Qualitative Research Methods
Action Research Case Study Research
Ethnography Grounded
Theory
Just as there are various
philosophical perspectives which can inform qualitative research, so there are
various qualitative research methods. A research method is a strategy of
inquiry which moves from the underlying philosophical assumptions to research
design and data collection. The choice of research method influences the way in
which the researcher collects data. Specific research methods also imply
different skills, assumptions and research practices. The four research methods
that will be discussed here are action research, case study research,
ethnography and grounded theory.
1. Action
Research
There are numerous definitions of action research,
however one of the most widely cited is that of Rapoport抯, who defines
action research in the following way:
Action research aims to contribute
both to the practical concerns of people in an immediate problematic situation
and to the goals of social science by joint collaboration within a mutually
acceptable ethical framework (Rapoport, 1970,
p. 499).
This definition draws attention to the
collaborative aspect of action research and to possible ethical dilemmas which
arise from its use. It also makes clear, as Clark (1972)
emphasizes, that action research is concerned to enlarge the stock of knowledge
of the social science community. It is this aspect of action research that
distinguishes it from applied social science, where the goal is simply to apply
social scientific knowledge but not to add to the body of knowledge.
Action research has been accepted as a valid
research method in applied fields such as organization development and
education (e.g. see the Special Issue on action research in Human
Relations, Vol. 46, No. 2, 1993, and Kemmis
and McTaggart, 1988). In information systems, however, action research was
for a long time largely ignored, apart from one or two notable exceptions (e.g.
Checkland,
1991). More recently, there seems to be increasing interest in action
research.
A brief overview of action
research is the article by Susman
and Evered (1988). An empirical example of action research is the article
by Ytterstad
et al. (1996).
2. Case Study
Research
The term "case study" has multiple
meanings. It can be used to describe a unit of analysis (e.g. a case study of a
particular organisation) or to describe a research method. The discussion here
concerns the use of the case study as a research method.
Case study research is the most common qualitative
method used in information systems (Orlikowski
and Baroudi, 1991; Alavi
and Carlson, 1992). Although there are numerous definitions, Yin (1994) defines
the scope of a case study as follows:
"A case study is an empirical
inquiry that:
·
investigates a contemporary phenomenon within its
real-life context, especially when
·
the boundaries between phenomenon and context are not
clearly evident" (Yin 1994, p. 13).
Case study research can be positivist,
interpretive, or critical, depending upon the underlying philosophical
assumptions of the researcher (for a fuller discussion, see the section of Philosophical
Perspectives above). Yin (1994) and Benbasat
et al. (1987) are advocates of positivist case study research, whereas Walsham
(1993) is an advocate of interpretive indepth case study research.
References on Case Study
Research
3.
Ethnography
Ethnographic research comes from
the discipline of social and cultural anthropology where an ethnographer is
required to spend a significant amount of time in the field. Ethnographers
immerse themselves in the lives of the people they study (Lewis 1985,
p. 380) and seek to place the phenomena studied in their social and cultural
context.
After early ground-breaking work by Wynn
(1979), Suchman
(1987) and
Zuboff (1988), ethnography has now become more widely used in the study of
information systems in organizations, from the study of the development of
information systems (Hughes
et. al, 1992; Orlikowski,
1991; Preston,
1991) to the study of aspects of information technology management (Davies, 1991;
Davies
and Nielsen, 1992). Ethnography has also been discussed as a method whereby
multiple perspectives can be incorporated in systems design (Holzblatt
and Beyer, 1993) and as a general approach to the wide range of possible
studies relating to the investigation of information systems (Pettigrew,
1985).
References on Ethnographic
Research
4. Grounded
Theory
Grounded theory is a research method that seeks to
develop theory that is grounded in data systematically gathered and analyzed.
According to Martin
and Turner (1986), grounded theory is "an inductive, theory discovery
methodology that allows the researcher to develop a theoretical account of the
general features of a topic while simultaneously grounding the account in
empirical observations or data." The major difference between grounded
theory and other methods is its specific approach to theory development -
grounded theory suggests that there should be a continuous interplay between
data collection and analysis.