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Chapter 12: Interpretive Research - Coggle Diagram
Chapter 12: Interpretive Research
Distinctions from Positivist Research
First: interpretive research employs a theoretical sampling strategy, cases are selected based on theoretical considerations such as whether they fit the phenomenon being studied.
Second: the role of the researcher receives critical attention in interpretive research.
Third: interpretive analysis is holistic and contextual, rather than being reductionist and isolationist.
Lastly: data collection and data analysis can proceed simultaneously and iteratively in interpretive research.
Benefits and Challenges of Interpretive Research
Benefits
Well suited for exploring hidden reasons behind complex processes, where quantitative evidence may be biased, inaccurate or difficult to obtain.
Often helpful for theory construction in areas with no or insufficient a priori theory.
Appropriate for studying context-specific unique or idiosyncratic events or processes.
Help uncover interesting and relevant research questions and issues for follow-up research.
Challenges
Tends to be more time and resource intensive than positivist research in data collection and analytic efforts.
Requires well trained researchers who are capable of seeing and interpreting complex social phenomenon from the perspectives of the embedded participants without injecting their personal biases or preconceptions into their inferences.
All participants or data sources may not be equally credible, unbiased or knowledgeable about the phenomenon of interest that may lead to misleading or false impressions.
Inferences do not lend themselves well to replicability or generalizability.
May sometimes fail to answer the research questions of interest or predict future behaviors.
Characteristics of Interpretive Research
Naturalistic inquiry: social phenomena must be studied within their natural setting.
Researcher as instrument: researchers are often embedded within the social context that they are studying and are considered part of the data collection instrument, they must use their observational skills, trust with the participants, and their ability to extract the correct information.
Interpretive analysis: observations must be interpreted through the eyes of the participants embedded in the social context.
Use of expressive language: documenting the verbal and non-verbal language of participants and the analysis of such language are integral components of interpretive analysis.
Temporal nature: interpretive research is often not concerned with searching for specific answers, but with understanding a dynamic social processes as it unfolds over time.
Hermeneutic circle: an iterative process of moving back and forth from pieces of observations to the entirety of the social phenomenon to reconcile their apparent discord and to construct a theory that is consistent with the diverse subjective viewpoints and experiences of the embedded participants.
Interpretive Data Collection
Interviews: the most frequently used technique.
Observation:
direct observation
where the researcher is a neutral and passive external observer and is not involved in the phenomenon of interest.
Participant observation
where the researcher is an active participant in the phenomenon and her inputs or mere presence influence the phenomenon being studied.
Documentation: external and internal documents may be used to cast further insight into the phenomenon of interest or to corroborate other forms of evidence.
Interpretive Research Designs
Case research: intensive longitudinal study of a phenomenon at one or more research sites, understanding the dynamic process underlying a phenomenon of interest.
Action research: aimed at theory testing rather than theory building.
Ethnography: emphasizes studying a phenomenon within the context of its culture.
Phenomenology: emphasizes the study of conscious experiences as a way of understanding the reality around us.
Rigor in Interpretive Research
Dependability: can be viewed as dependable or authentic if two researchers assessing the same phenomenon using the same set of evidence at different times arrives at similar conclusions.
Credibility: considered credible if readers find its inferences to be believable.
Confirmability: refers to the extent to which the findings reported in interpretive research can be independently confirmed by others.
Transferability: refers to the extent to which the findings can be generalized to other settings.
Interpretive Research: a research paradigm that is based on the assumption that social reality is not singular or objective but is rather shaped by human experiences and social contexts and is therefore best studied within its socio-historic context by reconciling the subjective interpretations of tis various participants.