Module 3 – Choosing your research strategy

Summary – Robson (2002) Chapters 4, 5, 6 and 7

This is a summary of Part 2 (Chapters 4, 5, 6 and 7) of your textbook which you can use to help you decide which design strategy is appropriate for your project.

  1. You need to decide should your design be Fixed or Flexible?

  2. Then you need to decide which tradition/design you think is most appropriate. For example if your project was to investigate how a particular teacher uses technology in her classroom then the likely decisions would be Flexible – Case Study – Individual Case Study.

You can use the page and box number references in the summary to revisit sections of the textbook.

1. Fixed Designs

  • General features (p98)
    Fixed designs are usually concerned with aggregates, with group properties and with general tendencies

    • Variables (p99)
      Fundamental concept central to fixed design research

  • Establishing trustworthiness (p100)
    Have you done a good, thorough and honest job? Have you tried to explore, describe or explain in an open and unbiased way?

    • Validity

      • Reliability
      • Observer Error
      • Construct Validity
      • Internal Validity

    • Generalizability (External Validity)
    • Objectivity
    • Credibility

2. Flexible Designs

  • General features
    It is respectable and acceptable in virtually all areas of social research (including applied fields such as education, health, social work, and business and management) to use research designs based largely or exclusively on methods generating qualitative data.

  • Establishing trustworthiness
    The trustworthiness of findings from flexible qualitative research is the subject of much debate. The notion of trustworthiness is important whether you use a fixed or a flexible design. If you opt for a flexible design then you must communicate what strategies you have used to show the reader you have done a good, thorough and honest job, and that you have tried to explore, describe or explain in an open and unbiased way. In discussing trustworthiness for flexible designs Robson (2002) uses the terms:
    • Validity
    • Reliability
    • Generalizability

Copyright

Acknowledgement