Earlier this week I moderated a workshop about qualitative research as part of the event “Research Day” at Loyola Marymount University Library. The goal of “Research Day” was to raise librarians’ awareness and understanding of qualitative research. My workshop was to provide an opportunity for librarians to practice in-depth interview and focus group interview – two prevalent qualitative research methods. I only had 3 hours, so I thought a lot about how to best make use of the time. Finally I decided to follow an organic four-step process as I do in my research methods class – 1) the participants would start by developing a qualitative research question; 2) then based on their research question, they would chose either in-depth interview or focus group interview as the data collection method; 3) they would then develop an interview guide and practice conducting the interview; and 4) finally they would reflect upon their experience and talk about their understanding of qualitative research.
Overall I was able to stick to my agenda – but at the end we weren’t able to spend as much time on reflection as I had planned. Step 3 was monstrously time-consuming. Still, I felt the workshop gave everyone a basic sense of what it’s like to conduct qualitative research. I created four handouts to guide the participants through the four steps, and I’m posting them here. Hopefully it will be beneficial to other people who are also interested in practicing qualitative research.
Sources:
Rubin, H. J., & Rubin, I. S. (2011). Qualitative Interviewing: The Art of Hearing Data. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Guest, G., Namey, E., & Mitchell M. (2013). Collecting qualitative data: A field manual for applied research. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Krueger, R., & Casey, M. (2014). Focus groups: a practical guide for applied research (5th ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Formalized Curiosity 