Qualitative Research Method

LEZ. 1

Qualitative VS Quantitative Methodologies

QUANTITATIVE QUALITATIVE
AIM TO MEASURE TO UNDERSTAND
SAMPLE LARGE SMALL
METHOD STRUCTURED OPEN
RESULT NUMERICAL TEXTUAL

AN EXAMPLE OF A QUALITATIVE INTERVIEW

20 people
Non-representative sample
Open question:
Could you tell me the story of how you bought your most recent laptop?
Starting from that first time that it occurred to you that you might need one…
Result: The main reasons are:
a. Its design
b. Its usability
c. Its social status

AN EXAMPLE OF QUANTITATIVE INTERVIEW

Survey
1000 people
Representative sample
Closed question:
What was your main motivation for choosing Apple over a PC?
Its design
Its usability
Its social status
Result:
a. Its design: 30%
b. Its usability: 50%
c. Its social status: 20%
Qualitative Research Method

Steps of the research question

1. Formulation of the research question

2. Data collection
3. Data analysis
4. Writing up findings

STEP. N 1: Formulation of the research question

Typical qualitative vs quantitative research questions

Quantitative
Two types:
1. How many…?
2. Why?  You must have a hypothesis beforehand.
Research question: Is my hypothesis true or false?
Does Z correlate with X?
Aim: to generalize

Qualitative
• You do not know the answer beforehand.
• How does phenomenon X happen? What is the process?
• What are the main types and how do they work?
• What role Z plays in the process of X?
• Aim: to understand

EX. of quantitative research questions

- How many people have heard about our brand?

- Is our product more popular among women or men?
- How many people use our service on a weekly basis?
 Answer: amount, distribution
Qualitative Research Method

- Is there a difference between young and old people’s Opera use?

- Is it because they have different levels of education? Or income…?
 Answer: correlation, regression

EXAMPLE of qualitative research questions

• Why did our brand become popular among women? We have no idea…
• What kind of new app could we develop for elderly people that helps
them in their daily life?
• What are the main types of fears that hold back consumers from trying
our new investment product?
• What are the desires of contemporary urban teenagers that we could
tap into with our advertisements?
à Answer: a process, an insight, a theory

STEP. 2: Data collection

Quantitative
How many times in the last two weeks have you been to the cinema?
a. I haven’t
Qualitative Research Method

b. Once
c. More than once

Qualitative
Could you please tell me the about the last time you went to the cinema?

After asking we have to observe the situation.

Quantitative observation: the number of car parking in IKEA
Qualitative observation: people in a disco club

Then we have to reading and watching the situation.

SAMPLING

Quantitative
 Large sample
 Representative (ideally)

Qualitative
 Smaller sample
 Purposive (when you select a case depends on the research
question

 Turning data into documents

Quantitative
• Distribution
• Frequency
• Relationship between variables
Qualitative
• In-depth analysis
• Emphasis on understanding, reconstructing the process, interpretation
• Theory-building

We don’t have to mix the two methods

MISTAKES TO AVOID:
Qualitative Research Method

- No small non-representative survey

- Large sample, quasi- interviews (could you please write down why you
chose your apple computer)

1. We already have quantitative data that we are not sure how to interpret
Quanti  Quali

Example: We see that our sales are declining, but we are not quite sure why.
We have no idea what is happening and we do a qualitative research to find
out why.

2. We are about to carry out quantitative data collection and we need

information on what kind of data to collect Quali Quanti
Example: We want to do a survey, but don’t know which answer options to
include.
We want to make sure that we collect quantitative data on the key
aspects and we do a qualitative study to identify them.

LEZ. 2
Qualitative Research Method

Sampling in qualitative research

Population: aggregate of all cases to which your assertions refer (can be

people, companies, stores..)

Sampling frame: concrete list

Sampling units: 1° level: groups, organizations, countries, etc.

2° level: within them: people, projects, etc.

QUANTITATIVE Probability sample: depends on population size, variance

and distribution. Usually min. 1000

QUALITATIVE RESEARCH Non-probability sample

1. Accidental
2. Quota
3. Purposive
4. Snowball
5. Theoretical

Normally around 20/30 items: depends on the scope of the study and how
many groups you want to compare
As many as you need to answer to your research question

1. ACCIDENTAL (CONVENIENCE) SAMPLING

- Cases easiest to reach

- Cheapest

2. QUOTA SAMPLING

- Sample that contains cases in the same proportion as the population

along a pre-defined set of criteria
- Within the quota: convenience (or judgmental) sampling
Qualitative Research Method

Quota sampling is when the sample contains cases in the same proportion as
the population along a pre-defined set of criteria BUT you choose what the
criteria should be.

For example: how do people choose their bank?

 which factors best explain, according to existing knowledge, variance in the

phenomenon that you study?
Qualitative Research Method

Education, living location, income, wealth, occupation, gender, age,

lifestyle

 choose the two most relevant ones

Education and living location

Studies rarely have more than 2 criteria

NEXT STEPS

3. PURPOSIVE (JUDGMENTAL) SAMPLE

Cases selected based on your expert judgment – based on the research

question.

 What is the difference between quota and purposive sampling?

In purposive sampling, cases do not need to reflect population proportions.
You can oversample groups that are important.

How? Main rationales of sample selection:

 Typical cases
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 Critical cases
 Extreme/ deviant cases
 Maximum variation (Different cases)

4. SNOWBALL SAMPLE

Initial small sample – next layer from existing sampling units

5. THEORETICAL SAMPLING

 Samples so far: A priori determination of sample size

 In contrast: Theoretical sampling is a gradual sampling method: you
continue to include elements till “necessary”  Sample size cannot be
known in advance
 What does that mean?
Qualitative Research Method

6. GRADUAL SAMPLING (Corpus Construction)

Saturation: additional cases do not yield substantial further insights

Process:
1. We start from an initial quota or judgmental sample
2. We analyse the data
3. Include further cases based on new criteria that we found in the
analysis
4. We repeat until saturation

Example: What are the main reasons why people get a tattoo?

- Time (and money)

- Width vs depth of the sample

RECREUTING PARTICIPANTS

- Recruitment agencies
- Advertisement, social media
- Using contacts

GATEKEEPERS

- People who give you access to the organization/group that you want to
study
- How to choose them?

 Insiders to identify the right gatekeeper

 Sponsors
 Start at the top and work your way down

GETTING ACCESS

• Remuneration/rewards
• Issues
• May not want to talk / let alone, be observed
• May not want to talk on the record
• May not be allowed to talk
Qualitative Research Method

LEZ. 3

Data collection – Interviews

QUALITATIVE INTERVIEWS: when do we use them?

1. Research question referring to people’s interpretations

2. Research referring to behavior - but we don’t have access to it.

DISADVANTAGES

 Relies on memory
 Social acceptability bias
 Explicit, consciously held views
 Less suitable for routine, habitual action

IN OUR CASE: If we want to understand how people buy smart home devices
and how they perceive IKEA’s entry into the category…
What would be the advantages and disadvantages of using interviews as a
data collection method?

Interviews: by the number of participants

• Alone
• Friendship pairs
• Household

Interviews: by the level of direction

- Unstructured
Example: Biographical narrative interview
- Semi-structured
(Most in-depth interviews)
- Structured
Example: Laddering technique

Elements of the interview protocol

- Introduction
Qualitative Research Method

- Topic headings and questions

- (Stimulus material)
- Documentation sheet

Introduction

o Thank you note

o Few words about the research
o Assurance of anonymity/confidentiality
o No right or wrong answers
o Ask for permission to tape record

YOU MAY INCLUDE:

o Topics
o Questions
o Probing questions
o Time you would like spend with each

Documentation sheet

o Date of the interview

o Place of the interview
o Identification of the interviewee
o Gender, age, ethnicity, profession of the interviewee (if necessary)
o Field notes

Formulating questions

The aim is to reconstruct what is in the interviewee`s head with as little

modification as possible.
The interview question is not the same as the research question! The aim is to
get interviewees talk about the phenomenon that will allow the RESEARCHER
to answer the research question.
Qualitative Research Method

Formulating questions
- Open ended questions
- Avoid leading questions
- Avoid jargon; use everyday language
- Avoid theoretical questions – ask instead what the interviewee thought,
felt and did
- Don’t include questions that you can’t answer
- Let the interviewee lead the way
- Do not finish the interviewee’s sentences
- Do not summarize, or reformulate what they say

DON’T GUIDE TOO MUCH

Structure of the interview guide

- Start with an easy question, leave sensitive issues for later in the
interview
- Move from broad to specific questions in order to avoid imposing your
own interpretation
Probing
• Can tell me a bit more about that?
• Why do you say that?
• Can you give an example?
An interview goes well..
- Short interview questions and long answers (with some exceptions)
Qualitative Research Method

- You getting spontaneous, rich, specific, and relevant answers

- Interviewer follows up and clarifies what the interviewee said

Doing the interview: practicalities

• Face-to-face? Skype?
• How will you record it?
• Make sure it works
• Try it in the interview setting
• Print the interview guide

Disadvantages of the interview method

• Relies on memory
• Social acceptability bias
• Explicit, consciously held views
• Less suitable for routine, habitual action
à Techniques to resolve these problems:

Revealing hidden meanings

• Zeltman metaphor elicitation technique
• Projective techniques
– Association technique
– Completion technique
• Sentence
• Story
– Construction technique
• Picture response
• Cartoon
• Expressive techniques
• Role playing
• Third person technique
• Personification technique
Stakeholders
• Researcher
• Research community
• Research participants
• Wider society

Basic principles
Qualitative Research Method

• Non-malefice: “responsibility to ensure that the physical, social and

psychological well-being of research participants is not adversely
affected by the research.” (BSA)
• Anonymity
• Right to privacy (Confidentiality)

Informed consent

• Right to know about the aims of the research

• Ability to interrupt research participation
• ‘Research subjects must be informed fully about the purpose, methods
and intended possible uses of the research, what their participation in
the research entails and what risks, if any, are involved.’
• Informed consent is specific, not blanket consent ‘to anything else the
research might involve’… apply for approval again if the research
involves any significant changes to the methods that were originally
approved ([Link]
• Debated issues
• Covert research and informed consent
• Exploratory research
• Influence of disclosing information
Qualitative Research Method

LEZ. 4

Data collection – Focus group

• Small group (6-8)

• Group DISCUSSION
• Group members can ask questions from each other and the group
• Moderator
• Unstructured or semi-structured
• 1.5 – 2 hours (but may last up to 6 hours)
• Recordings (video and audio) and moderator notes

Purpose
• Generate new ideas through interaction
• New product development
• Advertising pre-testing
• Image studies

Types by size
• Standard (6-10)
• Mini group

Types by composition
• Homogenous group
• Conflict group

Types by moderator
• One moderator
• Dual moderator
• Duelling moderators
• Participant-moderator

Participants
Pre-screening
• Homogenous group à feel more secure to open up
• Demographics
• Other aspects, depending on the topic
• Experience with the topic
Qualitative Research Method

• Not experienced with focus groups

Recruiting participants
• Snowball or local community
• Nominations
• Piggyback and on location
• Panels
• Lists

The focus group setting

• Comfortable and relaxing
• Focus group room

Setting
• Comfortable and relaxing
• Focus group room
• Participants „natural” environment: home, workplace, canteen
• Setting related to the topic (IKEA, museum, etc.)
• Refreshments (even meals if longer focus group) – check dietary
requirements

What to use?
• Questions, topics for discussions
• Activities
• Mood boards and other collages (video, audio, digital images)
• Stimulus material
• Images, videos, music
• Advertising storyboards
• Scent and taste

How to design a Focus group guide (protocol)?

• Clarify the aims: what do you want to find out?
• Imagine yourself with the perfect transcript à What do you need to ask
so that participants talk about these things?
• Topics that you would like THEM to cover
• Discussion questions that invite INTERACTION
• Questions for each topic in case of emergency – BUT you don’t need to
stick to them!
Qualitative Research Method

• Aim: You give them an initial question à Discussion brings up unexpected

topics

Focus group: timeline

• Welcome and ground rules
• Introductory questions
• Transition questions
• Key questions
• Wrap-up

A good Moderator is…

• Respectful, non-judgmental, kind
• Establishes rapport
• Able to deal with
• Disruptive members
• Groups with no „chemistry”
• Members who talk too much
• Members who do not talk enough
• Normally does not participate in the conversation – but may get involved
if necessary
• FLEXIBLE: open to new ideas

Probing
• Can you tell me more about that?
• Could you please give some examples?
• I don’t understand. Could you please explain?
• Does everybody have the same experience?
• I am interested in all the different points of views. Does anybody
have anything to add?
• You don’t seem to agree. Can you tell us about your experience?
• Take notes during the discussion for later probing questions!

Rewards and compensation

• Travel expenses
• Rewards
• Monetary
• Gift
• Charity
Qualitative Research Method

• Prize-draw
• Monetary payments are a debated issue
• May lead to sampling bias
• Raise ethical issues (see
[Link]
incentives-89)

How many groups?

• Depends on heterogeneity of the target group and the research question

• Class on sampling – matrices
• Think of interaction – are there people that are likely to dominate others
in a discussion? (e.g. age, gender, occupation) –> if yes, you may need
different focus groups for them

ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES

Focus group VS interview

On-line focus groups

• On-line focus group
• Via chat
• Via video-conference (Skype, Zaloom, etc.)
• On-line bulletin board
Qualitative Research Method

On-line focus group via chat: practicalities

• Basically a chatroom
• On-line pre-screening
• Time, on-line space of the discussion
• Manual: how the focus groups works (how to express emotions, etc.)
• Moderator: UPPERCASE – answers: lower case
• Can include on-line stimuli (and tasks)

Market research online community

• Similar to an on-line forum with a moderator

• Can run for longer (days or weeks)
• May include longer tasks
• More participants (25 or more)
• Participants have to be on-line a given amount of time

On-line vs off-line

Methodological implication: impact of ethnicity, class, age, gender, sexuality,

education of interviewee and interviewer/ moderator

You have to interview/moderate a focus group of working class women on

how they buy make-up.
Do you think it makes a difference if
• You are a woman vs a man?
Qualitative Research Method

• If you put the PhD title behind your name or if you don’t?
• If you are significantly younger than the participants? Or older?

Who should interview who?

• As similar to your interviewees as possible for better access

Finch (1993): women-women interview - women elicit more private

information

• BUT shared gender, age, ethnicity, etc. does not automatically lead to
access, rapport (and empowerment)

McDowell (1998): no sisterly bounding with high-flyer women in

banking
Qualitative Research Method

Focus group workshop

6-8 people per group plus moderator à 5 groups

Let’s make homogenous groups!

à What could be a criteria for homogeneity here?

To consider:
- Which groups are different from the point of view of your research
question?

1. How do people feel and what do they think about IKEA moving into the smart home
segment? (IKEA’s legitimation in the smart segment)
2. Into which smart device categories should IKEA move into in the future and how? 
Which groups may not interact well?

In each group
- One moderator
- One “note-taker”

What to focus on?

• Which questions/tasks worked well and which ones didn’t?
à A question/task ‘works well’, if:
• Participants answer it easily (and eagerly)
• It generates further interactions among participants
• The answers are relevant – that is, can be well used to answer your
Research Questions
1. How do people feel and what do they think about IKEA moving into the smart home
segment? (IKEA’s legitimation in the smart segment)
2. Into which smart device categories should IKEA move into in the future and how? 
What could be improved?

After the focus group

• Note-takers’ points
• Moderators’ experiences
• Participants'’ experiences
• Questions?
Qualitative Research Method

LEZ.5

Ethnography, netnography and participant observation

• What “observation methods” are and when we use them

• Main types

1. Participant observation and ethnography

• Participant roles
• Single-sited or multi-sited research
• Practicalities of data collection
2. Consumer as researcher
3. Netnography

Ethnography and participant observation

“watching people do what they do where they do it”
(Sayre, 2001, p.102)

Research questions
• What do people do?
- As opposed to “How people make sense of…?”
• What is the process?
• (What do people think?)

Why use observation methods?

People may not be able or willing to tell you what they did/thought
• They lie (social pressure, conformity, shame)
• They are not aware (routines)
• They forgot
• They are not able to express in words

1- Participant observation and ethnography

Issues of research design

1. Participant roles
2. Single-sited or multi-sited research
3. Practicalities of data collection
Qualitative Research Method

1- Partecipant roles

Participant-as-observer: “focuses on the overall situation, interacts with a

greater number of respondents, but does not develop personal relationships
with any of them.”

Observer-as-participant: “concentrates on participation by establishing a high

level of trust with a small number of respondents, developing a strong
relationship with them to the extent that they maintain contacts socially as
friends.”

2- Single-sited or multi-sited research

- Single-sited
- Multi-sited
a. Following the trails: tracing connections across sites
b. Comparative: comparing sites

Example of following trails

- Steiner (1994): African art in transit
- Research: Following the objects
Traders in Cote d’Ivoire
Markets in Cote d’Ivoire
European and American dealers
Archive research
Qualitative Research Method

Example of comparative design

- Trautner (2005): Comparison of striptease clubs for middle and for lower
class target groups

3 - Practicalities of data collection

Observation protocol/guide
Instructions specifying what to observe and what to focus on, guided by the
research question

EXAMPLE 1: Taco Bell service interaction

Customer behaviour during

- Arrival
- Queuing
- Ordering
- Waiting
- Seat selection
- Eating

Employee behaviour
- Order taking
- Order filling
- Food preparation
- Orchestrating of functions
Qualitative Research Method

EXAMPLE 2: Authority and gender in academia

Observation site: conferences and public lectures

• Speakers
– How do they speak?
– How long do they speak?
– Body language
– Interaction

• Audience
– Who speaks first?
– How long do they speak?
– Body language
– Interaction

WHAT TO OBSERVE?
(Customize to research question)

• Setting
– Ambience, atmosphere, environment
– Physical characteristics of the setting

• What is happening within the location

– What are people doing?
Qualitative Research Method

– How exactly do they do it?

• What else is happening in this site that is relevant to your research
question(s)?

• Field interviews: How do people characterise and understand what is

going on?

• Personal notes:
– How do you interpret what you are seeing?
– How you are feeling?

HOW TO RECORD YOUR OBSERVATIONS?

ETHNOGRAPHIC DATA

• Field notes, diary

• Photos
• Drawings
• Tape-recorded interviews

Taking field notes

“the human mind forgets massively and quickly “(Lofland and Lofland 101)

• Jotted notes:
– write ASAP/sound bites
• Full field notes:
– Ideally by the end of the day (24-hour rule)
– “at minimum… a couple of single-spaced typed pages for every
hour of observation” (Lofland and Lofland 1995)

WHAT TO JOT DOWN? (Cosa annotare)

• Observations of what is going on

• Your ideas

“What is going on”

• Comprehensive:
Qualitative Research Method

“giving a complete survey of the phenomena, and not picking out the
sensational, the singular, and still less the funny and the quaint” (Malinowski
1922: 10-11)

• Precise

– (smile vs happy): “clearly draw the line between, on the one hand,
the results of direct observation and of native statements and
interpretations, and on the other, the inferences of the author,
based on his common sense and psychological insight”
(Malinowski 1922: 3)

– Verbatim vs paraphrased

• Taken during and immediately after observation, frequently and

regularly
• Not limited to text: drawings, photos, maps, flyers, etc.

2- Consumer as researcher

- User-generated data collection

EXAMPLE 1:
Qualitative Research Method
Qualitative Research Method

EXAMPLE 2: SMS DIARIES

- Restaurant study

EXAMPLE 3: MOBILE PHOTO DIARY

eBay Christmas deals

Missing out on last minute due to fears over late delivery
Log each time you see a Christmas deal!
Note the details
Did you take it or not? Why?
Qualitative Research Method

EXAMPLE 4: MOBILE PHOTO DIARY

MTV

- Aim: To understand identity-construction among young people

- Phase I: Take pictures of your everyday life
- Phase II: Special tasks:
clothes that you wear to different social occasions
Pictures of peers and people you find important and from whom they want
to dissociate
Places where you can really be yourself (Malhotra, p.154)

EXAMPLE 5- VIDEO DIARY (FACEBOOK)

- 13-24 age group

Qualitative Research Method

- Citizen journalism: record short videos of your everyday life

- 13 key markets

3- Netnography

- Adaptation of ethnography to analyse on-line behaviour

- Real-time
- Past activity
Newsgroups, forums etc.