctioning protected rom external view. $hy did this

happen, and what were the consequences% Smith and Peith

believed that the school"s ormali#ed doctrine/its phi-

losophy and setup, along with procedural diiculties, sta

conlict, and poor program it with community biasesled to

the cloaking. !he cloaking, in turn, led to inaccurate public

perceptions and parental rustration* Pensington School

could not build long-term support or itsel.

Although the cloaking idea came rom prior organi#a-

tionalresearch, the way it patterned at Pensington plusFthe

other associated variables essentially were derived induc-

tively. Smith and Peith used many such emergent conceptualrameworks to explicate their understanding.

Ad'ice &


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with all o the inormation at once. !ry your hand at it,

especially i you are a beginning researcher.

=. @xpect to do several iterations, right rom the outset. !here

are probably as many ways o representing the main

variables as there are variables to represent, but some

typically later cutsare more elegant and parsimonious than

others.

E (. 4 your study has more than one researcher, have each

ield researcher do a cut at a ramework early on and then

compare the several versions. !his procedure will show,

literally, where everyone"s head is. 4t usually leads to an

explication o contentious or oggy areas that otherwise

would have suraced later on, with ar more loss o time and

data.

I. Avoid the no-risk rameworkthat is, one that deines

variables at a very global level and has two-directional

arrows everywhere. !his avoidance amounts essentially to

making no ocusing and bounding decisions, and is little

better than the strategy o going indiscriminately into the

ield to see what the site has to tell./


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7, &ormulating 1esearch 5uestions m 23

research questions, conceptual rameworks, and sampling

matricesthough their choices are more implicit and the

links between ramework and procedures less linear. Dev-

ertheless these choices will serve to bound and ocus their

study-.

!ake, or example, the problem o understanding police

worka domain that remains somewhat arcane and obscure

despite or perhaps because p !G shows. 4t deserves an

inductive approach. 7ut which acets o police work will be

studied% ou can"t look at them all. And where will you study

them% ou can"t look everywhere. And when% 4 you delay/

that decision or a ew months until you"ve spent some time,

say, at the precinct station, that simply relects two tacit

sampling decisions start at *the precinct house, then recheck

ater a while.Suppose the implicit research question was,


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Figure $%)KeneraQ and Speciic 1esearch 5uestions 1elating to the Adoption )ecision School 4mprovement Study


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requisite conditions,/ and the idea o requisite conditions/

may not be retained throughout the study.

Ad'ice

'. @ven i you are in a highly inductive mode, it is a good idea

to Start with some general research questions.

!hey allow you to get clear about what, in the general

domain, is o most interest. !hey make the implicit explicit

without necessarily ree#ing or limiting your vision.

=. 4 you are oggy about your priorities or about the ways they

can be ramed, begin with a oggy research question and

then try to deog it. 0ost research questions do not come out

right on the irst cut, no matter how experienced the

researcher or how clear the domain o study.

(. &ormulating more than a do#en or so general questions is

looking or trouble. ou can easily lose the orest or the

trees and ragment the collection o data. shows this graphically; !here is a ocus, or

heart,/ o the study, and a somewhat indeterminate bound-

ary deines the edge o the case; what will not be studied.

Figure $%*!he Case as the Jnit o Analysis

DF 7+JD)A1 UU setting,

U concepts,4 sampling, etc.

tt

O$

O&+CJS


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you will know it. !he beauty o qualitative ield research is that there

is nearly always a second chance.Illustrations

$hat are some examples o cases% Sometimes the phe-

nomenon/ may be an individualin a deined context;

A patient undergoing cardiovascular bypass surgery, beore,

during, and T months ater surgery, in the context o his or

her amily and the hospital setting !aylor, 0ac8ean,

6allister,H $hite, '233

Dote that the heart/ here is the patient. !he boundary

deines amily and hospital as the context. !he researchers

will not, or example, interview the patient"s colleagues at

work or visit the restaurants where he or she dines. !he

bounding is also by time; Do inormation will be gathered

later than T months ater hospitali#ation.

$e can also expect that the boundary will be deined

urther bysamplingoperations, to which we"ll come in a

minute. &or example, these researchers will not be inter-

viewing the patient"s children, only the spouse. 7ut they will

be sampling diet, exercise, and blood count data, as well as

interview data rom the patient"s lived experience./

+ther examples o individualsas the case are;

A young person"s work experience in his or her irst real/ Bob

7orman, '22'; or example, 0iriam"s work as a

bookkeeper in 1iver City 7ank

An uncommonly talented mechanic, in his shop amid the context

o his riends, neighbors, and customers study o what happened when a ather gave a

treasured chess set to his young son. A case also may be

deined as an event,such as a school sta meeting* or as a

period of time,as in the classic study)idwest and *ts

+hildren7arker H $right, '2?', which includes +ne

7oy"s )ay,: a record o what 1aymond did rom the time he

got out o bed until he reentered it* or as a sustainedprocess

the adoption, implementation, and institutionali#ation o an

innovative program by a school in its district, as in the study

we already described


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A comment on notation. $e sometimes preerand use

here and there in this boohthe wordsitebecause it reminds

us that a case/ always occurs in a speciied social and

physicalsetting-we cannot study individual cases devoid o

their context in the way that a quantitative researcher oten

does.

Ad'ice

'. Start intuitively. !hink o the ocus, or :heart/ and build

outward. !hink o what you will.no* be studying as a way to

irm up the boundary. Admit that the boundary is never quite

as solid as a rationalist might hope.

=. )eine the case as early as you can during a study. Kiven a

starting conceptual ramework and research questions, it paysto get a bit stern about what you are deining as a case* that

will help clariy urther both the ramework and the questions.

(. 1emember that sampling operations will deine the cases

urther.

I. Attend to several dimensions o the case; its conceptual

nature, itssocial si&e,itsphysicallocation, and its temporal

extent.

Ti!e Re(uired

4 a starting conceptual ramework and research questions

are reasonably clear, a irst cut at case deinition usually takes

no more than a ew minutes* discussion among members o a

research team or with interested colleagues may occupy an

hour or two as clarity emerges during successive iterations othe deinition o the case./

). Sampling* 7ounding the Collection o )ata

Rationale

Sampling is crucial or later analysis. As much as you

might want to, you cannot study everyone everywhere doing

everything. our choiceswhom to look at or talk with,

where, when, about what, and whyall place limits on the

conclusions you can draw, and on how conident you and

others eel about them.

Sampling may look easy. 0uch qualitative research ex-

amines a single case,/ some phenomenon embedded in a

single social setting. 7ut settings have subsettings schoolshave classrooms, classrooms have cliques, cliques have

individuals, so deciding where to look is not easy. $ithin any

case, social phenomena prolierate science lessons, teacher

questioning techniques, student unruliness, use o

innovations* they, too, must be sampled. And the questions o

multiple-case sampling add another layer o complexity.


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Figure $%+

!ypology o Sampling Strategies in 5ualitative 4nquiry

Pu#ei, '22=* 6atton, '22

0urpose

)ocuments diverse variations and identiies important common patterns

&ocuses, reduces, simpliies, acilitates group interviewing

6ermits logical generali#ation and maximum application o inormation to other

cases &inding examples o a theoretical construct and thereby elaborate and

examine it @laborating initial analysis, seeking exceptions, looking or variation

4dentiies cases o interest rom people who know people who know what cases are

inormation-rich 8earning rom highly unusual maniestations o the phenomenon o interest


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teristics over time- Xa replication strategy. 0ost o these

strategies will increase conidence in analytic indings on the

grounds o representativeness.

See also Kuba and 8incoln '232, who advocate maxi/

mum variationsampling, a deliberate hunt or negative

instances or variations. !his process may take the orm o

questions to inormants, such as, $hom do you know who

sees things dierently%/ or $here can 4 ind patients who

dontkeep appointments%/

Wohnson '22, in his comprehensive treatment o se-

lecting inormants, also suggests dimensionalsampling; !he

researcher lays out the dimensions on which variability is

sought, then takes representative, well-inormed/ inormants

or each contrasting dimension. !he aim is to ind people who

are more knowledgeable, reliable, and accurate in reportingevents that are usual, requent, or patterned. !his strategy has

risks; Such inormants may assume greater uniormity than

actually exists 6elto H 6elto, '2?>* 6oggie, '2?=.

!he sampling strategies we"ve been discussing can be

applied both within or across cases. 8et"s turn to some o the

core issues in each o these domains.

Within/case sampling.5uantitative researchers usually think

o cases as individual persons, draw a sample/ o persons,

and then collect comparable data points/ rom each. 7y

contrast, a qualitative case/ may range widely in deinition

rom individuals to roles, groups, organi#ations, programs,

and cultures. 7ut even when the case is an individual, the

qualitative researcher has many within- case sampling

decisions; $hich activities, processes, events, times,

locations,and role partnerswill 4 sample%4n our cardiovascular bypass patient example, we might

want to sample diet and exercise activities* the processes o

understanding, taking in, and acting on medical advice*

events such as admission and discharge interviews* time

periods including prehospitali#ation, hospitali#ation, and

posthospitali#ation once every = weeks* locations including

recovery room, ward, and the patient"s home* and role

partners including the patient"s physician, ward nurses,

dietitian, and spouse.

$ithin-case sampling is almost always nestedor ex-

ample, studying children within classrooms within schools

within neighborhoods, with regular movement up and down

that ladder.

A second maBor point is that such sampling must be

theoreticallydrivenwhether the theory is prespeciied oremerges as you go, as in Klaser and Strauss"s '2T? theo-

retical sampling./ Choices o inormants, episodes, and

interactions are being driven by a conceptual question, not by

a concern or representativeness./ !o get to the construct, we

need to see dierent instances o it, at dierent moments, in

dierent places, with dierent people. !he prime concern is

with the conditionsunder which the construct or theory

operates, not with the generali#ation o the indings to other

settings.

!he third point is that within-case sampling has an it/

erativeor rolling/ quality, working in progressive waves/

as the study progresses. Sampling is investigative* we are

cerebral detectives, erreting out answers to our research

questions. $e observe, talk to people, and pick up artiacts

and documents. !hat leads us to new samples o inormants

and observations, new documents. At each step along the

evidential trail, we are making sampling decisions to clariy

the main patterns, see contrasts, identiy exceptions or

discrepant instances, and uncover negative instanceswhere

the pattern does not hold. +ur analytic conclusions depend

deeply on the within-case sampling choices we made.

So within-case sampling helps us see a local conigurationin some depth. $hat can adding cases do or us, and how do

we create a sample o cases%

)ultiple/case sampling.0ultiple-case sampling adds

confidenceto indings. 7y looking at a range o similar and

contrasting cases, we can understand a single-case inding,

grounding it by speciying howand whereand, i possible,

whyit carries on as it does. $ecan strengthen the precision,

the validity, and the stability o the indings. $e are ollowing

a replicationstrategy in, '22'. 4 a inding holds in one

setting and, given its proile, also holds in a comparable

setting but does not in a contrasting case, the inding is more

robust. !he multiple comparison groups/ used in grounded

theory work play a similar role.

$ith multiple-case studies, does the issue ogener/

ali&abilitychange% @ssentially, no. $e are generali#ing rom

one case to the next on the basis o a match to the underlying

theory, not to a larger universe. !he choice o cases usually is

made on conceptualgrounds, not on representative grounds.

!he cases oten are arrayed on a continuum e.g., highly

gited to underachieving pupils, with ew exemplars o each,

or they are contrasted e.g., assertive and passive

adolescents. +ther, unique properties may be added e.g.,

some assertive adolescents are rom cities, some rom rural

areas. 4 you look closely at the cells o such a sampling

rame, each is essentially unique. 7ecause case study

researchers examine intact settings in such loving detail, they

know all too well that each setting has a ew properties it

shares with manyothers, some properties it shares withsome

others, and some properties it shares with noothers.

Devertheless, the multiple-case sampling gives us conidencethat our emerging theory is generic, because we have seen it

work outand not work outin predictable ways.

0ultiple-case sampling, although it may have iterative

aspects, normally has to be thought through careully. An

explicitsampling frameis needed. 4t will be guided by the

research questions and conceptual rameworkeither pre-

speciied or emergent. +nce again, random sampling will not

help.


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). Sampling; 7ounding the Collection o )ata n '>

$e have to deal with the issue conceptually;


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events, and an abundance o logistical problems. Gery seldom

does a start-up sampling rame survive the lovely

imperection and intractability o the ield. 4t must be shited

and reramed.

7eing selective calls or some restraint in the classes, o

data you go ater.


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Y @ Z externally developed innovation x ' program names are pseudonyms, to avoid identiying speciic sites.

able 2.4

Characteristics o &ield Study SampleS4!@ C+D!@L! AS6 @ C ! S +& !


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to

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8 as locally-developed innovation E 6rogram is used in this site with a comprehensive sample o learners, rather than with low-

achieving or marginal populations.!hble =.=

&inal Sampling &rame or &ield Study

are conceptually meaningul. !his eect is much more powerul than a series oindividual case studies over several years.

So we have done pretty well with a '=-case sample; careul illustration,

strong construct validity, legitimate claims to external validity with respect to the

core indings, and spadework or replication studies with well-identiied subsets

o settings and actorsall without control groups, random sampling, systematic

treatments, or other procedures required in experimental and correlationalresearch.

Dote that this sampling matrix does not resolve some o the importantwithin/

caseocusing and bounding decisions to be made in multiple-case studies. &or

example, i one case researcher observes only administrators and another only

teachers, the comparability o the two cases is minimal. &or these decisions, we

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to

i

usually need the conceptual ramework or the research questions. Jsing them,

we can agree on sampling parameters and comparable choices or initial

ieldworksettings, actors, events, processes.

Cross-case comparison is impossible i researchers operate in radically

dierent settings, use no coherent sampling rame, or, worst o all, i they ocus

on dierent processes. !hese processes in cases low out o the interplay o

actors, events, and settings. !hey are usually at the core o the conceptual

ramework, and serve as the glue holding the research questions together. Pey

processes can be identiied at the outset or graduallyoten via pattern codes,

relective remarks, memos, and interim summaries, as we"ll see in Chapter I,

7eing explicit about processes and collecting comparable data on them will not

only avoid costly distractions but also oster c omparability and give you easier

access to the core underlying constructs as you get deeper into data collection.

Ad'ice

'. 4 you"re new to qualitative research, rest assured that there is never enough:

time to do any study. So taking the tack, 4"ll start somewhere and take it rom

there,/ is asking or trouble. 4t is probably agood idea to start with a allback

sample o inormants and subsettings; the things you have to cover in light o

what you know at that point. !hat sam- pie will change later, but less than you

may think.

=. Wust thinking in sampling-rame terms is good or your study"s health. 4 you are

talking with one kind o inormant, you need to consider why this kind o

inormant is important and, rom there, who else should be interviewed or

observed. !his is also a good exercise or controlling bias.

(. 4n complex cases, remember that you are sampling people to gist atcharacteristics o settings, events, and processes. Conceptually, the people

themselves are secondary. !his means watching out or an overreliance on talk,

or on observation o inormants, while you may neglect sampling or key events,

interactions in dierent settings, and episodes embodying die emerging patterns

in the study. 1emember also to line up these sampling parameters with the

research questions as you go; Are my choices doing a representative, time-

eicient Bob o answering them% &inally, the sampling choices at the start o the

study may not be the most pertinent or data-rich ones, A systematic review can

sharpen early and late choices,

4n qualitative research, as well as in survey research, there is a danger o

sampling too narrowly. 4n act, points = and ( above tug in that direction; Ko to

the meatiest, most study-relevant sources. 7ut it is also important to work a bit at

the peripheriesto talk with people who are not .central to the phenomenon but

are neighbors to it, to people no longer actively involved, to dissidents and

renegades and eccentrics. Spending a day in the adBoining village, school,

neighborhood, or clinics is also worth the time, even i you don"t see the sense at

that point.

!here are rewards or peripheral sampling. &irst, you may learn a lot.

Second, you will obtain contrasting and comparative inormation that may help

you understand the phenomenon at hand by de-centering/ you rom a particular

way o viewing your other cases. As we all know, traveling abroad gives us

insights into our own culture,

Spend some time on whether your sampling rame is easible. 7e sure the time is

there, the resources are there, the requisite access to people and places is ensured,

and

F the conditions areright or doing a careul Bob. 6lan to study a bit less, rather

than more, and bank/ the extra time. 4 you are done, the time is yours or a

wider or deeper pass at the ield. 4 not, you will need this time t o complete your

more modest inquiry under good conditions.

!hree kinds o instances have great payo. !he irst is the apparently typical/

or representative/ instance. 4 you can ind it, try to ind another one. !he

second is the negative/ or disconirming/ instance* it gives you both the limitso your conclusions and the point o greatest variation. !he third is the

exceptional/ or discrepant/ instance. !his instance will allow you to qualiy

your indings and to speciy the variations or contingencies in the main patterns

observed. Koing deliberately ater negative and atypical instances is also healthy

in itsel* it may orce you to clariy your concepts, and it may tell you that you


22/27

to

i

indeed have sampled too narrowly. 0ore on this in Chapter ', section 7.

?. Apply some criteria to your irst and later sampling plans.


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to

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structured and ocused, So let"s not delude ourselves about total control/ and

precision/ in our instrumentationwhile remembering that attention to design

can make a real dierence in data quality and the analyses you can carry out.I

Asingle/casestudy calls or less ront-end preparation than dbes amultiple/casestudy. !he latter is looking orward to cross-case comparison, which requires

some standardi#ation o instruments so that indings can be laid side by side in

the course o analysis. Similarly, afreestandingstudy has ewer constraints than a

multimethodFigure $%, 6rior 4nstrumentation; Pey )ecision &actors


24/27

to

i

study e.g., a ield study tied to a survey, an idea we discuss urther in Chapter

(. A 8basic(study oten needs less advance organi#ing than anapplied,

evaluation,orpolicy study. 4n the latter cases, the ocus is tighter and the instru-

mentation more closely keyed to the variables o interest.

(. 0uch depends on thecase definitionand levels o analysis expected. A

researcher studying classroom climate in an elementary school might choose to

look intensively in ( o the building"s (> classrooms, and so probably would be

right to start with a looser, orienting set o instruments. 4, however, an attempt is

made to say something about how classroom climate issues are embedded in the

working culture o the building as a whole, a more standardi#ed, validated

instrumenta questionnaire or a group interview schedulemay also be

required.

4n &igure =.? is a summary o some main issues in deciding on the

appropriate amount o ront-end instrumentation.

$e think there is wisdom in all three stances toward ront-end

instrumentation and its degree o structure. !he irst stance little prior

instrumentation puts the emphasis on certain types o validity;constructAre

the concepts well grounded%,descriptive$contextuai4s the account complete

and thorough%, interpretive)oes the account connect with the lived

experience/ o people in the case%, andnatural4s the setting mostly

undisturbed by my presence%.T

!he second stance a lot o preinstrumentation emphasi#esinternal validity

Am 4 getting a comparably measured response rom dierent people% and

generali&ability 4s this case a good instance o many others%, along with sheer

manageabilityo data collection.

!he third stance is both contingent and ecumenical, considering it unhelpul

to reach or absolute answers in relative instances. &igure out irst what kind o

study you are doing and what kind o instruments you are likely to need at

dierent moments within that study, and then go to work on the ones needed atthe outset. 7ut in all cases, as we have argued, the amount and type o

instrumentation should be a unction o your conceptual ocus, research

questions, and sampling criteria. 4 not, the tail is likely to be wagging the dog,

and later analysis will suer.

6ittle 0rior*nstrumentation 8*t 9epends '

7 6ot of 0rior

*nstrumentation

1ich context description needed

Context less crucial

Concepts inductively grounded in

local meanings

Concepts deined

ahead by researcher

@xploratory, inductive Conirmatory,theory-driven

)escriptive intent @xplanatory intent

7asic: research emphasis

Applied, evaluation

or policy emphasisSingle case 0ultiple cases

Comparability not too important Comparabilityimportant

Simple, manageable, single-level

case

Complex,

multilevel,

Kenerali#ing not a concern

Kenerali#abi li

tyOrepre-

Deed to avoid researcher impact

1esearcher impact

o less concern

5ualitative only, ree-standing study

0ultimethod study,

quantitative


25/27

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Brief Descri#tion

4nstrumentation comprises speciic methods or collecting data; !hey may be

ocused on qualitative or quantitatively organi#ed inormation, and maybe

loosely to tightly structured.

Illustration


26/27

Figure $%-

@xcerpts &rom 4nterview Kuide,

School 4mprovement Study

((. 6robably you have a certain idea o howMMMMMMMMMMMMMMlooks to you

now, but keep thinking back to how it irst looked to you then, Bust

beore students came. . $hat parts or aspects seemed not worked out, not ready or use%

(T. Could you describe what you actually did during that week or so

beore you started usingMMMMMMMMMMwith students%

0robes%

-1eading

6reparing materials 6lanning

!alking with whom, about what

!raining

I. )id you make any changes in the standard ormat or the program

beore you started using it with students% $hat kind o changes with

things you thought might not work, things you didn"t like, things you

couldn"t do in this school%

0robes%

!hings dropped !hings added, created !hings revised

o the context, the actors, and how the school improvement

process seemed to be working locally. &rom that knowledge,we went or deeper and broader understanding.

Dow to dip into the guide near the point where the re-

search question will be explored &igure =.3.

!he interviewer begins by taking the inormant back to

the time Bust beore he or she was to use the innovation with

students, asking or detailed contextwhat was happening,

who colleagues were, and what eelings they had.

5uestions (( through (T move orward through time,

asking how the innovation looked, its ready or unready parts,

and what the teacher was doing to prepare or its use.

5uestion I comes directly to the research question, as-

sessing pre-use changes made in the innovation. !he probes

can be handled in various ways; as aids to help the

interviewer lesh out the question, as prompts or items the

inormant may have overlooked, or as subquestions derived

rom previous research.8ater in the interview, the same question recurs as the

interviewer evokes the teacher"s retrospective views o early

and later use, then moves into the present :$hat changes are

you making now%/ and the uture :$hat changes are you

considering%/.

So ail ield researchers are addressing the same general

question and are addressing it in similar ways chronologi-

cally, as a process o progressive revision, although the

question wording and sequencing will vary rom one re-

searcher to the next. 4 the response opens other doors, the

interviewer will probably go through them, coming back later

to the :transormation/ question. 4 the response is uncertain

or looks equivocal when the researcher reviews the ield

notes, the question will have to be asked again perhaps

dierentlyduring the next site visit.

pineal research and cognitive and social-psychological theory

both led us to the idea that people will adapt or reinvent

practices while using them.

!iresamplingdecisions are straightorward. !he question

addresses teachers in particular, and to get the answer, we

will have to observe or interview them or, ideally, do both.

$e should sample events such as the teacher"s irst encounter

with the innovation, and processes such as assessing its

strong and weak points and making changes in it to it one"s

practice.

8et"s look at the interview component o the instrumen/

tation.$e developed a semistructured interview guide. @ach

ield researcher was closely amiliar with the guide, but had

latitude to use a personally congenial way o asking and

sequencing the questions, and to segment them appropriately

or dierent respondents.

!he guide was designed ater ieldwork had begun. An

initial wave o site visits had been conducted to get a senseAdvice

'. $e have concentrated here on general principles o designing

appropriate instrumentation, not on detailed technical help.

&or the latter we recommend treatments such as Spradley

'2?2, $eller and 1omney '233, and 0ishler '23T on

interviewing. Wudd, Smith, and Pidder '22', 1. 7. Smith

and 0anning '23=, $erner and Schoeple '23?a, '23?b,

Koet# and 8eCompte '23I, and 7randt '23' are helpul

on other methods as well, including questionnaires,observation, and document analysis. Kood overviews are

provided by 0arshall and 1ossman '232, &etterman

'232, 7ogdan and !aylor '2?>, and i$in '2?3.

=. Simply thin:ingin instrument design terms rom the outset

strengthens data collection as you go. 4 you regularly ask,

Kiven that research question, how can 4 get an answer% it will

sharpensamplingdecisions 4 have to observeOinterview this

class o people, these events, those processes, help clariy

concepts,and help setprioritiesor actual data collection.

ou also will learn the skills o redesigning instrumentation

as new questions, new subsamples, and new lines o inquiry

develop.

Dot thinking in instrument design terms can, in act,

lead to sel-delusion; ou eel sensitive/ to the site but

actually may be stuck in reactive, seat-o-the-pants inter-

viewing. !hat tactic usually yields laccid data.

6eople and settings in ield studies can be observed more than

once. Dot everything is riding on the single interview or

observation. 4n qualitative research there is nearly always a

second chance. So ront-end instrumentation can be revised

in act, should be revised. ou learn how to ask a question in

the siteFs terms and to look with new eyes at something that

began to emerge during the irst visit. 4nstrumentation can be

modiied steadily to explore new leads, address a revised

research question, or interview a new class o inormant,

4n qualitative research, issues o instrument validity and

reliability ride largely on the skills o the researcher.

@ssentially apersonmore or less alliblyis observing,

interviewing, and recording, while modiying the observa-

tion, interviewing, and recording devices rom one ield trip

to the next. !hus you need to ask, about yoursel and your

colleagues,


27/27

@. 4nstrumentation \ I

disciplinary grounding are considered assets. 7ut although

unamiliarity with the phenomenon or setting allows or a

ertile decentering,/ it also can lead to relatively naive,

easily misled, easily distracted ieldwork, along with the

collection o ar too much data.

!he problem is how to get beyond the supericial or the

merely salient, becoming empirically literate./ ou can

understand little more than your own evolving mental map

allows. A naive, undierentiated map will translate into

global, supericial data and interpretations-and usually

intoFsel-induced or inormant-induced bias as well. ou have

to be knowledgeable to collect good inormation 0arkus,

'2??. As Kiorgi '23T puts it, educated looking/ is

necessary. *.-.

4nexperience and single-discipline ocus can lead to asecond danger; plastering a ready-made explanation on

phenomena that could be construed in more interesting ways.

!hus presumably grounded/ theori#ing can turn out to be

conceptual heavy-handedness, without the researcher"s even

being aware o it. Kinsberg, '22, even suggests that the

researcher"s counter-transerence/ like the

psychoanalystFs unacknowledged eelings toward the patient

is at work during data collection and must be suraced and

tamed/ through discussions with peers, careul retrospective

analysis, and audits./ !ranscending personal biases and

limitations is not easy.

+n balance, we believe that a knowledgeable practitioner

with conceptual interests and more than one disciplinary

perspective is oten a better research instrument/ in a

qualitative study; more reined, more bias resistant, moreeconomical, quicker to home in on the core processes that

hold the case together, and more ecumenical in the search or

conceptual meaning.?

Ti!e Re(uired

4t is not possible to speciy time requirements or instru-

mentation. So much depends on the modes o data collection

involved, on how prestructured you choose to be, on the

nature o the research questions, and on the complexity o the

sample. 0ore structured instrumentation, done with diverse

samples, with a conirmatory emphasis, will take

substantially more time to develop.

Su!!ar. Co!!ents

$e"ve looked at substantive moves that serve to ocus

and bound the collection o datareducing it in advance, in

eect. !hese moves include systematic conceptual

framewor:sorgani#ing variables and their relationships,

research questionsthat urther deine the obBects o inquiry,

deining the heart/ and boundaries o a study through case

definition,planning or within-case and multiple-case

sampling,and creating instrumentation. A< o these moves

serve both to constrain and support analysis. All can be done

inductively and developmentally* all can be done in advance

o data collection. )esigns may be tight or loose. Such

choices depend on not only your preerred research style but

also the study"s topic and goals, available theory, and the

researcher"s amiliarity with the settings being studied.

4n the next chapter, we pursue other, more technical issueso ocusing and bounding a study during its design.

Dotes

'. !here is a paradox here 1. @.

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Qualitative Data Analysis 1

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