Qualitative Social Science Research Research Articles

Bricolage for Innovative Qualitative Social Science Research: A Perspective on Its Conceptual Hallmarks

Bricolage for Innovative Qualitative Social Science Research: A Perspective on Its Conceptual Hallmarks

Echoes of silence: an embossed poetic inquiry

PurposeSilences in qualitative social science research present a unique and sometimes ambiguous challenge for researchers. When working with transcription artefacts, considering not only what has been said but also what has been silenced, omitted, overlooked or brushed over allows new ways of examining a phenomenon. This paper explores a new methodological approach to exploring these silences.Design/methodology/approachThis article explores “embossed” poetry as a methodological process to consider what has not been said. Via an empirical study that examined the experience of six teachers of a year nine programme in Victoria, Australia, we explore how embossed poems within a larger research project allowed the interrogating of silences. Through a polyvocal performance of text and poetry, this paper argues that embossed poetry offers significant methodological possibilities through which previously silenced ideas and analytical processes can become visible within poetic research praxis.FindingsThe findings of this paper are that by using embossed concrete poems, researchers can explore new territories within qualitative work. By putting down the keyboard and picking up a hand-embossing tool, new space for thought emerges and other parts of an assemblage can be explored.Originality/valueThis paper presents a unique methodological contribution to poetic inquiry. Furthermore, it explores the path trodden to develop this new approach through a reflexive-diffractive polyvocal text.

“It’s Like Having an Uncontrolled Situation”: Using Body Maps to Understand the Embodied Experiences of People with Hidradenitis Suppurativa, a Chronic Dermatological Condition

Hidradenitis suppurativa (HS) is a chronic, inflammatory, and often debilitating skin condition that includes painful “flares” in the groin, genital, and underarms. (1) Background: Patients with HS have the highest reported mental health comorbidities among dermatological conditions. Qualitative social science research about HS is limited, so this study aimed to understand the lived experiences of people with HS through body mapping. Body mapping is a participatory research process where participants illustrate a drawing of their body with images, symbols, and words that represent their embodied experience. (2) Methods: This study recruited 30 participants from a previous survey about HS experiences. Participants selected from pre-made body silhouettes based on their body shape, illustrated a body map about their HS experience, then shared their body map during in-depth interviews. Interviews and body maps were analyzed with the same codebook created with inductive and deductive codes. (3) Results: The body map drawings yielded rich visual data and the mapping process helped participants express their HS experiences in unique ways that cannot always be captured with textual data alone. (4) Conclusions: This study adds to the limited social science literature about HS and introduces body mapping as a relevant qualitative method for exploring chronic dermatological conditions.

Short Take: Designing a Multinational Smartphone App Survey during COVID-19: Rewards, Risks, and Recommendations

Cost-effective and user-friendly, mobile phone-assisted methods have remained underutilized in qualitative social science research. The scarce methodological guidance, together with recruitment and ethical challenges, has arguably stifled advancements in this area. COVID-19 exposed the need to better equip researchers with the expertise and tools to conduct remote research effectively. In 2020, we designed and launched a smartphone survey application to collect real-time data from children’s sector professionals across the globe regarding best practices in, and challenges to, responding to the pandemic. In this short article, we reflect on the efficiency, quality, and acceptability afforded by the smartphone app survey, and outline recommendations for enhancing rigor and feasibility. We also present data snippets illustrating the positive impact of participation on respondents—a seldom-documented aspect of app-based research. Altogether, we advocate a flexible, pragmatic, and user-centered study and app design that aligns with respondents’ specific, situational needs, and preferences.

Queer Connections and Fostering Inclusion: Reflections on Qualitative Focus Group Design

Qualitative social science research has an obligation to resist replicating or reinforcing social harms. This paper explores how researchers can adopt strategies to develop inclusive, safe, and reflexive research spaces with queer participants. Reflecting on a research study that explored the impact of queer representation in young adult literature on young readers, the paper explores the concepts of building queer connections and fostering inclusion as methods to support qualitative research design. Through this reflexive process, it has been found that intentionally using strategies to establish queer connections between participants and promoting inclusion through empathetic listening can significantly enhance participant experiences, primarily in terms of safety, support, and openness to vulnerability. These deliberate strategies also play a crucial role in reinforcing participant engagement and retention. Further, these findings indicate that these methods have additional benefits for research that transitions from face-to-face methods to online and digital formats. We argue that qualitative social science researchers who work with the queer community have an obligation to create inclusive and safe spaces for participants – not only to resist replicating stigmatising social structures, but to move beyond a pedagogy of pathologization in queer research.

Solidarity as an Empirical-Ethical Framework for the Analysis of Contact Tracing Apps — a Novel Approach

Digital contact tracing is used in different countries to help contain the COVID-19 pandemic. It raises challenging empirical and ethical questions due to its complexity and widespread effects calling for a broader approach in ethical evaluation. However, existing approaches often fail to include all relevant value perspectives or lack reference to empirical data on the artifact in question. In this paper, we describe the development of an interdisciplinary framework to analyze digital contact tracing from an empirical and ethical perspective. Starting with an analysis of methodological tensions in the attempt to analyze digital contact tracing, we, firstly, set out three methodological premises regarding (a) a specific view of technology, (b) a fruitful normative perspective, and (c) ways to gather empirical knowledge about the object under investigation. Secondly, we inspect consequences of these premises to develop our research methodology. In doing so, we argue for a postphenomenological perspective on technology, solidarity as an important concept to guide the ethical perspective, and an empirical approach based on qualitative social science research and the concept of affordances. We illustrate these considerations by referring to our analysis of the German Corona-Warn-App as an instance of contact tracing based on the Exposure Notification Framework by Google and Apple. We then discuss the implications of using such a framework, including considerations concerning future developments of technologies similar to or inspired by the current concepts of contact tracing.

Clericalism: What Is It and How Can We Treat It?

Pope Francis has frequently spoken about the scourge of clericalism and its damaging effects on life in the Church. Clerical priests are those priests who demonstrate the following characteristics: aloof, unaccountable, entitled, arrogant, and authoritarian. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops have openly recognized the intimate relationship of clericalism to the sexual abuse crisis in the Church. However, clericalism has yet to receive adequate qualitative social science research with clear directives on how the clinical community can serve the Church in treating clericalist priests. This article addresses the issue of clericalism both theologically and psychologically to provide direction for the clinical community to respond to clericalist priests and their need for healing.

Moral distress in rural veterinarians as an outcome of the Mycoplasma bovis incursion in southern New Zealand

Aims: To gain insight into the world of rural veterinarians during the Mycoplasma bovis incursion within southern Aotearoa New Zealand by exploring their experiences during the incursion, and to understand the consequences, positive and negative, of these experiences. Methods: A qualitative social science research methodology, guided by the philosophical paradigm of pragmatism was used to collect data from an information-rich sample (n = 6) of rural veterinarians from Otago and Southland. Interview and focus group techniques were used, both guided by a semi-structured interview guide. Veterinarians were asked a range of questions, including their role within the incursion; whether their involvement had any positive or negative impact for them; and their experience of conflicting demands. Analysis of the narrative data collected was guided by Braun and Clarke’s approach to reflexive thematic analysis. Results and findings: All six participants approached agreed to participate. Analysis of the data provided an understanding of the trauma they experienced during the incursion. An overarching theme of psychological distress was underpinned by four sub-themes, with epistemic injustice and bearing witness the two sub-themes reported to be associated with the greatest experience of psychological distress. These, along with the other two identified stressors, led to the experience of moral distress, with moral residue and moral injury also experienced by some participants. Conclusions: Eradication programmes for exotic diseases in production animals inevitably have an impact on rural veterinarians, in their role working closely with farmers. Potentially, these impacts could be positive, recognising and utilising veterinarians’ experience, skills and knowledge base. This study, however, illustrates the significant negative impacts for some rural veterinarians exposed to the recent M. bovis eradication programme in New Zealand, including experiences of moral distress and moral injury. Consequently, this eradication programme resulted in increased stress for study participants. There is a need to consider how the system addresses future exotic disease incursions to better incorporate and utilise the knowledge and skills of the expert workforce of rural veterinarians and to minimise the negative impacts on them. Clinical relevance: To date, the experience of moral distress by rural veterinarians during exotic disease incursions has been underreported globally and unexplored in New Zealand. The findings from this study contribute further insights to the existing limited literature and provide guidance on how to reduce the adverse experiences on rural veterinarians during future incursions.

Qualitative research in social sciences: data collection, data analysis and report writing

Qualitative research in social sciences: data collection, data analysis and report writing

Signalling Reflexivity and Complexity: A Step Analysis of Methods Sections in Qualitative Social Science Research

Signalling Reflexivity and Complexity: A Step Analysis of Methods Sections in Qualitative Social Science Research

Memo Writing Procedures in Grounded Theory Research Methodology

This paper develops memo writing techniques within the framework of grounded theory methodology of qualitative research in social sciences. In grounded theory, memoing is one of the most important processes to develop and enrich theory. Memo is the written record of the researcher’s thinking. It is an analytical strategy that facilitates the researcher to achieve clear concept and truth from the data. It is considered as the tool of all kinds of notes taken by the researchers in grounded theory during their research. But yet there is a limited use of memo writing in other qualitative researches. Memoing increases investigation, inspection and continuity of data during the research analysis. In this study an attempt has been taken to discuss the aspects of memoing along with its benefits.

Sample Size for Interview in Qualitative Research in Social Sciences: A Guide to Novice Researchers

This review aimed to answer the question of how many interviews are enough for one qualitative research? The question ‘how many interviews are enough for one qualitative research is persistently controversial among qualitative researchers in social science. For this frequently occurring question especially among novice practitioners, the majority of scholars are opted to say no universally guiding rule to decide on a required number of sample for qualitative research rather ‘it depends’. But, this also raises another insight among researchers urging them to look for different things, i.e., on what circumstance would be making a decision about the required number of respondents depend? Though we lack one guideline dictating researchers how to decide on the number of sample size, the majority of researchers agree on one reasonable answer this is ‘it depends’. Indeed, in our work, we endeavor to identify, on what it depends? We also attempted to figure out or indicate the commonly referred range of sample size in qualitative research. Generally when we sum up our review work, the decision on “How many” is depended on several factors among which the following are some; the focus of the research, the type of research question, available resource and time, institutional committee requirements, the judgments of epistemic community in which a researcher is located, the nature of the selected group, the domain of inquiry, the experience of the researcher with qualitative research, and so on. Specific to number 20-60 is the most frequently observed range of sample size in qualitative research which of course is determined by the aforementioned factors.

Requirements for the use of impact-based forecasts and warnings by road maintenance services in Germany

Abstract. Impact-based forecasts and warnings (IBFs) are seen as important drivers for adequate anticipation and assessment of potential threats to public safety as they give a better understanding of the weather event's impacts. To prepare for impacts of weather events and prevent weather-related accidents, road maintenance services are actively using weather information in their daily work routine. This paper looks into the requirements that road maintenance services have for IBFs and how weather forecasts are used at the moment. The study is part of an interdisciplinary research project and follows a qualitative social science research approach. Findings show that the following factors are general user requirements: relevance of information, recognition of spatial and temporal requests, acceptability, comprehensibility, and technical demands. These are also applicable to IBFs with the extension to provide a benefit for road maintenance services in situations that rarely occur and where no embodied knowledge in the organization is existent.

Towards an integrative perspective on commercialised wild-gathered bamboo use: insights into the extraction of lung bamboo in the Vietnamese uplands

ABSTRACT Bamboo is a vital non-timber forest product (NTFP) and income source for rural communities in the Global South, including in Latin America, Asia, Africa and Oceania. Due to the manifold goods and services it provides to society, bamboo has recently drawn considerable attention in the forest-development discourse. The potential that bamboo offers as a substitute for timber in the industrialised production of pulp, paper, charcoal and flooring is spurring bamboo commercialisation in light of nascent bamboo-processing industries. This is most apparent in Asia, where Viet Nam has some of the largest forest bamboo resources and ambitious government plans aim to boost sector development in the future. As is observable worldwide, the bulk of bamboo in Viet Nam grows naturally, often as a weakly regulated common-pool resource. Hence, as for many other wild-gathered NTFPs, the commercialisation of the harvesting, trading and processing of forest bamboo raises questions about balancing use and conservation to achieve long-term sustainability. Empirical studies that provide an integrative perspective on wild-gathered bamboo commercialisation are rare. To close the knowledge gap, this exploratory study investigates the social, economic and ecological dimensions of the commercialisation of lung bamboo (Bambusa longissima sp. nov.), a native bamboo species endemic to north-central Viet Nam. We combined quantitative and qualitative social science research methods with a forest inventory of selected lung bamboo exploitation sites in the Que Phong district (a mountainous region of Nghe An province), where lung bamboo use constitutes a vital element of local livelihoods. Our results highlight the need to consider the complex interplay of local livelihoods, harvesting regimes, institutional arrangements and value-chain configurations to understand the ecological outcomes of wild-gathered bamboo commercialisation. We call for the adoption of an integrative perspective when designing practical project interventions, sector plans and policies for forest bamboo commercialisation. Promoting alternative livelihood options, robust and clear institutional arrangements to regulate access and tenure, capacity building in management and harvesting and, not least, supportive commodity-chain governance are critical elements on the pathway to greater sustainability in wild-gathered bamboo commercialisation.

The role of qualitative social science. Discussion of “Guiding principles for hydrologists conducting interdisciplinary research and fieldwork with participants”

ABSTRACT To understand two-way linkages between water and society, achieve sustainable water management, and effectively communicate science and policy outcomes, Rangecroft et al. (2021) highlight the need for interdisciplinary collaboration between hydrologists and social scientists and outline considerations for conducting fieldwork with participants.1In this discussion, I expand upon Rangecroft et al. (2021) to propose two contributions of qualitative social science for research about social-hydrological systems. First, qualitative social science research can help build an understanding of the lived experiences and perspectives of individuals within hydrological systems with the aim of sustainable water management. Second, drawing from a constructivist theoretical framework, qualitative social science research can highlight nuance and complexity within social-hydrological systems. In my discussion of these contributions, I provide real-world examples of effective data integration from research on the impacts of natural hazards, groundwater governance, understanding systematic vulnerabilities and adaptation to water scarcity, and sustainability science and planning.

Resistance of Local Actors to the Leasing of Water Supply in the Village of Atchannou in South-West Benin

Leasing as an innovation in the governance of the Village Water Supply System (VWSS) should, a priori, allow local authorities to manage the delivery of drinking water to rural populations in Benin rationally and transparently. However, instead of being favourably welcomed, this system has met with resistance from local actors. Based on the premise that leasing involves issues that are insufficiently elucidated by its innovators, this article analyses the causes of the resistance observed in its implementation. To achieve this goal, a qualitative social science research method was used, favouring discussion with 18 participants. The data were analysed in the backdrop of the market mode of local governance and fuzzy set theory. The results of this research show that the populations of Atchannou Village do not fully accept the leasing of water, or at least they set out the preconditions to be met by the local government authorities before this innovative approach to governance of the water point can become operational: guaranteeing the management of the funds from the sale of water (1), and repaying the debts related to the community management of the water supply (2). The local actors are therefore in a logic of preserving the interests that will be generated by the sale of water, which is now retroceded to the Municipality; this further increase their resistance to the leasing of the water supply system.

Qualitative Research in Social Sciences: A Research Profiling Study

The principal objective of this study was to profile qualitative research in social sciences through a comprehensive examination of 10,637 documents. An analysis on how scholars from central/peripheral countries included in the qualitative research citations/publications is presented. Central/peripheral distinction is used to determine the trends in the globalization of qualitative research. With the comprehensive examination, this paper will shed light on the discussion of the patterns of globalization in qualitative research. Science mapping technique among bibliometric methods was employed. This paper is based on studies that published in journals that use the English word/term "qualitative" in their titles. The data for this study encompassed 10,637 documents published between 1995 and 2019 by 16,884 authors. Our findings reveal that qualitative research continue to be mostly North America- and Europe-centered initiatives. A similar situation is also observed for the most cited publications and the affiliated institutes of their authors. The studies focus primarily on the individuals' self and social experiences, social psychology, and their knowledge, attitude, and behaviors in education. The most cited publications and the institutions with the highest number of publications are all North America- and Europe-centered. Another finding is that six of every 10 qualitative research are about medical sciences.

Qualitative Research in Social Sciences: Data Collection, Data Analysis, and Report Writing

Qualitative Research in Social Sciences: Data Collection, Data Analysis, and Report Writing

From the Editors

Welcome to the third volume of JoAE. Similar to the previous two editorials, here we offer an update regarding the journal, as well as ponder one of the stupefying dilemmas we have encountered: the “So What?” question.Last year we found ourselves in some manuscript submission conundrums. The primary issue involved the processing of manuscripts. As of this writing (September 2021), we have 90+ submissions for this year, and more than 200 manuscripts in some form of revision or review from the previous two years. Using Google’s G Suite for manuscript submission and correspondence was not sustainable. We needed to evolve.We migrated to the web-based journal management system Scholastica. We made some beginners’ mistakes, but the system makes organizing submissions quicker and easier. Moreover, we felt we were overwhelming our editorial board and ad hoc reviewers. After consultation with experienced journal editors, we began issuing more “desk rejects.” If manuscripts do not follow submission guidelines1 and/or disregards our previous editors’ introductions2 or the JoAE blog,3 we no longer send them out for peer review. We appreciate our reviewers and want to protect their time and effort; they offer their passion and unpaid labor to make this journal go.Another issue was the overwhelming number of COVID-19 submissions. We made the decision to reject a majority of these. Why? Most were chronologies: “This happened, and this happened, and this happened.” They did not satisfy the showing-telling characteristic of solid autoethnographic writing. Moreover, while providing personal experience, a majority of manuscripts did not answer the all-important “So What?” question: Why does (or should) your experience matter to others? Why should readers care about your issues and experiences? For COVID-19 manuscripts, we believe the So What? question was (is) difficult to answer because we are all still living with the pandemic.4The “So What?” dilemma was not just a challenge for COVID-19 submissions. Many submissions we desk rejected also did not answer the “So What?” question. In some manuscripts it was not clear if the author even considered the “So What?” question. Therefore, in this editorial, we thought it would be meaningful to consider the “So What?” question not only for JoAE but for autoethnographic research in general.5We reflected on why some autoethnographers appear to have difficulty answering the “So What?” question. We suggest that to answer the question, autoethnographers need to seriously consider four “How” questions:This list is not all-encompassing, nor do all the “how” questions need to be answered to fully answer the “So What?” question.Answering the “So What?” question is clearer when pursuing research in the sciences. “This analysis is the first in the United States to assess COVID-19 vaccination coverage among pregnant women.”8 This statement (and article) has obvious important health care implications. The Event Horizon Telescope Collaboration answered the “So What?” question when they showed “Our radio-wave observations thus provide powerful evidence for the presence of supermassive black holes in centers of galaxies and as the central engines of active galactic nuclei.”9 They are moving physics forward. Even in traditional quantitative and qualitative social science research, the “So What?” question is more easily answered. “Group identification and stream familiarity were found to be positively related to perceived credibility. These findings hold implications for using video game streams as a marketing tool…”10 But, for autoethnography, answering the question requires much more skill, deliberation, and nuance.We want to publish articles that use autoethnography to add to understandings of the complexities of personal and social experience. Or manuscripts that add to or complicate our understandings of the philosophical underpinnings of autoethnography. Or manuscripts that examine new subjects through an autoethnographic lens. The “So What?” question is critical, and authors must show and tell why their research is important and necessary, as well as why we, readers, should care about their work. Insightful and nuanced answers and analyses will help steer manuscripts away from a dreary desk reject

Computational Social Science for Nonprofit Studies: Developing a Toolbox and Knowledge Base for the Field

How can computational social science (CSS) methods be applied in nonprofit and philanthropic studies? This paper summarizes and explains a range of relevant CSS methods from a research design perspective and highlights key applications in our field. We define CSS as a set of computationally intensive empirical methods for data management, concept representation, data analysis, and visualization. What makes the computational methods “social” is that the purpose of using these methods is to serve quantitative, qualitative, and mixed-methods social science research, such that theorization can have a solid ground. We illustrate the promise of CSS in our field by using it to construct the largest and most comprehensive database of scholarly references in our field, the Knowledge Infrastructure of Nonprofit and Philanthropic Studies (KINPS). Furthermore, we show that through the application of CSS in constructing and analyzing KINPS, we can better understand and facilitate the intellectual growth of our field. We conclude the article with cautions for using CSS and suggestions for future studies implementing CSS and KINPS.