Establishing Quality: Trustworthiness or Validity
Quality All research is rightly open to scrutiny from its readers. Health researchers too must not only consider the ‘truth value’ of their studies but also demonstrate that it is…
Data Analysis: Procedures, Practices and Computers
The process of data analysis Qualitative data analysis (QDA) is a complex, non-linear process but also systematic, orderly and structured. Not all qualitative forms of inquiry take the same approach…
Mixed Methods: Combining Qualitative and Quantitative Research
The nature of mixed methods studies Mixed methods research (MMR) means the use of both qualitative and quantitative approaches in one empirical study. (It must be noted, however, that mixed…
Additional Approaches
Case study research The term ‘case study’ is used for a research approach with specific boundaries and can be both qualitative and quantitative. Stake (2000) states that much qualitative research…
Action Research
What is action research? Action research (AR) is a type of inquiry generally undertaken by practitioners who become researchers, or who work in partnership with university researchers, to examine issues…
Phenomenology
Intentionality and the early stages of phenomenology Phenomenology begins with Husserl who was the core figure in the development of phenomenology as a modern movement. It is important, however, to…
Narrative Inquiry
The nature of narrative and story Stories are reflections on people’s experience and the meaning that this experience has for them. Narrative research is a useful way of gaining access…
Grounded Theory
History and origin GT originated in the 1960s by Barney Glaser and Anselm Strauss, who worked together on research about health professionals’ interaction with dying patients in 1965. From research,…
Initial Steps in the Research Process
Selecting and formulating the research question The first step in the process is the selection of the research area, topic and question. Although the terms are often used interchangeably, Punch…
Ethnography
The historical perspective Modern ethnography has its roots in social anthropology and emerged in the 1920s and 1930s when famous anthropologists such as Malinowski (1922), Boas (1928) and Mead (1935),…
