CRESWELL (Ch. 11)
Summary of Chapter 11
In this chapter, Creswell reiterates the value of having awareness about the differences between the five approaches to qualitative research. Creswell further distinguishes each of the five approaches by refocusing one research topic or study, for example the gunman case, through the lens of each approach. The author moves through the narrative approach explaining how the focus changes from identifying responses from multiple constituents to just one interview with someone involved in the incident focusing on the racial context and his or her ensuing reactions to the campus shooting. The campus shooting becomes his life experience and the stories are a result of personal, social, and interactional components.
In phenomenology, the researcher focuses on several individual students and a psychological concept. The story would be explored in terms of the fear that students in the shooting experienced, capturing its essence. If a theory needed to be developed, then a grounded approach, as Creswell describes, would have been the appropriate approach. The focus would move to the process of exploring the surreal experiences of students following the shooting and developing a theoretical model that explains those experiences.
Ethnography would focus on the campus community and how it functions as a culture-sharing group. Creswell explains how one could explore how the shooting, though unpredictable, resulted in rather predictable responses by different constituents across campus. This would require the researcher to enter the field, build rapport, and ultimately tell a story through his interpretation of the events that ensued.
Creswell concludes by re-examining the question of “how does the approach to inquiry shape the design of a study?” To answer this question, he offers seven suggestions; the approach identifies the focus of the study, interpretation flows throughout, the language of the research design procedures is shaped by the approach, the approach is inclusive of the participants, consider how the data will be analyzed, the approach informs the written product as well as the structure, and assessment criteria differ among approaches. Creswell recommends that a researcher design a study within the bounds of one approach reflecting the nuances that are unique to that approach.
Reflections and Analysis
This chapter was rather fascinating. I appreciated how Creswell used one case example and weaved it through each approach explaining how the study would look differently and where the focus of the study would shift. In class, we each decided on our topic and similarly, explored how our studies may develop through each of the five approaches. As Creswell articulated, it is sometimes difficult to differentiate when to use one approach over another as there are many ways that one case could very well cross over and become the product of a different approach.
One thing to keep in mind is that each approach is very very different to say the least. It really depends on whose story you want to tell and how you want to tell it. I also appreciated Creswell’s insight in that the essence of a good qualitative study can be captured if a researcher is able to convey the approach of inquiry, research design procedures, and philosophical and theoretical frameworks and assumptions. These are essentially the crux of qualitative research and regardless of the approach contribute to a rigorous and contributive study.
GOLDEN-BIDDLE AND LOCK (Chapter 1)
Summary of Chapter 1
In Chapter 1, Golden-Biddle and Locke establish the notion that as researchers, we are text-writers among knowledge-creating professions and we maintain our status through textual networking. The authors ascertain the need to explore what we often take for granted in the scientific writing process… the writing process itself and discussions that illuminate the endeavor.
Academic writing is often devoid of emotion, attitude, and judgment and is simplified for the sole purpose of knowledge transfer. As authors we are encouraged to write using an active voice being sure to avoid suggestive language and stick to professional code as prescribed by scholarship. Golden-Biddle and Locke make the point that while academic writing is structured and particular it certainly is not straightforward. The reporting style of academic writing makes comprehension challenging for readers who are not among the disciplines within which we write. The authors make the claim that this actually deters some readers from engaging in our reading. When doctoral students were asked to share about their learning experiences in writing academically, most of them shared that it was structured, difficult to learn the language, and they struggled getting their ideas across without self-expression.
In their discussion about what to write, the authors indicate that a writer writes much more than what they physically experienced in the field, they are called to discuss their thoughts and comparisons as they relate to what they believe about their field experience. But often our experiences are trumped by space constraints and publishing expectations, again limiting the true shape that the experience takes as it is written and read.
When determining whom we are writing for, we are influenced by intended audiences and susceptible to their influence. We often write for researchers and scholars within our specialization and the meaning we develop and articulate in our work is geared towards the theoretical models embraced by that discipline. Our contribution to the literature is manifested in our ability to link our insights and experiences to existing theory ensuring that it is both true and significant.
The authors discuss the ‘how’ of this writing by exploring the style and practice of academic writing. The accrediting process in moving our writing from proposal to publishing invites our work to be both persuasive and contributive, advancing our claims as knowledge and not merely as ideas to be ignored or challenged.
The persuasive discourse of our knowledge contribution often takes many forms but is always grounded in theoretical insights that have already laid the foundation on which knowledge is built. This is no different in qualitative writing. However, here the authors begin to explore other literary devices used in qualitative writing such as metaphors in order to depict the stories we discern in the field. Our writing task involves four components: articulating our insights in theoretically relevant terms, identifying and shaping our contribution through a storyline, arguing the uniqueness of our story line by challenging and acknowledging its limitations, and characterizing ourselves as storytellers.
Reflections and Analysis
Since my first assignment in my first psychology course in college I have been assigned course papers that strengthen my capacity to write both scientifically and academically. It was like learning another language and since I have been in either psychology or educational fields since, my default has been APA style, first person, empirically based, analytical, and especially “unadorned and disembodied.” I realize I like the structure of academic writing and I find that I get nervous when I’m asked to “take away the training wheels” and explore the research process as phenomena occur, as it is socially constructed around me and through literature.
The authors make a great point that “if the writing of scientific work does not come naturally, then neither does the reading of it for audiences outside these disciplinary boundaries” (p. 11). But this was further clarified by the fact that we intentionally choose our audience by deciding to explore a concept within a discipline of academic writers and scholars who have the “insider language”. By simply moving through the writing and publishing processes, we expose both ourselves and our writing to critique.
It is in the constraint of publishing and truly academic writing that I see where qualitative writing gets tricky and messy. In an effort to give our writing depth and meaning in the academic field we have to give consideration to our writing as being worthy of inclusion in this “public” theoretical discourse. Yet in order to give our experiences and stories depth and meaning, we have to be able to “show” not tell through literary devices that, convey the results and theoretical implications of our insights, contribute to the literature, and also accurately depict the holistic experience of the story we are trying to tell. Somewhere in all of that we inject our own personal style and beliefs about how theory and story meet. So it makes sense to me know that I would find qualitative writing a bit more consuming than I bargained for.
Monday, July 13, 2009
Thursday, April 16, 2009
Reflective Reading Log #4
CRESWELL (Ch. 10)
Summary of Chapter 10
Creswell touches on the importance for researchers to understand the knowledge that is gained from visiting with participants, asking questions to elicit meaning, and spending hours in the culture and in the field. In an effort to “check” this knowledge one must seek to validate the account and determine by whose standards this validation is suitable.
Validation and reliability in qualitative research vary in terms of perspective, definition, and procedure. Creswell explores the literature on validation and summarizes each of the major findings indicating that some writers use qualitative equivalents to quantitative methods of validation, some writers contend that qualitative validation requires more natural and fluid terms. In some cases, writers replace the use of the word validation with such words as credibility and utilize a different set of standards to judge research. Further still are writers whom conceptualize qualitative research through a postmodern frame. Other writers use an interpretive approach, draw on metaphors through the image of a crystal, or have little use for validation altogether. Creswell considers these perspectives and focuses on eight strategies that are employed by researchers and recommends, “qualitative researchers engage in at least two of them in any given study.”
Reliability, much like validation, can be addressed in many ways in qualitative research, mostly through detailed field notes, quality transcriptions, and through “blind” coding and intercoder agreements. Establishing the quality of qualitative research depends on the variety of standards that exist and vary within the research community. Such standards can be through a procedural/methodological perspective, a postmodern perspective, and an interpretive perspective. Creswell further explores how these standards can be utilized with each of the five approaches to qualitative research. In addition to the standards discussed through Creswell’s exploration of the literature, he also offers his own set of standards by which a researcher can judge his or her work.
Reflections and Analysis
As open to interpretation as I find qualitative research to be in general, it doesn’t surprise me that the concept of validity and reliability is the same. There are several perspectives and standards for measuring the validity. I found this chapter helpful in my understanding of qualitative research in that it identifies standards that inform whether or not your research findings are accurate—do they truly capture what the participants reported or are they the researchers’ own version of what was gathered in interviews. These standards also inform whether or not the research is trustworthy. Words such as transferability, authenticity, dependability, confirmability actually make sense to me as a way to describe the quantitative equivalent to internal/external validation, reliability, and objectivity. With qualitative research it is hard for me to understand how one person’s observations, interpretations, and conclusions are essentially “valid”— a sense of checks and balances if you will is needed to give the research credibility. Time spent in the field, thick description, and triangulation of data are among the ways to make sure that findings are transferable and essentially credible.
In grounded theory, which I focus on since that is the approach I am utilizing in my project, the suggested criteria used to judge the quality of the research, according to Strauss and Corbin (1990), is comprised of seven items. I like the way these criterion flow beginning with identifying how the original sample was collected and on what grounds. This captures the essence of the research at its preliminary moment, before the researcher has collected data and identified categories or themes. Then once themes are identified, the criterion suggest that one seeks to understand what events, incidents, and actions specifically point to some of the categories. I especially appreciate the 6th criterion that asks what hypotheses pertained to the relationship among categories and on what grounds were these hypotheses formulated and tested. This holds the researcher accountable and it is advised that discrepancies are accounted for as well as an explanation of how they affect the hypotheses. While there is plenty of room for interpretation, these standards provide the researcher with benchmarks that ensure a sound study and an opportunity to include and discuss the criteria in the final write-up.
MY FRESHMAN YEAR (Ch. 6-7, Afterward)
Summary of Chapters 6, 7, and Afterward
Chapter 6 of Nathan’s My Freshman Year was the last chapter of her actual research and time in the field. She discusses the cultural traditions of college/campus life and summarizes the culture in terms of how students navigate and manage college as an art. First outlining “classic” American college culture and the male experience, Nathan recounts the impact of peer influence as a measure of success and that the cultural codes expressed in eighteenth and nineteenth century college life are remarkably similar to the culture of the twenty-first century. The first notion of managing college is “time management.” “The key to succeeding at college is effort and good planning.” Yet Nathan found that the juggling wasn’t between preparing for courses and studying for exams, rather it was “controlling college by shaping schedules, taming professors, and limiting workload.”
In this sense, students arrange their schedules to accommodate their lifestyle as opposed to changing their lifestyle to accommodate a busy academic schedule. This means building in social activities, club involvement, and selecting courses that fit a student’s needs either by way of time of course offerings or courses’ levels of demand. Similarly, Nathan’s observations revealed “you can get what you want from classes by establishing and using a personal relationship with your teachers.” Placating to the teachers’ ideals and completing assignments that reflect the teacher’s mindset gives them what they want—this was among the relationship advice espoused by students. Doing what’s necessary was one of the way students regulate their workload. Nathan uses mostly research and statistics to convey the message here that students are often cultured to “ditch” class, strategically cut corners by only studying for and reading materials that student’s will be tested on, and partake in questionable forms of “cheating.” Her findings indicated that most students viewed academic integrity through blurred lines and vague definitions. She concludes the chapter by examining seniors’ ability to move through the college scene successfully having in some fashion employed the strategies discussed.
In chapter 7, Nathan reflects on her transition both in the student experience as a professor and her transition back into her role as a professor having been a student. She answers the lingering questions that colleagues, and essentially readers, have about her personal learning and the implications that her findings have on higher education and in the future. She refers to the shared ignorance that teachers and students possess as they encounter and sometimes misperceive the other’s world. Nathan discusses how her experience has re-shaped how she teaches her courses and how she perceives her students inside and outside of the classroom. In terms of policy and change, Nathan offers several examples showing how “assumptions that do not reflect the reality of student life can lead to weak analyses, bad policy, or ineffective solutions to problems.” College is characterized as a rite of passage and the behaviors described in preceding chapters shape what is known as college culture. Students at this juncture, suspend normal rules of society in an effort to explore their identities, grapple with the generation’s questions, and look to their future in curiosity. This chapter ends with the notion that college culture is deeply rooted and influenced by society or American culture. Nathan explores the university as a business subject to the ebbs and flows of the wavering market and plummeting economy. This affects affordability on many different fronts for the university and the student alike. Nathan ends the chapter with highlighting the conflicting messages that institutions send to students about what it means to be educated—career skills and money-focused benefits verses the importance of humility, tolerance, self-criticism, and the wise use of power.
The afterword provides the reader with a behind the scenes account of the author’s research. Nathan discusses the ethical boundaries she encroached upon when she reached the writing portion of her research. Relinquishing all professional responsibilities, Nathan underwent the transformation to become a student in all senses of the term. She unveils key moments where she disclosed her identity for the sake of reciprocating the vulnerability she encountered with other students in specific settings. Many of her conversations and gleanings, while trendy and significant in understanding student culture, were out of the confines of what was ethical to use for her book. Under the premise that she was a student, there were many opportunities for her to put down her notes and simply be a student knowing well that she would not be able to incorporate them into her publication.
Reflections and Analysis
Chapter 6
I found Nathan’s observation and analysis in Chapter 6, The Art of College Management, to be very intriguing. At first I was skeptical of her conclusions about what contributes to students’ abilities to be successful in college. I found myself wondering, and actually wrote down at the end of the chapter, what about other factors that contribute to academic and overall college success? How does she define success, how is success generally defined? I was concerned that her conclusions were isolated and narrowed down to her observations and experiences within the field, which the were, but I mean in the sense that she collected the very bare and raw material necessary to conclude that it all boils down to time management, the perfect schedule, the care and handling of professors, any only doing what’s necessary in terms of course workload. In other words, I wondered if she had made hypotheses or came to a set of conclusions on her own and then in self-fulfilling prophecy looked for examples, information, and findings that confirmed her initial perceptions. Not to say that her perceptions were false necessarily, I agreed with much of what she described, but it just seemed as though her findings supported her predictions as opposed to the other way around.
However, after skimming through the chapter again and thinking about it, I feel a little differently. Much of this may be due to the fact that it had been a month or so since I had read the preceding chapters and my initial understanding of her style of writing and her observations had swayed after much of our online threaded discussions about her study in general. I must say, now, though that even when I initially read through this chapter I more or less agreed with her observations about how students negotiated their lives at college. Whether she came to these conclusions initially or after much time spent in the field, I appreciated her exploration of college culture. I found myself nodding agreement either having experienced some of the strategies myself as a college student or know plenty of students on my own campus who execute them in the same way. Time management is absolutely less about how to schedule in adequate time to study and prepare for class (in my undergraduate career of course) and more about how can one fit that activity or social opportunity in an already packed schedule. I found it most interesting when Nathan observed that at AnyU “the university had designated no unscheduled hours during the week when meetings, lectures, film series, or other event could be held without interference.” Balancing courses and shaping the perfect schedule is absolutely an art. I don’t know about treating professors in a friendly manner results in better understanding and more forgiveness later, but I wouldn’t put it past a college student. Doing what is necessary for class is necessary to keep that life balance that Nathan speaks of as the key to success. However, attendance, preparation, and ideals on cheating have risen to new fashions that I could not relate with. Perhaps I was the student with the guilty conscience who graduated with a halo over my head. By the end of the chapter I still wondered about other factors that may or may not contribute to student success like environment, upbringing, natural intelligence, learned study habits, emotionally stability, major selection, motivation for college. But at the same time, those didn’t get at the “culture” that Nathan describes, those are the individual characteristics that each student brings to the general college culture and college experience. So suffice it to say, that I appreciated and agreed with Nathan’s analysis in this chapter.
Chapter 7
Nathan’s actual observation and field experience had more or less finished by chapter 7, which I was not expecting. I was just getting into the book, her style, her experience, and beginning to feel as if I was right there beside her and suddenly she is reflecting on her experience and relating it back to her initial role as a professor first. I really appreciated her newfound respect and understanding of the student experience and I agree with her when she says that more teachers could see students and student culture from “the other side” in order to realize their students’ perceptions and ways of navigating the college scene.
One thing that stands out to me was that Nathan mentioned how “most professors have no idea what a dorm room looks like, or about the routes of the campus bus system, or the cost of books, tuition, and housing. Most students have no understanding of faculty rank, how the university actually functions, or how professors advance in their careers. They [students] have little appreciation for the after-hours work that goes into staging the course they are taking, and no inking of what teach are required to do beside teach.” I find this to be incredibly fascinating because while this may seem like a two-way street in terms of understanding the others’ experience, it’s not. Simply put, at one point ALL professors were college students and at no point were students were ever professors. So it is does not seem fair when Nathan says “it is easy to see students as irresponsible, deceitful, and self-indulgent, just as it is easy to see teachers as officious, unkind, and self-important.” Why is it that professors completely forget what its like to be a student, much in the same way that parents forget what its like to be a child or a teenager? Furthermore, professors are often shocked or disappointed by students’ behavior that Nathan describes as purely college culture. While in chapter 6 Nathan described student’s behavior as negative and a discourse, in chapter 7 she justifies it, saying that students are generally good, the majority do not cheat or take the easy way out, and that “the actual experience of individual students is much richer than the normative expressions of student culture.” While I appreciate her journey and exploration of her own alienation as a professor, I don’t know that I would give students quite the benefit of the doubt. While culture is grounded in many things, including societal influence, market fluctuations, generational differences, etc, and is rather difficult to change, I don’t feel its appropriate to attribute all behavior good and bad to “college culture” without scrutiny and reflection of one’s role in changing or shifting the culture. I hear that a lot at my own institution, many individuals attribute student’s negative behavior to the “culture” and that somehow dismisses their responsibility in facilitating change. While the inclination is to, as Nathan says, address the negatives in student culture with a frontal attack-- that is not the answer either. In fact Nathan hits it head on when she says “I believe that policy works best when it reflects a positive regard for the judgment of those it seeks to influence and a respect for the resiliency of the culture it wishes to change.”
Afterward
After reading through the chapters, discussing much of her work through threaded discussions, and understanding her own learning throughout the process, I completely appreciated this text. I thought it was very interesting that most of her learning and interpretation came during the writing process, not during her actual time in the field. This chapter really conveys the “behind the scenes” aspects of her research; I wish she had expanded more on this. It occurred to me that there were so many aspects of the research project in general that she hadn’t given a great deal of consideration until the moment or the necessity to, presented itself. For example, navigating the reaction of and her relationship with students who might read the finished product and find themselves in her work. She more or less figured she would deal with it when the time came.
This chapter also helped me in understanding her shift in writing from the first 5 chapters and the 6th chapter. Her descriptions in the first chapters were so rich and full of detail. Her insights were supported by student comments, dialogue in and out of class, and the plethora of notes she collected as a result of conversations in the hall, in class, and through wall postings. It was almost as if her research agenda was front-loaded with a majority of her insights gathered during the first semester. Then in chapter 6, her descriptions of actual events were less forthcoming as compared to her observations of student behavior in general and her interpretation of those behaviors or snippets of quotes. However, in the afterward she explained the difference. While valuable information was gathered through spontaneous conversations and out-of-class gatherings, it was all under the precept that she was a student and therefore felt that it was unethical to use any of the information from these accounts in her writing. The reality was that anyone she quoted and the interviews to which she referred were all conducted with informed consent and disclosure of her identity as a researcher. In the end, I didn’t feel she was nearly as sneaky or deceitful as I had initially suspected her to be. This chapter is very helpful in mediating the internal conflicts one may encounter as they wrap their mind around her experience as a professor in a student’s world. She described three instances where she disclosed her identity, however, I wonder how that confines her research slightly. Students talk! Even when they tell you they don’t, they do. I would be skeptical to assume that the small groups and select individuals that were told maintained total confidentiality. Is it ethical to disclose to some and not others? For the students that she developed relationships with and whom she encountered later, how were they not violated to learn about her research and the fact that she was a professor? I almost think she would have fared better to remain completely anonymous even throughout the publishing process. Waiting a year or two did not suffice in my opinion. Over all, however, Nathan wrote an excellent story and captured the true essence, in my opinion, of college students, the college culture, and the college experience!
Summary of Chapter 10
Creswell touches on the importance for researchers to understand the knowledge that is gained from visiting with participants, asking questions to elicit meaning, and spending hours in the culture and in the field. In an effort to “check” this knowledge one must seek to validate the account and determine by whose standards this validation is suitable.
Validation and reliability in qualitative research vary in terms of perspective, definition, and procedure. Creswell explores the literature on validation and summarizes each of the major findings indicating that some writers use qualitative equivalents to quantitative methods of validation, some writers contend that qualitative validation requires more natural and fluid terms. In some cases, writers replace the use of the word validation with such words as credibility and utilize a different set of standards to judge research. Further still are writers whom conceptualize qualitative research through a postmodern frame. Other writers use an interpretive approach, draw on metaphors through the image of a crystal, or have little use for validation altogether. Creswell considers these perspectives and focuses on eight strategies that are employed by researchers and recommends, “qualitative researchers engage in at least two of them in any given study.”
Reliability, much like validation, can be addressed in many ways in qualitative research, mostly through detailed field notes, quality transcriptions, and through “blind” coding and intercoder agreements. Establishing the quality of qualitative research depends on the variety of standards that exist and vary within the research community. Such standards can be through a procedural/methodological perspective, a postmodern perspective, and an interpretive perspective. Creswell further explores how these standards can be utilized with each of the five approaches to qualitative research. In addition to the standards discussed through Creswell’s exploration of the literature, he also offers his own set of standards by which a researcher can judge his or her work.
Reflections and Analysis
As open to interpretation as I find qualitative research to be in general, it doesn’t surprise me that the concept of validity and reliability is the same. There are several perspectives and standards for measuring the validity. I found this chapter helpful in my understanding of qualitative research in that it identifies standards that inform whether or not your research findings are accurate—do they truly capture what the participants reported or are they the researchers’ own version of what was gathered in interviews. These standards also inform whether or not the research is trustworthy. Words such as transferability, authenticity, dependability, confirmability actually make sense to me as a way to describe the quantitative equivalent to internal/external validation, reliability, and objectivity. With qualitative research it is hard for me to understand how one person’s observations, interpretations, and conclusions are essentially “valid”— a sense of checks and balances if you will is needed to give the research credibility. Time spent in the field, thick description, and triangulation of data are among the ways to make sure that findings are transferable and essentially credible.
In grounded theory, which I focus on since that is the approach I am utilizing in my project, the suggested criteria used to judge the quality of the research, according to Strauss and Corbin (1990), is comprised of seven items. I like the way these criterion flow beginning with identifying how the original sample was collected and on what grounds. This captures the essence of the research at its preliminary moment, before the researcher has collected data and identified categories or themes. Then once themes are identified, the criterion suggest that one seeks to understand what events, incidents, and actions specifically point to some of the categories. I especially appreciate the 6th criterion that asks what hypotheses pertained to the relationship among categories and on what grounds were these hypotheses formulated and tested. This holds the researcher accountable and it is advised that discrepancies are accounted for as well as an explanation of how they affect the hypotheses. While there is plenty of room for interpretation, these standards provide the researcher with benchmarks that ensure a sound study and an opportunity to include and discuss the criteria in the final write-up.
MY FRESHMAN YEAR (Ch. 6-7, Afterward)
Summary of Chapters 6, 7, and Afterward
Chapter 6 of Nathan’s My Freshman Year was the last chapter of her actual research and time in the field. She discusses the cultural traditions of college/campus life and summarizes the culture in terms of how students navigate and manage college as an art. First outlining “classic” American college culture and the male experience, Nathan recounts the impact of peer influence as a measure of success and that the cultural codes expressed in eighteenth and nineteenth century college life are remarkably similar to the culture of the twenty-first century. The first notion of managing college is “time management.” “The key to succeeding at college is effort and good planning.” Yet Nathan found that the juggling wasn’t between preparing for courses and studying for exams, rather it was “controlling college by shaping schedules, taming professors, and limiting workload.”
In this sense, students arrange their schedules to accommodate their lifestyle as opposed to changing their lifestyle to accommodate a busy academic schedule. This means building in social activities, club involvement, and selecting courses that fit a student’s needs either by way of time of course offerings or courses’ levels of demand. Similarly, Nathan’s observations revealed “you can get what you want from classes by establishing and using a personal relationship with your teachers.” Placating to the teachers’ ideals and completing assignments that reflect the teacher’s mindset gives them what they want—this was among the relationship advice espoused by students. Doing what’s necessary was one of the way students regulate their workload. Nathan uses mostly research and statistics to convey the message here that students are often cultured to “ditch” class, strategically cut corners by only studying for and reading materials that student’s will be tested on, and partake in questionable forms of “cheating.” Her findings indicated that most students viewed academic integrity through blurred lines and vague definitions. She concludes the chapter by examining seniors’ ability to move through the college scene successfully having in some fashion employed the strategies discussed.
In chapter 7, Nathan reflects on her transition both in the student experience as a professor and her transition back into her role as a professor having been a student. She answers the lingering questions that colleagues, and essentially readers, have about her personal learning and the implications that her findings have on higher education and in the future. She refers to the shared ignorance that teachers and students possess as they encounter and sometimes misperceive the other’s world. Nathan discusses how her experience has re-shaped how she teaches her courses and how she perceives her students inside and outside of the classroom. In terms of policy and change, Nathan offers several examples showing how “assumptions that do not reflect the reality of student life can lead to weak analyses, bad policy, or ineffective solutions to problems.” College is characterized as a rite of passage and the behaviors described in preceding chapters shape what is known as college culture. Students at this juncture, suspend normal rules of society in an effort to explore their identities, grapple with the generation’s questions, and look to their future in curiosity. This chapter ends with the notion that college culture is deeply rooted and influenced by society or American culture. Nathan explores the university as a business subject to the ebbs and flows of the wavering market and plummeting economy. This affects affordability on many different fronts for the university and the student alike. Nathan ends the chapter with highlighting the conflicting messages that institutions send to students about what it means to be educated—career skills and money-focused benefits verses the importance of humility, tolerance, self-criticism, and the wise use of power.
The afterword provides the reader with a behind the scenes account of the author’s research. Nathan discusses the ethical boundaries she encroached upon when she reached the writing portion of her research. Relinquishing all professional responsibilities, Nathan underwent the transformation to become a student in all senses of the term. She unveils key moments where she disclosed her identity for the sake of reciprocating the vulnerability she encountered with other students in specific settings. Many of her conversations and gleanings, while trendy and significant in understanding student culture, were out of the confines of what was ethical to use for her book. Under the premise that she was a student, there were many opportunities for her to put down her notes and simply be a student knowing well that she would not be able to incorporate them into her publication.
Reflections and Analysis
Chapter 6
I found Nathan’s observation and analysis in Chapter 6, The Art of College Management, to be very intriguing. At first I was skeptical of her conclusions about what contributes to students’ abilities to be successful in college. I found myself wondering, and actually wrote down at the end of the chapter, what about other factors that contribute to academic and overall college success? How does she define success, how is success generally defined? I was concerned that her conclusions were isolated and narrowed down to her observations and experiences within the field, which the were, but I mean in the sense that she collected the very bare and raw material necessary to conclude that it all boils down to time management, the perfect schedule, the care and handling of professors, any only doing what’s necessary in terms of course workload. In other words, I wondered if she had made hypotheses or came to a set of conclusions on her own and then in self-fulfilling prophecy looked for examples, information, and findings that confirmed her initial perceptions. Not to say that her perceptions were false necessarily, I agreed with much of what she described, but it just seemed as though her findings supported her predictions as opposed to the other way around.
However, after skimming through the chapter again and thinking about it, I feel a little differently. Much of this may be due to the fact that it had been a month or so since I had read the preceding chapters and my initial understanding of her style of writing and her observations had swayed after much of our online threaded discussions about her study in general. I must say, now, though that even when I initially read through this chapter I more or less agreed with her observations about how students negotiated their lives at college. Whether she came to these conclusions initially or after much time spent in the field, I appreciated her exploration of college culture. I found myself nodding agreement either having experienced some of the strategies myself as a college student or know plenty of students on my own campus who execute them in the same way. Time management is absolutely less about how to schedule in adequate time to study and prepare for class (in my undergraduate career of course) and more about how can one fit that activity or social opportunity in an already packed schedule. I found it most interesting when Nathan observed that at AnyU “the university had designated no unscheduled hours during the week when meetings, lectures, film series, or other event could be held without interference.” Balancing courses and shaping the perfect schedule is absolutely an art. I don’t know about treating professors in a friendly manner results in better understanding and more forgiveness later, but I wouldn’t put it past a college student. Doing what is necessary for class is necessary to keep that life balance that Nathan speaks of as the key to success. However, attendance, preparation, and ideals on cheating have risen to new fashions that I could not relate with. Perhaps I was the student with the guilty conscience who graduated with a halo over my head. By the end of the chapter I still wondered about other factors that may or may not contribute to student success like environment, upbringing, natural intelligence, learned study habits, emotionally stability, major selection, motivation for college. But at the same time, those didn’t get at the “culture” that Nathan describes, those are the individual characteristics that each student brings to the general college culture and college experience. So suffice it to say, that I appreciated and agreed with Nathan’s analysis in this chapter.
Chapter 7
Nathan’s actual observation and field experience had more or less finished by chapter 7, which I was not expecting. I was just getting into the book, her style, her experience, and beginning to feel as if I was right there beside her and suddenly she is reflecting on her experience and relating it back to her initial role as a professor first. I really appreciated her newfound respect and understanding of the student experience and I agree with her when she says that more teachers could see students and student culture from “the other side” in order to realize their students’ perceptions and ways of navigating the college scene.
One thing that stands out to me was that Nathan mentioned how “most professors have no idea what a dorm room looks like, or about the routes of the campus bus system, or the cost of books, tuition, and housing. Most students have no understanding of faculty rank, how the university actually functions, or how professors advance in their careers. They [students] have little appreciation for the after-hours work that goes into staging the course they are taking, and no inking of what teach are required to do beside teach.” I find this to be incredibly fascinating because while this may seem like a two-way street in terms of understanding the others’ experience, it’s not. Simply put, at one point ALL professors were college students and at no point were students were ever professors. So it is does not seem fair when Nathan says “it is easy to see students as irresponsible, deceitful, and self-indulgent, just as it is easy to see teachers as officious, unkind, and self-important.” Why is it that professors completely forget what its like to be a student, much in the same way that parents forget what its like to be a child or a teenager? Furthermore, professors are often shocked or disappointed by students’ behavior that Nathan describes as purely college culture. While in chapter 6 Nathan described student’s behavior as negative and a discourse, in chapter 7 she justifies it, saying that students are generally good, the majority do not cheat or take the easy way out, and that “the actual experience of individual students is much richer than the normative expressions of student culture.” While I appreciate her journey and exploration of her own alienation as a professor, I don’t know that I would give students quite the benefit of the doubt. While culture is grounded in many things, including societal influence, market fluctuations, generational differences, etc, and is rather difficult to change, I don’t feel its appropriate to attribute all behavior good and bad to “college culture” without scrutiny and reflection of one’s role in changing or shifting the culture. I hear that a lot at my own institution, many individuals attribute student’s negative behavior to the “culture” and that somehow dismisses their responsibility in facilitating change. While the inclination is to, as Nathan says, address the negatives in student culture with a frontal attack-- that is not the answer either. In fact Nathan hits it head on when she says “I believe that policy works best when it reflects a positive regard for the judgment of those it seeks to influence and a respect for the resiliency of the culture it wishes to change.”
Afterward
After reading through the chapters, discussing much of her work through threaded discussions, and understanding her own learning throughout the process, I completely appreciated this text. I thought it was very interesting that most of her learning and interpretation came during the writing process, not during her actual time in the field. This chapter really conveys the “behind the scenes” aspects of her research; I wish she had expanded more on this. It occurred to me that there were so many aspects of the research project in general that she hadn’t given a great deal of consideration until the moment or the necessity to, presented itself. For example, navigating the reaction of and her relationship with students who might read the finished product and find themselves in her work. She more or less figured she would deal with it when the time came.
This chapter also helped me in understanding her shift in writing from the first 5 chapters and the 6th chapter. Her descriptions in the first chapters were so rich and full of detail. Her insights were supported by student comments, dialogue in and out of class, and the plethora of notes she collected as a result of conversations in the hall, in class, and through wall postings. It was almost as if her research agenda was front-loaded with a majority of her insights gathered during the first semester. Then in chapter 6, her descriptions of actual events were less forthcoming as compared to her observations of student behavior in general and her interpretation of those behaviors or snippets of quotes. However, in the afterward she explained the difference. While valuable information was gathered through spontaneous conversations and out-of-class gatherings, it was all under the precept that she was a student and therefore felt that it was unethical to use any of the information from these accounts in her writing. The reality was that anyone she quoted and the interviews to which she referred were all conducted with informed consent and disclosure of her identity as a researcher. In the end, I didn’t feel she was nearly as sneaky or deceitful as I had initially suspected her to be. This chapter is very helpful in mediating the internal conflicts one may encounter as they wrap their mind around her experience as a professor in a student’s world. She described three instances where she disclosed her identity, however, I wonder how that confines her research slightly. Students talk! Even when they tell you they don’t, they do. I would be skeptical to assume that the small groups and select individuals that were told maintained total confidentiality. Is it ethical to disclose to some and not others? For the students that she developed relationships with and whom she encountered later, how were they not violated to learn about her research and the fact that she was a professor? I almost think she would have fared better to remain completely anonymous even throughout the publishing process. Waiting a year or two did not suffice in my opinion. Over all, however, Nathan wrote an excellent story and captured the true essence, in my opinion, of college students, the college culture, and the college experience!
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
Reflective Reading Log #3
CRESWELL (Ch. 9) - Writing a Qualitative Study
Summary of Chapter 9
Chapter 9 of Creswell focused specifically on the writing of a qualitative study. The narrative report is what brings together the whole study and Creswell describes the necessary pieces that should ultimately be considered and incorporated into a qualitative study. He begins with exploring several rhetorical issues that deserve attention regardless of the approach. Reflexivity and representation offers the writer ways to consider how their writing is reflective of their own culture-based interpretations as well as consider the ways in which their writing can impact the reader and the participant. Audience is an essential consideration as many researchers often tailor their writing to match or fit the audience. Encoding is also directly related the audience and emphasizes the importance of language in shaping the text. The style of writing should invite the reader to be a part of the study. The voice of participants in brought in through the use of quotes. Creswell describes the uses of three types of quotes including short eye-catching quotations intended to signify different perspectives, embedded quotes intended to “prepare a reader for a shift in emphasis or display a point” (Creswell, p. 182), and longer quotations used to convey more complex understandings.
Creswell then discusses each of the five approaches and examined overall rhetorical structure and embedded rhetorical structure. The former is the general format or organization of the study at large and the latter is the various strategies and techniques employed in the study. Each approach offers a unique set of structural detail based on the different data analysis procedures and variability of each approach. Throughout the discussion of each approach, Creswell provides the reader with literature and examples of the strategies employed and recommended guidelines for structure. Creswell concludes the chapter with a brief comparison of narrative structures emphasizing why and how structure is directly related to and different because of the nature of its approach.
Reflections and Analysis
This chapter challenged me, once again, to ask myself questions about the research writing process that I had not considered previously. For example, considering the audience in my writing. Alex has mentioned this on several occasions, but for whatever reason I was not thinking about who my audience was that I should consider in my writing. Creswell identified four potential audiences and presented how researchers often revise the structure of their narrative to fit and elicit the best response from the selected audience.
Similarly, it is important to also consider the writer’s responsibility in writing. Creswell presented some great questions that a writer should think about considering “how we write is a reflection of our own interpretation based on the cultural, social, gender, class, and personal politics that we bring to research” (p. 179). For example, have I considered how my words could be used for progressive, conservative, and repressive social politics, or, what are my political reflexivities that need to come into my report? Understanding how one approaches the writing process and the content of the research will help the writer to shape and accept how the data will be presented and interpreted. Furthermore, it is interesting to think about how the writing process not only impacts the reader, but the participant(s) as well. How they will respond, whether or not they will be marginalized or offended, and how they perceive the interpretation—how might this differ from the perceptions of the readers? These are great things to consider in qualitative research and I appreciate Creswell’s attention to them.
I was relieved to find that there is some amount of structure and certainly strategy in qualitative research writing— albeit open to interpretation and the stylistic preferences of both the researcher and the selected research approach. Nonetheless, the overall rhetorical structure indicates the general direction or set-up of the study and the “core elements” that should perhaps be included with each approach. I appreciated Creswell’s suggested readings and recommendations to literature that provide guidelines or suggestions for the overall structure within each approach. The embedded rhetorical structure is much more fluid and offers maximum flexibility in structure. These are more or less the strategies that a writer employs within a research approach throughout the written report, adhering to the core elements of the overall structure of course. Here, Creswell explored various research articles and studies that employed various strategies and provided an example.
I don’t think I expected each approach to be so drastically different in terms of structure. Some approaches share similar aspects, but over all each approach provides a unique way of reporting information that is quite specific the aspects and expectations of that approach. For example, we are reading about an ethnographic writing style through the Nathan book, but in Creswell, he describes the several forms that ethnographies take such as “Tales.” These range from the often-used realist tales, confessional tales, impressionistic tales, to the seldom-used critical tales, formalist tales, literary tales, and jointly told tales. That’s just the overall structure; the embedded structure presents ethnographic information using strategies such as metaphors and tropes. Different, but very fascinating.
MY FRESHMAN YEAR (Ch. 4-5)
Summary of Chapters 4 and 5
Nathan opened up chapter four by exploring her gravitation towards other “partial outsiders” and understanding how culture can often go unnoticed by its natives. Using thirteen formal interviews and several informal conversations, Nathan explored the perceptions of several students from international cultures on American culture and U.S. college life. The resistance these students faced and the interesting aspects of American life that they each encountered in different ways are very telling of higher education in the U.S. Through individual experiences, Nathan described how many of the student’s first encountered American students and their perceptions that American friendliness is only a surface thing. The lack of interest that American students had in international students was replaced by the comfort international students felt with US minority students, American students who were well traveled or who had been exchange students themselves, and Americans students with whom they found common interests or hobbies. The idea of relationships and friendships looked very different for international students as compared to American students and exposed the true individualistic nature of American students. Nathan went on to describe how international students perceive the American attitude and rituals within the classroom setting. While the faculty was more involved in students’ lives and choice was abounding, American students were less respectful in general, and course content was usually less rigorous according to most international students. Nathan ended the chapter with a description of the ignorance that American students possess in terms of misinformation and lack of information about other countries and about themselves.
Chapter five focused on the classroom setting and the nature of academics at AnyU. After describing the unconscious norms and acceptable classroom behavior, Nathan depicted the rituals of the classroom and the level of teacher-student interaction, or the lack thereof. Her notion of stated opinions as opposed to class debates reflected how students opted out of the commentary process in class discussions. Nathan’s observations revealed that students employed boundaries such that outside of the classroom, students did not “talk among themselves about the ideas presented in their classes or the issues of the day” (p. 97). Nathan investigated this notion further by collecting data in the residence halls. Her findings revealed that students discussed topics such as body image, relationships, personal histories, entertainment, alcohol, drugs, and sex—nothing related to class content or academics. Nathan described how students were more compelled to stay in college because of the social community they were a part of, not because of the learning that took place in the classroom. Nathan concluded the chapter by exploring one course in particular that was popular among students. She found the course’s unconventional technique and socially acceptable content, “sexuality” to align with what students desire in a learning environment or community.
Reflections and Analysis
Chapters 4 and 5 were hard to swallow considering I am an “American” student who experienced the traditional American college and likely exhibited many of the annoying dominant culture behaviors that Nathan talks about throughout both of these chapters. Nothing is more sobering that listening to the many accounts of international students only to realize that they ALL say the same thing about American students.
I thought it was interesting in chapter four to find that international students found it easier to get to know US minority students than white students not because they could relate easier to them but because they found that minority students were more interested in the lives of the international students, unlike the white students who never asked and did not seem interested. Similarly, that in order to relate to American students, international students felt that they had to find areas of interest or hobbies in common with one another.
It was even more disturbing to learn about how students behave in the classroom, what they discuss outside of the classroom, and how out of touch students are from academia when they are not seated in a classroom. I still can’t believe students attribute most of their learning to the experiences they have outside of the classroom, in social groups, and with their peers. They enjoy college not to learn, but to be a part of the social community that only exists in college.
Content aside, these two chapters captured the essence of ethnographic writing. It was clear in these chapters how the themes emerged and were told as a story, supported with vignettes and quotes. In chapter four, “As Others See Us” Nathan explored why and how she was drawn to international students and outsiders and how her conversations with these students were “illuminating” and led to the addition of 13 formal interviews and several informal conversations. The stories told by these students and the flow of Nathan’s writing really had an impact on me as the reader in deep ways. I found myself writing notes and reacting aloud to some of the perceptions that these students had, I’m sure a reaction that Nathan was intending.
Ironically, Creswell discussed in Chapter 9 the uses of three types of quotes including short eye-catching quotations intended to signify different perspectives, embedded quotes intended to “prepare a reader for a shift in emphasis or display a point” (Creswell, p. 182), and longer quotations used to convey more complex understandings. Nathan employed all three of these types throughout both chapters, though more so in chapter four. Throughout her analysis she embedded quotes from international students make her point and contribute to the theme. When essential, she would use long indented quotations indicating a student’s story or perspective. I would be curious to know how she sifted through all of the data and chose what seemed like the most impactful accounts, quotes, and stories among the dozens she encountered. Her level of focus both to the unveiling theme and description of supporting events was clearly depicted and really allowed the reader to jump into the story with her. I feel like I was there listening to these students and experiencing “the classroom” as she did.
I appreciated Nathan’s strategy in Chapter five in exploring academics, conversation, and “real” learning. This chapter seemed to move through a process where one observation led to the exploration of another. She first began with exploring classrooms norms and lack of participation; this led to her curiosity about conversations and dialogue in the classroom, which then led to her curiosity of conversations and dialogue outside of the classroom. Finally recognizing that virtually no conversations concerned class content or learned material, she pursued more of what students really learn in college, realizing “how little intellectual life seemed to matter in college” (p. 100). Finally in her analysis she touched on “The Perfect Class” and explored what made students want to take a particular course, learn the content, or participate openly and willingly during class. Ironically, and amazingly, she tied it all back to “community” and realized that students learned when the course reflected their culture and paralleled their social world.
Summary of Chapter 9
Chapter 9 of Creswell focused specifically on the writing of a qualitative study. The narrative report is what brings together the whole study and Creswell describes the necessary pieces that should ultimately be considered and incorporated into a qualitative study. He begins with exploring several rhetorical issues that deserve attention regardless of the approach. Reflexivity and representation offers the writer ways to consider how their writing is reflective of their own culture-based interpretations as well as consider the ways in which their writing can impact the reader and the participant. Audience is an essential consideration as many researchers often tailor their writing to match or fit the audience. Encoding is also directly related the audience and emphasizes the importance of language in shaping the text. The style of writing should invite the reader to be a part of the study. The voice of participants in brought in through the use of quotes. Creswell describes the uses of three types of quotes including short eye-catching quotations intended to signify different perspectives, embedded quotes intended to “prepare a reader for a shift in emphasis or display a point” (Creswell, p. 182), and longer quotations used to convey more complex understandings.
Creswell then discusses each of the five approaches and examined overall rhetorical structure and embedded rhetorical structure. The former is the general format or organization of the study at large and the latter is the various strategies and techniques employed in the study. Each approach offers a unique set of structural detail based on the different data analysis procedures and variability of each approach. Throughout the discussion of each approach, Creswell provides the reader with literature and examples of the strategies employed and recommended guidelines for structure. Creswell concludes the chapter with a brief comparison of narrative structures emphasizing why and how structure is directly related to and different because of the nature of its approach.
Reflections and Analysis
This chapter challenged me, once again, to ask myself questions about the research writing process that I had not considered previously. For example, considering the audience in my writing. Alex has mentioned this on several occasions, but for whatever reason I was not thinking about who my audience was that I should consider in my writing. Creswell identified four potential audiences and presented how researchers often revise the structure of their narrative to fit and elicit the best response from the selected audience.
Similarly, it is important to also consider the writer’s responsibility in writing. Creswell presented some great questions that a writer should think about considering “how we write is a reflection of our own interpretation based on the cultural, social, gender, class, and personal politics that we bring to research” (p. 179). For example, have I considered how my words could be used for progressive, conservative, and repressive social politics, or, what are my political reflexivities that need to come into my report? Understanding how one approaches the writing process and the content of the research will help the writer to shape and accept how the data will be presented and interpreted. Furthermore, it is interesting to think about how the writing process not only impacts the reader, but the participant(s) as well. How they will respond, whether or not they will be marginalized or offended, and how they perceive the interpretation—how might this differ from the perceptions of the readers? These are great things to consider in qualitative research and I appreciate Creswell’s attention to them.
I was relieved to find that there is some amount of structure and certainly strategy in qualitative research writing— albeit open to interpretation and the stylistic preferences of both the researcher and the selected research approach. Nonetheless, the overall rhetorical structure indicates the general direction or set-up of the study and the “core elements” that should perhaps be included with each approach. I appreciated Creswell’s suggested readings and recommendations to literature that provide guidelines or suggestions for the overall structure within each approach. The embedded rhetorical structure is much more fluid and offers maximum flexibility in structure. These are more or less the strategies that a writer employs within a research approach throughout the written report, adhering to the core elements of the overall structure of course. Here, Creswell explored various research articles and studies that employed various strategies and provided an example.
I don’t think I expected each approach to be so drastically different in terms of structure. Some approaches share similar aspects, but over all each approach provides a unique way of reporting information that is quite specific the aspects and expectations of that approach. For example, we are reading about an ethnographic writing style through the Nathan book, but in Creswell, he describes the several forms that ethnographies take such as “Tales.” These range from the often-used realist tales, confessional tales, impressionistic tales, to the seldom-used critical tales, formalist tales, literary tales, and jointly told tales. That’s just the overall structure; the embedded structure presents ethnographic information using strategies such as metaphors and tropes. Different, but very fascinating.
MY FRESHMAN YEAR (Ch. 4-5)
Summary of Chapters 4 and 5
Nathan opened up chapter four by exploring her gravitation towards other “partial outsiders” and understanding how culture can often go unnoticed by its natives. Using thirteen formal interviews and several informal conversations, Nathan explored the perceptions of several students from international cultures on American culture and U.S. college life. The resistance these students faced and the interesting aspects of American life that they each encountered in different ways are very telling of higher education in the U.S. Through individual experiences, Nathan described how many of the student’s first encountered American students and their perceptions that American friendliness is only a surface thing. The lack of interest that American students had in international students was replaced by the comfort international students felt with US minority students, American students who were well traveled or who had been exchange students themselves, and Americans students with whom they found common interests or hobbies. The idea of relationships and friendships looked very different for international students as compared to American students and exposed the true individualistic nature of American students. Nathan went on to describe how international students perceive the American attitude and rituals within the classroom setting. While the faculty was more involved in students’ lives and choice was abounding, American students were less respectful in general, and course content was usually less rigorous according to most international students. Nathan ended the chapter with a description of the ignorance that American students possess in terms of misinformation and lack of information about other countries and about themselves.
Chapter five focused on the classroom setting and the nature of academics at AnyU. After describing the unconscious norms and acceptable classroom behavior, Nathan depicted the rituals of the classroom and the level of teacher-student interaction, or the lack thereof. Her notion of stated opinions as opposed to class debates reflected how students opted out of the commentary process in class discussions. Nathan’s observations revealed that students employed boundaries such that outside of the classroom, students did not “talk among themselves about the ideas presented in their classes or the issues of the day” (p. 97). Nathan investigated this notion further by collecting data in the residence halls. Her findings revealed that students discussed topics such as body image, relationships, personal histories, entertainment, alcohol, drugs, and sex—nothing related to class content or academics. Nathan described how students were more compelled to stay in college because of the social community they were a part of, not because of the learning that took place in the classroom. Nathan concluded the chapter by exploring one course in particular that was popular among students. She found the course’s unconventional technique and socially acceptable content, “sexuality” to align with what students desire in a learning environment or community.
Reflections and Analysis
Chapters 4 and 5 were hard to swallow considering I am an “American” student who experienced the traditional American college and likely exhibited many of the annoying dominant culture behaviors that Nathan talks about throughout both of these chapters. Nothing is more sobering that listening to the many accounts of international students only to realize that they ALL say the same thing about American students.
I thought it was interesting in chapter four to find that international students found it easier to get to know US minority students than white students not because they could relate easier to them but because they found that minority students were more interested in the lives of the international students, unlike the white students who never asked and did not seem interested. Similarly, that in order to relate to American students, international students felt that they had to find areas of interest or hobbies in common with one another.
It was even more disturbing to learn about how students behave in the classroom, what they discuss outside of the classroom, and how out of touch students are from academia when they are not seated in a classroom. I still can’t believe students attribute most of their learning to the experiences they have outside of the classroom, in social groups, and with their peers. They enjoy college not to learn, but to be a part of the social community that only exists in college.
Content aside, these two chapters captured the essence of ethnographic writing. It was clear in these chapters how the themes emerged and were told as a story, supported with vignettes and quotes. In chapter four, “As Others See Us” Nathan explored why and how she was drawn to international students and outsiders and how her conversations with these students were “illuminating” and led to the addition of 13 formal interviews and several informal conversations. The stories told by these students and the flow of Nathan’s writing really had an impact on me as the reader in deep ways. I found myself writing notes and reacting aloud to some of the perceptions that these students had, I’m sure a reaction that Nathan was intending.
Ironically, Creswell discussed in Chapter 9 the uses of three types of quotes including short eye-catching quotations intended to signify different perspectives, embedded quotes intended to “prepare a reader for a shift in emphasis or display a point” (Creswell, p. 182), and longer quotations used to convey more complex understandings. Nathan employed all three of these types throughout both chapters, though more so in chapter four. Throughout her analysis she embedded quotes from international students make her point and contribute to the theme. When essential, she would use long indented quotations indicating a student’s story or perspective. I would be curious to know how she sifted through all of the data and chose what seemed like the most impactful accounts, quotes, and stories among the dozens she encountered. Her level of focus both to the unveiling theme and description of supporting events was clearly depicted and really allowed the reader to jump into the story with her. I feel like I was there listening to these students and experiencing “the classroom” as she did.
I appreciated Nathan’s strategy in Chapter five in exploring academics, conversation, and “real” learning. This chapter seemed to move through a process where one observation led to the exploration of another. She first began with exploring classrooms norms and lack of participation; this led to her curiosity about conversations and dialogue in the classroom, which then led to her curiosity of conversations and dialogue outside of the classroom. Finally recognizing that virtually no conversations concerned class content or learned material, she pursued more of what students really learn in college, realizing “how little intellectual life seemed to matter in college” (p. 100). Finally in her analysis she touched on “The Perfect Class” and explored what made students want to take a particular course, learn the content, or participate openly and willingly during class. Ironically, and amazingly, she tied it all back to “community” and realized that students learned when the course reflected their culture and paralleled their social world.
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Research Journal #2
Methodological Memo
It has been truly challenging trying to determine which direction I want to go with my research. While I want to understand student's perceptions about graduation and their sense of preparedness, I have found it difficult to identify a target population. It is my opinion that women (soon I will back this with research) that women feel less prepared than men for the post-college work force, non-White women may feel less prepared than White women, and first-generation non-White women likely feel less prepared than second and third-generation non-White women.
I have decided to narrow my target population to African American graduating senior women living in an honors community on campus. There are a total of 11 women living in this particular area of the residential community. I initially wanted to explore students of different ethnic background to determine if there were racial or ethnic differences in terms of students feeling prepared for graduation and the post-college workforce. However, I realized that within the scope of this research project, it is necessary to hone in on one population and focus on the experiences of the women within this particular population and to truly gain any depth of their experiences.
While in my head, I think I understand why I have selected one sub-population to work with, I realize that I haven't really examined what makes this choice purposeful. I have found it very challenging so far, in the three interviews that I have scheduled, to explain to the participant that they have been chosen for a set of particular reasons. I explain my rational for the study, I explain my ideas and desire to explore gender differences in preparedness for graduation and my interests in whether differences exist for women who are first generation college students and for women from different ethnic backgrounds. That's where I get stuck, I have a hard time explaining why I chose African American women--it's almost as if I feel like the participants assume that because I have selected an African American female population within the honors community that they are somehow less prepared or able than their peers from other ethnic backgrounds. No participant has indicated this at all, but I sense this non-verbally every time I engage in that initial conversation. I think I need to challenge myself both in terms of my presuppositions and biases consider whether these are accurate assumptions or fabricated because of my own insecurities. I think as I explore the literature more and continue to think about my study, these insights will become clearer to me.
It has been truly challenging trying to determine which direction I want to go with my research. While I want to understand student's perceptions about graduation and their sense of preparedness, I have found it difficult to identify a target population. It is my opinion that women (soon I will back this with research) that women feel less prepared than men for the post-college work force, non-White women may feel less prepared than White women, and first-generation non-White women likely feel less prepared than second and third-generation non-White women.
I have decided to narrow my target population to African American graduating senior women living in an honors community on campus. There are a total of 11 women living in this particular area of the residential community. I initially wanted to explore students of different ethnic background to determine if there were racial or ethnic differences in terms of students feeling prepared for graduation and the post-college workforce. However, I realized that within the scope of this research project, it is necessary to hone in on one population and focus on the experiences of the women within this particular population and to truly gain any depth of their experiences.
While in my head, I think I understand why I have selected one sub-population to work with, I realize that I haven't really examined what makes this choice purposeful. I have found it very challenging so far, in the three interviews that I have scheduled, to explain to the participant that they have been chosen for a set of particular reasons. I explain my rational for the study, I explain my ideas and desire to explore gender differences in preparedness for graduation and my interests in whether differences exist for women who are first generation college students and for women from different ethnic backgrounds. That's where I get stuck, I have a hard time explaining why I chose African American women--it's almost as if I feel like the participants assume that because I have selected an African American female population within the honors community that they are somehow less prepared or able than their peers from other ethnic backgrounds. No participant has indicated this at all, but I sense this non-verbally every time I engage in that initial conversation. I think I need to challenge myself both in terms of my presuppositions and biases consider whether these are accurate assumptions or fabricated because of my own insecurities. I think as I explore the literature more and continue to think about my study, these insights will become clearer to me.
Reflective Reading Log #2
CRESWELL (Ch. 8) – Data Analysis and Representation
Summary of Chapter 8
Chapter 8 of Creswell’s Qualitative Inquiry and Research Design focused on three major data analysis procedures, Madison (2005), Huberman and Miles (1994), and Wolcott (1994b). The general process of data analysis includes preparing and organizing data, using the process of coding to deduct themes from the data, using figures, tables, or a dialogue to represent the data and its themes. Creswell discusses the data analysis spiral in which the researcher is free to move “in analytic circles rather than using a fixed linear approach (p 150). The spiral begins with the organization of information or database. The researcher explores the data by reading it through multiple times creating short notes or memos of ideas. A few select categories emerge and the process moves to “describing, classifying, and interpreting” the information (p. 151). It is at this stage where codes or themes are generated, interpretations within context are developed, and the researcher is able to compare these themes to multiple databases. In the last phase, the information is presented through a table, figure, or other visual image.
Each approach follows its own set of guidelines and expectations for data analysis. While all five approaches begin with creating and all five approaches move towards reading through the text while taking notes and developing initial codes. It is the process of describing, classifying, and interpreting where each approach takes its own turn. Narrative research lacks the structure that each of the other four approaches has while grounded theory and phenomenology are the most procedurally detailed. Ethnography and case study have the have the most commonalities of any two approaches. Each approach uses distinct language and terms to describe each phase of the process that might be similar to another approach. The final product is representative of the approach and its steps involved in the analysis. Creswell ends with considering the various computer software programs that can be used to analyze the data; they provide organization, easier searching, provide deeper meaning, visualize relationships, and retrieve memos. However, these programs are expensive, require learning, separate the researcher from the data, less mobility, less accessibility, and lacking in desired features.
Reflections and Analysis
I found that chapter 8 was explanatory in terms of understanding the different procedures to data analysis, but by no means was it exhaustive. My expectations were that I would have a keen sense of how to approach the data analysis of my project using a grounded theory approach and the not quite two pages of text covering these procedures hardly did my curiosity justice. I think I was looking for examples of how the themes were extrapolated from the text transcripts and reduced to categories that explain the process of phenomenon being explored. Perhaps I was expecting too much. Creswell did explore the five approaches and how they are similar and different in terms of data analysis, especially in terms of how the data is described, how themes are categorized, and how perspectives and data are interpreted.
The data analysis spiral provided a visual representation of the steps and movement that exist and occur during the analysis process. The spiral allows the researcher to move around and focus on specific loops or steps in an effort to exhaust the necessary components of that loop before moving to the next, but with the option to move back if needed. The model gives the process purpose and meaning and identifies clearly the sequential order of the procedures. Though this tool is to be used for the purpose of understanding the general process of data analysis as the intricacies of each approach are not reflected within the spiral.
It is difficult to remain focused and attentive to each approach’s unique language, procedures, available opportunities, and outcomes. Since we are focusing on only one approach for our project, I have to be reminded that the learning comes in understanding each approach, how they are unique or similar, and in what ways are they used. I am grateful that we are reading a book on ethnography as it gives us great insight into the value of describing, analyzing, and interpreting a cultural-sharing group. This is vastly different than the saturation, open coding, axial coding, and selective coding of a grounded theory approach. An ethnographer chronologically presents the information as an observer/participant making sense of how the culture works. In grounded theory, interviews are the basis for much of the data collection. The researcher constantly returns to this data identifying a single factor and the causes of this factor in an effort to develop a story. I only recently conducted my first interview and I am currently in the transcribing phase. While during the interview I was excited as I saw potential themes that could develop, at its conclusion and after reading this chapter, I am not so confident about articulating categories confirming evidence of them within the interview. I will revisit this process in my next journal entry.
Frankly, using a computer system to track all of this information and analysis sounds as cumbersome as doing it by hand. It is hard to imagine that a machine can search and explore the text identifying themes and categories and if it does, I cannot imagine not using it. Like Creswell articulates, understanding how the program works itself and taking the time to learn it is where its true value is evident.
MY FRESHMAN YEAR (Ch. 1-3)
Summary of Chapters 1-3
This is the story of one woman, a researcher and professor, who after 15 years of teaching anthropology and AnyU, embarks on a year-long journey to immerse herself in the culture of college freshmen. Having participated in traditional cultural anthropology in remote villages across the world, she found herself increasingly confused by her students in her academic experience. In an effort to understand her students better, she felt it necessary to become one, not simply observe them as a professional. In the preface and chapter 1, she discusses the questions that guide her research, reflects on some of the ethical challenges, and develops an identity as a college freshman.
Her research began in June 2002, long before the school year started, during summer Previews required of all incoming freshman. It is here that her accounts of being a college freshman over the age of 50 begin. Through her rich description locations, people, attire, conversations, lingo, information sessions, activities, and experiences, you begin to see Nathan’s transformation into a college student and the perplexities of college life that are gradually revealed throughout her narrative.
Nathan was intentional with her decisions, she moved into the dorms, signed up for a meal plan, ate her meals in the cafeteria of dorm lounge, enrolled in a full course load, fully engaged and interacted with her peers, developed relationships with other residents on her floor, joined student organizations, learned the college slang and language, and regularly played touch football and volleyball with her peers. Through these experiences she was able to capture the essence of the college student experience as a participant.
Nathan records her experiences daily interpreting events and behaviors and relating many of her findings to prior research and national averages. She reveals a great deal about students in today’s college “community” as well as today’s “individualistic and materialistic” society. Nathan is able to conduct field interviews, focus groups, and collect daily diary logs from various participants without revealing her identity or true purpose behind her research efforts. While her colleagues may ultimately challenge this, nothing compares to the intimate understanding she will develop out of her experiences with and as a student. So far her findings are sensational, compelling, and certainly worth our attention.
Findings include, an understanding of welcome week and getting acquainted with the university and her peers, life in the dorms, college culture themes as expressed on bulletin boards, resident doors, hallways, bathroom stalls, and in pictures, planned daily activities and hall involvement, classroom and homework demands, the phenomenon of studying less and socializing less, the reality of working more, the importance of organizational involvement, understanding how community is created in a system of options and individual choice (individualism in community), the phenomenon of failed diversity and same-ethnic social networks, and who eats with whom in the student dining hall.
Reflections and Analysis
When I first heard about this book in my masters program, I assumed it was purely a story, the account of one woman’s experience returning to school as a college freshman. To be honest, I had no idea it was a qualitative research study using an ethnographic approach. Once this was understood, the frame from which I viewed her writing completely shifted. I noticed that I was reading it trying to understand it as research with a design, research questions, observations, field notes, interviews, focus groups, rich descriptions, in addition to other forms of data. She was able to capture remarkable detail from notes and messages on doors, bulletin boards, and bathroom stalls to personal items in dorm rooms, attendance at meetings, participants in activities, and in her sheer interpretation of the presented data.
One of the first points she raised was the unexpected difference in understanding the geography of the campus as a professor and now as a student. I thought it was rather interesting that she could not point out familiar buildings, or find her way around campus at an institution where she spent fourteen years as a professor. The back roads and faculty parking lots where she once hovered were far out of her reach now.
As a researcher, much of what Nathan observes and deducts is compared to prior research and national averages or statistics. Her interpretation of behaviors such as studying, joining organizations, working, and embracing community provides a great deal of insight into understanding the dichotomies that exist in American higher education between studying and socializing. I think it is fascinating that in her exploration of students’ study habits she surmised that while students these days, as compared to research by Moffatt in the 70’s, are studying less they are not necessarily socializing more. She found that most students were working either on-campus or off-campus paid jobs.
Community is a common theme among most colleges and universities across the nation. Building community is always on the residential life agenda as is fostering community and allowing community to be the guiding principal for the residential college student experience. However, Nathan makes an incredible point that I had failed to notice as a professional in what we call Community Living and that is “it is hard to create community when the sheer number of options in college life generate a system in which on one is in the same place at the same time” (p. 38). With all this emphasis on community and evaluative measures that indicate its not working, it is amazing to me that it never occurred to me how universities create the very trouble that they try so hard to avoid by giving students innumerable options to choose from. It is clear how paths do not cross frequently and how students have to intentionally build networks with peers because their schedules and involvements do not create those opportunities. “In this light, the university becomes, for individual students, an optional set of activities and a fluid set of people whose paths are ever-shifting” (p. 40). The opportunities for community that the university intentionally creates are often “mandatory” or “highly encouraged” and in the name of individualism, spontaneity, freedom, and choice, as Nathan explains, students inevitably opt out avoiding sense of obligation and limits on freedom. Students live in an individualistic society that focuses on choice and materialism, this indeed presents a truly fascinating dilemma in higher education community development programs.
This book was fascinating to read as a student affairs professional working in residence life on a college campus. I live among my students and I interact with them on the daily basis and I would argue that I have a pretty good handle on student issues, concerns, pop culture, and the mere realities of being a college student. But reading Nathan’s account reminds me of how much I am missing, even living beside and below juniors and seniors in the residential community. Because I am an authority in the community, students immediately relate differently to me than they do their peers. No matter how intentional and involved I am with my residents, there are just some conversations that will never happen, there will be things that I will never know about, and there will be times when my bubbly personality and genuine care for them simply won’t interest them in the least. It is energizing to read this as an ethnographic study that captures the true essence of the college student experience beyond what any professional could ever guess or experience.
I wonder how faculty members and administrators at large respond, or would respond, to this book. It seems that many would have a difficult time grappling with some of the realities that Nathan unveils about higher education and the American college system. It is truly challenging to read about failed diversity efforts and to realize that the university is responsible for many of the structures in place “that encourage early formation of same-ethnicity relationships” (p. 60). Her research is indeed unconventional and perhaps the books end will answer any looming questions of ethical integrity.
Summary of Chapter 8
Chapter 8 of Creswell’s Qualitative Inquiry and Research Design focused on three major data analysis procedures, Madison (2005), Huberman and Miles (1994), and Wolcott (1994b). The general process of data analysis includes preparing and organizing data, using the process of coding to deduct themes from the data, using figures, tables, or a dialogue to represent the data and its themes. Creswell discusses the data analysis spiral in which the researcher is free to move “in analytic circles rather than using a fixed linear approach (p 150). The spiral begins with the organization of information or database. The researcher explores the data by reading it through multiple times creating short notes or memos of ideas. A few select categories emerge and the process moves to “describing, classifying, and interpreting” the information (p. 151). It is at this stage where codes or themes are generated, interpretations within context are developed, and the researcher is able to compare these themes to multiple databases. In the last phase, the information is presented through a table, figure, or other visual image.
Each approach follows its own set of guidelines and expectations for data analysis. While all five approaches begin with creating and all five approaches move towards reading through the text while taking notes and developing initial codes. It is the process of describing, classifying, and interpreting where each approach takes its own turn. Narrative research lacks the structure that each of the other four approaches has while grounded theory and phenomenology are the most procedurally detailed. Ethnography and case study have the have the most commonalities of any two approaches. Each approach uses distinct language and terms to describe each phase of the process that might be similar to another approach. The final product is representative of the approach and its steps involved in the analysis. Creswell ends with considering the various computer software programs that can be used to analyze the data; they provide organization, easier searching, provide deeper meaning, visualize relationships, and retrieve memos. However, these programs are expensive, require learning, separate the researcher from the data, less mobility, less accessibility, and lacking in desired features.
Reflections and Analysis
I found that chapter 8 was explanatory in terms of understanding the different procedures to data analysis, but by no means was it exhaustive. My expectations were that I would have a keen sense of how to approach the data analysis of my project using a grounded theory approach and the not quite two pages of text covering these procedures hardly did my curiosity justice. I think I was looking for examples of how the themes were extrapolated from the text transcripts and reduced to categories that explain the process of phenomenon being explored. Perhaps I was expecting too much. Creswell did explore the five approaches and how they are similar and different in terms of data analysis, especially in terms of how the data is described, how themes are categorized, and how perspectives and data are interpreted.
The data analysis spiral provided a visual representation of the steps and movement that exist and occur during the analysis process. The spiral allows the researcher to move around and focus on specific loops or steps in an effort to exhaust the necessary components of that loop before moving to the next, but with the option to move back if needed. The model gives the process purpose and meaning and identifies clearly the sequential order of the procedures. Though this tool is to be used for the purpose of understanding the general process of data analysis as the intricacies of each approach are not reflected within the spiral.
It is difficult to remain focused and attentive to each approach’s unique language, procedures, available opportunities, and outcomes. Since we are focusing on only one approach for our project, I have to be reminded that the learning comes in understanding each approach, how they are unique or similar, and in what ways are they used. I am grateful that we are reading a book on ethnography as it gives us great insight into the value of describing, analyzing, and interpreting a cultural-sharing group. This is vastly different than the saturation, open coding, axial coding, and selective coding of a grounded theory approach. An ethnographer chronologically presents the information as an observer/participant making sense of how the culture works. In grounded theory, interviews are the basis for much of the data collection. The researcher constantly returns to this data identifying a single factor and the causes of this factor in an effort to develop a story. I only recently conducted my first interview and I am currently in the transcribing phase. While during the interview I was excited as I saw potential themes that could develop, at its conclusion and after reading this chapter, I am not so confident about articulating categories confirming evidence of them within the interview. I will revisit this process in my next journal entry.
Frankly, using a computer system to track all of this information and analysis sounds as cumbersome as doing it by hand. It is hard to imagine that a machine can search and explore the text identifying themes and categories and if it does, I cannot imagine not using it. Like Creswell articulates, understanding how the program works itself and taking the time to learn it is where its true value is evident.
MY FRESHMAN YEAR (Ch. 1-3)
Summary of Chapters 1-3
This is the story of one woman, a researcher and professor, who after 15 years of teaching anthropology and AnyU, embarks on a year-long journey to immerse herself in the culture of college freshmen. Having participated in traditional cultural anthropology in remote villages across the world, she found herself increasingly confused by her students in her academic experience. In an effort to understand her students better, she felt it necessary to become one, not simply observe them as a professional. In the preface and chapter 1, she discusses the questions that guide her research, reflects on some of the ethical challenges, and develops an identity as a college freshman.
Her research began in June 2002, long before the school year started, during summer Previews required of all incoming freshman. It is here that her accounts of being a college freshman over the age of 50 begin. Through her rich description locations, people, attire, conversations, lingo, information sessions, activities, and experiences, you begin to see Nathan’s transformation into a college student and the perplexities of college life that are gradually revealed throughout her narrative.
Nathan was intentional with her decisions, she moved into the dorms, signed up for a meal plan, ate her meals in the cafeteria of dorm lounge, enrolled in a full course load, fully engaged and interacted with her peers, developed relationships with other residents on her floor, joined student organizations, learned the college slang and language, and regularly played touch football and volleyball with her peers. Through these experiences she was able to capture the essence of the college student experience as a participant.
Nathan records her experiences daily interpreting events and behaviors and relating many of her findings to prior research and national averages. She reveals a great deal about students in today’s college “community” as well as today’s “individualistic and materialistic” society. Nathan is able to conduct field interviews, focus groups, and collect daily diary logs from various participants without revealing her identity or true purpose behind her research efforts. While her colleagues may ultimately challenge this, nothing compares to the intimate understanding she will develop out of her experiences with and as a student. So far her findings are sensational, compelling, and certainly worth our attention.
Findings include, an understanding of welcome week and getting acquainted with the university and her peers, life in the dorms, college culture themes as expressed on bulletin boards, resident doors, hallways, bathroom stalls, and in pictures, planned daily activities and hall involvement, classroom and homework demands, the phenomenon of studying less and socializing less, the reality of working more, the importance of organizational involvement, understanding how community is created in a system of options and individual choice (individualism in community), the phenomenon of failed diversity and same-ethnic social networks, and who eats with whom in the student dining hall.
Reflections and Analysis
When I first heard about this book in my masters program, I assumed it was purely a story, the account of one woman’s experience returning to school as a college freshman. To be honest, I had no idea it was a qualitative research study using an ethnographic approach. Once this was understood, the frame from which I viewed her writing completely shifted. I noticed that I was reading it trying to understand it as research with a design, research questions, observations, field notes, interviews, focus groups, rich descriptions, in addition to other forms of data. She was able to capture remarkable detail from notes and messages on doors, bulletin boards, and bathroom stalls to personal items in dorm rooms, attendance at meetings, participants in activities, and in her sheer interpretation of the presented data.
One of the first points she raised was the unexpected difference in understanding the geography of the campus as a professor and now as a student. I thought it was rather interesting that she could not point out familiar buildings, or find her way around campus at an institution where she spent fourteen years as a professor. The back roads and faculty parking lots where she once hovered were far out of her reach now.
As a researcher, much of what Nathan observes and deducts is compared to prior research and national averages or statistics. Her interpretation of behaviors such as studying, joining organizations, working, and embracing community provides a great deal of insight into understanding the dichotomies that exist in American higher education between studying and socializing. I think it is fascinating that in her exploration of students’ study habits she surmised that while students these days, as compared to research by Moffatt in the 70’s, are studying less they are not necessarily socializing more. She found that most students were working either on-campus or off-campus paid jobs.
Community is a common theme among most colleges and universities across the nation. Building community is always on the residential life agenda as is fostering community and allowing community to be the guiding principal for the residential college student experience. However, Nathan makes an incredible point that I had failed to notice as a professional in what we call Community Living and that is “it is hard to create community when the sheer number of options in college life generate a system in which on one is in the same place at the same time” (p. 38). With all this emphasis on community and evaluative measures that indicate its not working, it is amazing to me that it never occurred to me how universities create the very trouble that they try so hard to avoid by giving students innumerable options to choose from. It is clear how paths do not cross frequently and how students have to intentionally build networks with peers because their schedules and involvements do not create those opportunities. “In this light, the university becomes, for individual students, an optional set of activities and a fluid set of people whose paths are ever-shifting” (p. 40). The opportunities for community that the university intentionally creates are often “mandatory” or “highly encouraged” and in the name of individualism, spontaneity, freedom, and choice, as Nathan explains, students inevitably opt out avoiding sense of obligation and limits on freedom. Students live in an individualistic society that focuses on choice and materialism, this indeed presents a truly fascinating dilemma in higher education community development programs.
This book was fascinating to read as a student affairs professional working in residence life on a college campus. I live among my students and I interact with them on the daily basis and I would argue that I have a pretty good handle on student issues, concerns, pop culture, and the mere realities of being a college student. But reading Nathan’s account reminds me of how much I am missing, even living beside and below juniors and seniors in the residential community. Because I am an authority in the community, students immediately relate differently to me than they do their peers. No matter how intentional and involved I am with my residents, there are just some conversations that will never happen, there will be things that I will never know about, and there will be times when my bubbly personality and genuine care for them simply won’t interest them in the least. It is energizing to read this as an ethnographic study that captures the true essence of the college student experience beyond what any professional could ever guess or experience.
I wonder how faculty members and administrators at large respond, or would respond, to this book. It seems that many would have a difficult time grappling with some of the realities that Nathan unveils about higher education and the American college system. It is truly challenging to read about failed diversity efforts and to realize that the university is responsible for many of the structures in place “that encourage early formation of same-ethnicity relationships” (p. 60). Her research is indeed unconventional and perhaps the books end will answer any looming questions of ethical integrity.
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Reflective Reading Log #1
Creswell (Ch. 5)
Entry 1
Summary of Chapter 5
Chapter five of Creswell’s Qualitative Inquiry and Research Design focused on five articles that served as research examples of the five different approaches examined throughout chapters 1 through 4. Each case presented offered the reader an opportunity to understand the type of data explored, how the data was collected and analyzed, and the final product or report that ensued. The first study illustrated a biographical narrative approach as the author focused on the life history of a single individual, Vonnie Lee Hargrett, a man with mental retardation who defined his life by the hour and a half bus ride to his place of work. Data collection consisted of the conversations and observations of the individual that were later reconstructed as chronological stories, thereby giving them meaning through the researcher’s interpretations and presence in the study. The second study illustrated a phenomenological approach as the authors explored AIDS patients and the images or cognitive ways that these patients thought of their disease. Multiple interviews were conducted and transcripts were analyzed such that significant themes, statements, and meaning of the experiences were identified and a description of the central phenomenon emerged. A Grounded theory approach was illustrated in the third study where authors explored how 11 women survived and coped with their experiences of childhood sexual abuse. Data collection consisted of one-on-one interviews, focus groups, and participant observation. Researchers took the information provided to them, constructed a visual model, systematically relating categories that formed, and identified factors causing a central phenomenon. An ethnographic approach was used in the fourth study as researchers explored the core values of a culture-shaping group known as straight edges or sXers. The focus of the analysis was on the group itself and the values, beliefs, and behavioral patterns of participants within the group. The development of themes helped to define how the grouped worked and the complex multi-layers of sub-cultural resistance emerged and was presented in the conclusion. The fifth and final study utilized a case study approach. A campus reaction to a gunman incident was the identified case and through an extensive, multiple source data collection, meaning was derived and a plan for future was developed.
Chapter five further explored how each of these approaches differed in terms of focus. Creswell explains to the reader how the focus of a narrative is on a single individual whereas the focus of a phenomenological study is on a concept or phenomenon. Furthermore, phenomenology might focus on the meaning of people’s experiences toward a phenomenon but the objective of grounded theory is to generate a theory as a way to explain a process or central phenomenon. Finally, if a researcher wants to explore the values or behaviors of a culture-sharing group, they would use an ethnographic design, but if they want to provide an in-depth picture of an event, program, or case with in a specific context, they would use a case study approach. At the conclusion of chapter 5, one has a far better understanding of each approach and the value that each brings to the nature of qualitative research.
Entry 2
Reflections and Analysis
As I think about my past and experience and reading this text so far, I’m afraid that I only have some level of clarity in understanding qualitative research. I realize with time these concepts will become clearer and I will come to better understand the process. However, I must say that reading chapter 5 cleared up quite a few things for me. It was the most helpful in terms of understanding and differentiating among the five different approaches to qualitative research. Up to this chapter I understood, on a cursory level, how each approach is different, but in practice I struggled in identifying when to use one over another. In fact with my own research interests, I was uncertain as to which approach, a phenomenological approach, a grounded theory approach, or a case study approach, was more appropriate. Reading through each of the articles in the back of the book, those presented and summarized in chapter five, enabled me to hone in on why one approach was more appropriate over another.
Back in chapter two, Creswell discusses philosophical assumptions and worldviews that researchers bring to their studies. As I think about the ontological assumption I was reminded of my Nature of Inquiry course when we were challenged to think about our own epistemology in terms of influences. I remember thinking about the nature of reality and now I see how this shapes qualitative research, much more so than quantitative research. Different ways of viewing the world shape different ways of researching the world. “If the world is viewed as a social construct, we have to study the actors within the society to understand the world” (Crotty, 1998). For example, diversity and an awareness of cultural diversity by default changes how knowledge is acquired. For me this cultural bias impacts my every thought about the world and about truth because what may be truth for me may not be truth for someone else. Truth and knowledge become relative terms that interpretivists then seek to explain. Interpretivism is the idea that different approaches are required to understand the different realms of the social world (Crotty, 1998). This epistemological approach looks for “culturally derived and historically situated interpretations of the social-life world”(Crotty, 1998). This to me illustrates qualitative research.
As I think about my own research, I begin to recognize how my epistemology and way of knowing is further defined by my experiences as well as my desire to understand the field of participants that I choose to research. In this case, I know I want to understand graduating senior college students from a 4-year private institution. I unfortunately came up with a question first instead of letting the questions evolve from a selected approach. It has been challenging to go back and fit an approach in to what I want to learn about this particular population. I have had to step back, reread some chapters, and try to look more broadly at my design. In doing so, I discovered the social constructivist nature of my curiosity.
In chapter three, Creswell outlines the characteristics of qualitative analysis, when to use qualitative research, and the general structure of a plan or proposal. This was helpful in determining a direction for my study and what to expect from the process. Stepping back and taking a broader look at my research interests enabled me to see how and if it could be shaped into each of the five approaches. Immediately, I knew I was not conducting a narrative study or an ethnographic study. In wanting to know what factors influence a student’s perception of preparedness for graduation, I looked towards a phenomenological approach in that I could identify several students who have experienced the phenomenon of not feeling prepared for life after college. But I realized that this is merely an experience and as chapter four outlines, this does not constitute a universally experienced event, there is no universal essence behind anticipating graduation, students have not graduated yet. I then explored a case study approach and while my research, or case, is bound by time and setting, there really does not exist a descriptive case or event in which I can draw conclusions from and analyze. The assumptions about preparedness for graduation need to be constructed by understanding the individual experiences of graduating seniors. As I learn more about their different experiences and accounts, a theory or explanation could then be generated, thus leading me to a grounded theory approach.
Reading how each approached was used in chapter five further validated my findings that a grounded theory approach is the likely approach to use in terms of focus, population, data collection, analysis, and the final product or written report for my research topic. I look forward to reading subsequent chapters to fine tune the procedures for conducting grounded theory research.
References:
Crotty, M. (1998). The foundations of social research: Meaning and perspective in the research process. London: Sage.
Entry 1
Summary of Chapter 5
Chapter five of Creswell’s Qualitative Inquiry and Research Design focused on five articles that served as research examples of the five different approaches examined throughout chapters 1 through 4. Each case presented offered the reader an opportunity to understand the type of data explored, how the data was collected and analyzed, and the final product or report that ensued. The first study illustrated a biographical narrative approach as the author focused on the life history of a single individual, Vonnie Lee Hargrett, a man with mental retardation who defined his life by the hour and a half bus ride to his place of work. Data collection consisted of the conversations and observations of the individual that were later reconstructed as chronological stories, thereby giving them meaning through the researcher’s interpretations and presence in the study. The second study illustrated a phenomenological approach as the authors explored AIDS patients and the images or cognitive ways that these patients thought of their disease. Multiple interviews were conducted and transcripts were analyzed such that significant themes, statements, and meaning of the experiences were identified and a description of the central phenomenon emerged. A Grounded theory approach was illustrated in the third study where authors explored how 11 women survived and coped with their experiences of childhood sexual abuse. Data collection consisted of one-on-one interviews, focus groups, and participant observation. Researchers took the information provided to them, constructed a visual model, systematically relating categories that formed, and identified factors causing a central phenomenon. An ethnographic approach was used in the fourth study as researchers explored the core values of a culture-shaping group known as straight edges or sXers. The focus of the analysis was on the group itself and the values, beliefs, and behavioral patterns of participants within the group. The development of themes helped to define how the grouped worked and the complex multi-layers of sub-cultural resistance emerged and was presented in the conclusion. The fifth and final study utilized a case study approach. A campus reaction to a gunman incident was the identified case and through an extensive, multiple source data collection, meaning was derived and a plan for future was developed.
Chapter five further explored how each of these approaches differed in terms of focus. Creswell explains to the reader how the focus of a narrative is on a single individual whereas the focus of a phenomenological study is on a concept or phenomenon. Furthermore, phenomenology might focus on the meaning of people’s experiences toward a phenomenon but the objective of grounded theory is to generate a theory as a way to explain a process or central phenomenon. Finally, if a researcher wants to explore the values or behaviors of a culture-sharing group, they would use an ethnographic design, but if they want to provide an in-depth picture of an event, program, or case with in a specific context, they would use a case study approach. At the conclusion of chapter 5, one has a far better understanding of each approach and the value that each brings to the nature of qualitative research.
Entry 2
Reflections and Analysis
As I think about my past and experience and reading this text so far, I’m afraid that I only have some level of clarity in understanding qualitative research. I realize with time these concepts will become clearer and I will come to better understand the process. However, I must say that reading chapter 5 cleared up quite a few things for me. It was the most helpful in terms of understanding and differentiating among the five different approaches to qualitative research. Up to this chapter I understood, on a cursory level, how each approach is different, but in practice I struggled in identifying when to use one over another. In fact with my own research interests, I was uncertain as to which approach, a phenomenological approach, a grounded theory approach, or a case study approach, was more appropriate. Reading through each of the articles in the back of the book, those presented and summarized in chapter five, enabled me to hone in on why one approach was more appropriate over another.
Back in chapter two, Creswell discusses philosophical assumptions and worldviews that researchers bring to their studies. As I think about the ontological assumption I was reminded of my Nature of Inquiry course when we were challenged to think about our own epistemology in terms of influences. I remember thinking about the nature of reality and now I see how this shapes qualitative research, much more so than quantitative research. Different ways of viewing the world shape different ways of researching the world. “If the world is viewed as a social construct, we have to study the actors within the society to understand the world” (Crotty, 1998). For example, diversity and an awareness of cultural diversity by default changes how knowledge is acquired. For me this cultural bias impacts my every thought about the world and about truth because what may be truth for me may not be truth for someone else. Truth and knowledge become relative terms that interpretivists then seek to explain. Interpretivism is the idea that different approaches are required to understand the different realms of the social world (Crotty, 1998). This epistemological approach looks for “culturally derived and historically situated interpretations of the social-life world”(Crotty, 1998). This to me illustrates qualitative research.
As I think about my own research, I begin to recognize how my epistemology and way of knowing is further defined by my experiences as well as my desire to understand the field of participants that I choose to research. In this case, I know I want to understand graduating senior college students from a 4-year private institution. I unfortunately came up with a question first instead of letting the questions evolve from a selected approach. It has been challenging to go back and fit an approach in to what I want to learn about this particular population. I have had to step back, reread some chapters, and try to look more broadly at my design. In doing so, I discovered the social constructivist nature of my curiosity.
In chapter three, Creswell outlines the characteristics of qualitative analysis, when to use qualitative research, and the general structure of a plan or proposal. This was helpful in determining a direction for my study and what to expect from the process. Stepping back and taking a broader look at my research interests enabled me to see how and if it could be shaped into each of the five approaches. Immediately, I knew I was not conducting a narrative study or an ethnographic study. In wanting to know what factors influence a student’s perception of preparedness for graduation, I looked towards a phenomenological approach in that I could identify several students who have experienced the phenomenon of not feeling prepared for life after college. But I realized that this is merely an experience and as chapter four outlines, this does not constitute a universally experienced event, there is no universal essence behind anticipating graduation, students have not graduated yet. I then explored a case study approach and while my research, or case, is bound by time and setting, there really does not exist a descriptive case or event in which I can draw conclusions from and analyze. The assumptions about preparedness for graduation need to be constructed by understanding the individual experiences of graduating seniors. As I learn more about their different experiences and accounts, a theory or explanation could then be generated, thus leading me to a grounded theory approach.
Reading how each approached was used in chapter five further validated my findings that a grounded theory approach is the likely approach to use in terms of focus, population, data collection, analysis, and the final product or written report for my research topic. I look forward to reading subsequent chapters to fine tune the procedures for conducting grounded theory research.
References:
Crotty, M. (1998). The foundations of social research: Meaning and perspective in the research process. London: Sage.
Research Journal #1
Introduction
I am a quantitative researcher. I live by numbers; they make sense to me. From a very young age I have been intrigued by mathematical concepts. I was good at math in the first grade, I had skipped three math courses by 7th grade, and was studying calculus 1 and 2 with minimal use of a calculator in my junior and senior year of high school. (I’m really not bragging, I just think it’s helpful in understanding where I am coming from). If it weren’t for that professor in college who told me I had too much personality to be a math and computer science major, I would be in a numbers world, not a peoples world. But I love people too. At a young age, relationships, people, their behaviors, and the complexities of interpersonal communication also intrigued me. I was curious to know more so I subsequently studied psychology in my undergraduate years and counseling psychology during my graduate education. I am by nature a people and numbers person I suppose. After several years of primary and secondary education, three and a half years of undergraduate higher education, and going on six years of graduate higher education, this is my first experience in qualitative research. Everything up to this point has been quantitative…. This is where I begin my journey for qualitative analysis.
I am a quantitative researcher. I live by numbers; they make sense to me. From a very young age I have been intrigued by mathematical concepts. I was good at math in the first grade, I had skipped three math courses by 7th grade, and was studying calculus 1 and 2 with minimal use of a calculator in my junior and senior year of high school. (I’m really not bragging, I just think it’s helpful in understanding where I am coming from). If it weren’t for that professor in college who told me I had too much personality to be a math and computer science major, I would be in a numbers world, not a peoples world. But I love people too. At a young age, relationships, people, their behaviors, and the complexities of interpersonal communication also intrigued me. I was curious to know more so I subsequently studied psychology in my undergraduate years and counseling psychology during my graduate education. I am by nature a people and numbers person I suppose. After several years of primary and secondary education, three and a half years of undergraduate higher education, and going on six years of graduate higher education, this is my first experience in qualitative research. Everything up to this point has been quantitative…. This is where I begin my journey for qualitative analysis.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)