This document includes the lecture summary including module 1 - 5, which are important for Exam 1. As the articles are core reading material for this exam, I highly recommend reading the articles as well (or just buy the summary)
BRM II lectures - Module 1
Lecture 1 - Introduction
What is qualitative research?
● An umbrella term covering an array of interpretive techniques which seek to describe,
decode and translate (and otherwise come to terms with) the meaning, not the frequency,
of a more or less naturally occuring phenomena in the social world (Van Maanen, 1979)
● Basically, qualitative researchers are interested in understanding the meaning people have
constructed, that is, how people make sense of the world and their experiences in the
world.
Qualitative research, is a situated activity that locates the observer in the world.
● interested i n understanding the meaning people have constructed, that is, how people
make sense of their world and the experiences they have in the world.
● not i nterested in the frequency of certain more or less naturally occuring phenomena in
the social world; but interested in the meaning.
○ naturally occurring means not set up by the researcher (experiment).
3 aspects of qualitative research? (important to remember)
● interpretivist approach→ interpret an already interpreted world
○ subjective, data is constructed with participants
○ links finding to the context, data is linked to language
○ vs. postpositivist approach
● qualitative data → observe and question the world to find evidence of meaning
○ vs. quantitative approach
● inductive logic → build understanding from our interpretations of this evidence
○ vs. deductive logic
Difference between qualitative and quantitative approaches
Qualitative Quantitative
● data constructed with participants ● ata is collected
● data is expressed in language ● data is expressed in numbers
● ‘’subjective’’ ● “objective”
● linked to context ● generalizable
● seeking evidence of meaning ● seeking evidence of frequency
● methods for data collection ● methods for data collection
○ ethnography ○ surveys
○ case studies ○ questionnaires
○ interviews ○ content analysis
○ document analysis ○ polls
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,Positivist approach (vs. interpretive approach):
● data is collected from ‘real world’
● data is expressed in numbers, seeking evidence of frequency
● ‘objective’, generalizable
method for gathering data
● interviews, ethnography, case studies, document analysis
● focus on ‘emic’ perspective
○ the insider’s perspective
○ etic = outsiders; for example the researcher has taken an etic perspective to make a
judgement on what counts as an important email, means that the researcher has
defined what is considered as an important email and not the employees that were
used for the research.
Induction → from observations to theory (results → theory)
Deduction (quantitative) → from theory to confirmations (theory → results)
Lecture 2 - Research approaches
Video
● What elements do you recognize from our last lecture?
● What reminds you of this module’s reading by Creswell?
They were talking about ethnography. Cresswell brings up that there is a strong link
between ethnography and anthropology. Spending time with culture around you or
subcultures, and learn about how their culture functions.
● What that you’ve learned about isn’t included here?
Identifying a research topic
● Curiosity- what has sparked your interest in the course?
● Bigger picture- what trends or bigger ideas does this park of interest connect to?
● Reconnaissance- maybe the topic is just interesting because you don’t know much about it
yet? Read around a bit to check that it really is viable.
● Opportunity- sometimes referred to as ‘spotting gap’, you need to identify what your study
could offer.
Practical considerations
● access to the research site and to research participants: who do you know that works in
an organization? Where could you conduct observations and interviews?
● international but local: your topic should have an international focus but you don’t have
time/resources to travel to another country. How can you introduce an international
element while conducting research in the Netherlands?
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, 3 (Three) approaches to qualitative research:
● Ethnography
○ Focused on an entire cultural group e .g. students or lecturers at the VU
○ Involves extensive, sustained observations
○ The researcher is immersed in the day to day lives of the research group
■ researcher can get emotionally involved in the research.
○ most often involves participant observation.
○ History: the Chicago School of the 20th Century
○ Often had a critical edge: showing how things ‘really are’ on the ground. not the
way reality is presented by those in power/authority
○ Started out with risky research: e.g. during taking, joining gangs, etc.
■ travel with them, take drugs with them, get beaten by them and so on,
because you want to immerse yourself with their culture.
When is ethnography right for you? Ask yourself the question whether you are trying to
describe how a cultural group works. However, this approach does come with some
challenges:
○ can you get extensive access to a setting where this cultural group operates in their
‘natural’ setting, where you can observe, shadow, converse with them
○ can you maintain enough ‘distance’ (‘avoid going native’) to tell stories that are
relevant to outsider audiences.
■ imagine a spy going into a (criminal) group and eventually start liking it and
never come back.
■ Reflect on the things that you are observing, and prevent applying your own
feelings direct on the findings.
● Case study
○ is a qualitative approach in which the investigator explores a bounded system (a
case) or multiple bounded systems (cases) over time, through detailed, in-depth
data collection involving multiple sources of information and reports a case
description and case based themes.
■ important to clearly justify what boundary is.
○ Some types of case studies: exploratory/pilot study, revelatory, multiple &
intrinsic.
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