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E-Lecture 9:ESM and Self Studies (SELF STUDIES (e. What is a…
E-Lecture 9:ESM and Self Studies
Learning objectives
Outline the method of experience sampling
Explain the choices needed for ESM
Review the methods of ethnography and autoethnography
Discuss the weaknesses of autoethnography
Explain what is meant by a self study
Give an example of a self study
EXPERIENCE SAMPLING
a. Experience Sampling
Experience Sampling Method (ESM)
Psychology
Consolvo & Walker (2003)
Multiple questionnaires
Activities or feelings
Self reporting
Minimal involvement
Less bias
Less cost
ESM is a technique borrowed from psychology that allows you to conduct field studies
It involves collecting information from participants at intervals throughout the day
Consolvo & Walker for instance get participants to fill out brief questionnaires everyday in response to alert
It doesn’t require participants to remember or recall anything but rather ask about their current activities or feelings
ESM is a form of self reporting like an interview
However, the involvement of the investigator is minimal
This reduces bias and also helps to reduce costs
b. Number of participants
30 to 80 participants
One to three weeks
Up to 10 alerts per day
Quantitative
Qualitative
Increase access
ESM studies often involve 30 to 80 participants over 1 to 3 weeks
With each participant receiving 10 alert per day
A nice feature of ESM is that you can use statistical methods to evaluate the data because of the large number of participants
This contrasts with other field studies techniques which are purely qualitative
Depending on the nature of the questions in the questionnaire, ESM can also be used to collect qualitative data
Because the investigator is not present, it means you can often collect observation about events which are not normally be accessible
Consolvo and Walker give the example of people getting ready for work in the morning or going on a date
c. Decisions
-Alerts
-Question delivery
In conducting ESM, there are 2 issues that you have to make decisions about
The first relates to alerts. You have to decide what type of alerts you’re going to use, how it’s going to be scheduled, and what mechanisms you going to use to deliver that alert
The second thing you have to make a decision about, is how you’re going to collect the data, what kind of questions you going to use, and what format are the answers going to be delivered to you
Alert choices
Consolvo and Walker distinguish 3 types of alerts: random alerts, scheduled alerts and event-based alerts
As well as deciding on the scheduling timetable, you also have to make a decision whether the alerts are going to be ones that the participants can hear or ones that the participants can feel
d. ESM in Clinical Education
In the next video, Tom Saver discusses the use of ESM
Although he applies it to clinical studies, you can get a good insight of the technique
SELF STUDIES
a. What is a self-study?
-Subject
-Investigator
-Autoethnography
A self-study is a form of field study in which you are both the investigator and the subject of the research
Literally it doesn’t approach where you study yourself
There are a number of different kinds of self-studies
This lecture will focus on autoethnography
b. Review of ethnography
-Immersion in the culture
-Participant observation
-Interpretation - thick description
-Analytical orientation
You might recall that ethnography involves immersion in the culture of the participants
It has 3 defining characteristics: participant observation, interpretation and analytical orientation
Participant observation doesn’t mean standing back and watching the participants, It means getting to know them
The interpretation is done as the observations are made, something that is known as the thick description, the goal is to try make sense of things as they being observed
c. Keep it simple
-Time consuming
-Ethnography-lite- quick and dirty, rapid ethnography
The main drawback of conventional ethnographic studies is that they’re incredible time consuming
As a consequence, when apply to interaction design, various ethnographic-like techniques have been developed in order to support fast product lifecycle
One of these approaches is described by Cunningham and Jones as quick-and-dirty
The idea of the quick-and-dirty approach is to conduct a series of mini studies like pilot studies
The context in which these mini studies are conducted is carefully chosen
In a hope that it won’t be necessary to conduct a fully fledged studies
The second type of approach is known as the rapid ethnography where the participants and the time of studies are very carefully chosen to get maximum insights.
In addition, multiple researchers are often involved
d. It is rude to stare
A second drawback of ethnography is an ethical problem inherited in the ethnographic approach
The idea of ethnography is to make observations whilst immersing yourself in the culture of the people you’re studying
But immersed culture, to observe people in that way, is not considered ethically acceptable
As Crawford puts it, following Smith, it’s rude to stare
Autoethnography overcomes this ethical problem simply by observing yourself
e. What is a autoethnography?
“Autoethnography is a form or method of research that involves self-observation and reflexive investigating in the context of ethnographic fieldwork and writing”
i. Description by Crawford
“Autoethnography epitomizes the reflexive turn of fieldwork for human study by (re)positioning the researcher as an object of inquiry who depicts a site of interest in terms of personal awareness and experience”
ii. Alternative names
Autoethnography
Sometimes, you will also hear autoethnography refers to
Personal ethnography (Crawford, 1996)
Autobiographical design (Neustaedter & Sengers, 2012)
Autobiographical design occurs when people build a system using themselves, used the experience to learn about the design space and evaluate any trait of design based on their own experiences
iii. Definition by Cunningham & Jones
“The creation of an ethnography focused on the self; the author is both informant and investigator”
iv. Dangers of autoethnography
“Done badly.. The author creates a self-indulgent, un-generalisable, impenetrably individualised narrative”
One of the danger of autoethnography is that it might become a self-indulgent description of your own experiences
v. Autoethnography in IT
Article: Autoethnography: Critical appreciation of an emerging art
One of the first autoethnography studies applied to Information Technology was conducted by Duncan in 2004
She was working on the design of hypermedia educational resources in the early days of the web and CD-ROM
Because it was an innovative product at that time, there were no users with experience or guidelines to work to
It order to overcome this, she kept a journal of her experiences in designing, creating and testing the hypermedia
vi. Autoethnography example
Autoethnography research relating to Asian Dating Sites
The next video is an example of autoethnographic research conducted about Asian Dating sites that part of the student research projects
Empathy
i. Empathy case study
Article: Gaining Empathy for Non-Routine Mobile Device Use through autoethnography
Okain, Rogers and Blandford use autoethnography as a way to study the non-routine use of mobile devices
By non-routine use that means situations that don’t happen on a regular basis for example it might be when you’re travelling, or on holiday or attending celebration
In this situations, experience sampling method (ESM) or diaries studies might be too disruptive or intrusive
Studying yourself however, seems a way to minimise objections
ii. Blood pressure monitor
One of the researchers, wore a blood pressure monitor for 3 months
A wrist watch would remind her to take her blood pressure twice a day
Because there were non-routines times, Okain often find herself having to carry out the test in unfamiliar places
One of the problems was the embarrassment caused by the noise that the device made
Blood pressure monitors, for those who don’t know involve using a pump to inflate a bag that squeezes your arm enabling the pressure of your blood to be measured.
The next video shows the consequences of using the devices in the privacy of a toilet
iii. Empathy
Empathy
What it feels like to be the user
The idea was to study empathy, what it feels like to be the user
The study found that autoethnography was a very useful technique for studying non-routine times