Zusammenfassung der Ressource
Qualitative and Quantitative Research.
- Qualitative Research.
- Usually focuses on a
participant's thoughts
and feelings about an
aspect of their life or a
particular experience.
- An example might be an in-depth
interview about childhood experiences,
where the researcher records the
conversation and then writes up case
notes, summarising what has been said.
- Qualitative data is often
described as more
meaningful information, since
it is true to its original source
and reflects behaviour in a
real-life context.
- STRENGTHS.
- Rich and Detailed.
- Meaningful.
- High Validity.
- LIMITATIONS.
- Difficult to replicate.
- Difficult to analyse.
- Low reliability.
- Very personal,
subjective account.
- Quantitative Research.
- Involves measuring
behaviour in a numerical way.
- An example might
be the score out of
20 on a memory test.
- Quantitative data is sometimes
described as less meaningful since
it usually involves narrow focus on
a very specific aspect of behaviour,
and the measurement of tens takes
place out of the context in which
that behaviour usually occurs.
- STRENGTHS.
- Easy to analyse.
- Can replicate.
- More objective.
- LIMITATIONS.
- Less meaningful.
- Low in ecological validity.
- As a general rule...
- Unstructured interviews, case
studies, open questionnaires and
some observational studies involve
the collection of qualitative data.
- Experiments, correlational studies,
structured observations, structured
interviews and closed questionnaires
involve the collection of quantitative data.
- Quite often, researchers gather data
using a qualitative method and then
convert the information into quantitative
data for the purpose of analysis.
- As an example, having recorded an
in-depth interview about childhood
experiences, a researcher might analyse
the recording to see how many times
certain themes occur, for example,
sibling rivalry, discipline methods used
by parents, peer influences, and so on.