This document provides an overview of qualitative research methods in information and library science. It compares qualitative and quantitative methods, describing key differences such as qualitative research focusing on discovery, themes, and understanding events in natural settings using tools like observation, interviews, and content analysis. The document discusses examples and considerations for using these qualitative methods, emphasizing that the researcher is the main research tool and qualitative validity relies on techniques like triangulation.

1. Qualitative research methods in
information and library science
dr. Alenka Šauperl
Department of Library and
Information Science and Book
Studies, Faculty of Arts,
University of Ljubljana
alenka.sauperl@ff.uni-lj.si

2. Comparison of quantitative and
qualitative methods
QUANTITATIVE
 Hypothesis testing
 Variables
 Measuring instruments
developed before the actual
project starts
 Numeric data, precise,
exact measurement
 Standardized procedures,
repetitions
 Analysis: statistical
methods, charts and tables
 Results: charts, tables,
facts
 Validity: statistical tests
QUALITATIVE
 Discovery and understanding of events
 Themes, motives, categories
 Measuring instruments develop during
the project, considering setting and
researcher
 Textual data, documents,
observations, descriptive
 Individualized procedures, repetitions
are difficult and different
 Analysis: seeking patterns,
generalizations from available data
 Results: stories, narratives,
descriptions
 Validity: triangulation, peer review

3. Qualitative methods
 Researcher collects data in a real environment.
 Researcher himself/herself is the key research tool.
 Focus of research is a process or activity itself, not just
results of that process or activity.
 Data collected is most often verbal (non-numerical).
 Verbal data analysis (rarely numerical).
 Results are facts with limited usability and new
research questions. Rarely verification of hypothesized
relationships are confirmed.

4. Why engage in qualitative
research?
 Different research methods supplement each other.
 Qualitative methods focus on social interactions and
the individual in that social situation – just like libraries
and information centres.
 We should use all means to aid our efforts in attracting
more users and fulfilling their information needs.

5. Most frequently used methods
 Observation
– The researcher observes events and behavior in natural
setting
– Diary – “self-observation”
 Interview
– Opinions and feelings of interviewed people
– Formal and informal
– Group discussion, focus group
 Content analysis
– Artefacts, documents – not people
– Also part of every other qualitative research

6. Observation
 We are intrigued by a problem in a library
 We observe
– A certain space (reference desk)
– An individual or a group of people (catalogers, OPAC users)
– An activity (storytelling)
 Observation has to be
– Systematic and open
– Nonobtrusive but not covert

7. Observation: An example
 Cobus, L., Dent, V.F. & Ondusek, A. 2005.
How twenty-eight users helped redesign and
academic library Web site: a usability study.
Reference & User Services Quarterly, vol. 44,
no. 3, pp. 232-46.
– Does the organization of the library Web site help
users find the desired information?
– Hunter College Library, City University of New York
– Result: a user friendly Web site

8. Research design
 Quantitative part:
– Exercises for participants: counting moves,
measuring time
 Qualitative part:
– Observing participants during their work on
exercises: what confuses them, how do they
understand terms

9. Quantitative part
 Example questions:
– Find a book by [author name]
– Find the loan period for books
 Research assistants were trained to administer the
questionnaire and manage the session
 The sessions were audiotaped, the work on the
computer was captured
 Analysis of results prompted redesign of the Web site
and redesign of research project

10. Qualitative part
 Participants were asked to talk more freely
about what features they found interesting,
what terms were familiar/unfamiliar to them,
what spots of the page were obviously links.
 Recording of speach and computer moves

11. Observation with unstructured
interview 1/6
 Recording equipment
– shy participants
 Placing of the researcher
– personality/attitude, dress, guidance
 Interaction with the participant - observation
– Ask the person sitting next to you to show you what
do they carry in their purse or pockets.

12. Observation with unstructured
interview 2/6
 Interaction with the participant - observation
– Ask the person sitting next to you to show you what
do they carry in their purse or pockets.
– How do you as the researcher feel?
– How do you as the participant feel?

13. Observation with unstructured
interview 3/6
 Interaction with the participant - observation
– Ask the person sitting next to you to show you what do they
carry in their purse or pockets.
– How do you as the researcher feel?
– How do you as the participant feel?
– What can you as the researcher do to make the participant
feel comfortable and willing to give the information you need?
– In what circumstances would you as a participant be willing to
comply with the researcher honestly?

14. Observation with unstructured
interview 4/6
 Interaction with the participant - interview
– Ask the person sitting next to you: What do you
think of dr. Šauperl’s slides?

15. Observation with unstructured
interview 5/6
 Interaction with the participant
– Ask the person sitting next to you: What do you
think of dr. Šauperl’s slides?
– How did you as a researcher ask the question?
– What did you as a participant hear as a question?

16. Observation with unstructured
interview 6/6
 Interaction with the participant
– Ask the person sitting next to you: What do you
think of dr. Šauperl’s slides?
– How did you as a researcher ask the question?
– What did you as a participant hear as a question?
– nonverbal clues, timing, place, social “pressure”

17. Interview
 Usually a series of interviews with individuals
 Structured or unstructured
 Usual questions: who, what, where, when, how, why
 Only ask things that cannot be observed
 New questions emerge during the interview
 New issues emerge during and after the interview,
therefore we sometimes need to return to the same
interviewee

18. Content analysis
 Analysis of text
– Archival documents describe the library’s
development
– Notes, that a researcher takes during an
observation session report on events during that
session

19. Content analysis: an example
 Wilson, T.D. 2004. Talking about the problem: a
content analysis of pre-search interviews. Information
Research, vol.10, no.1, paper 206. [Available at
http://InformationR.net/ir/10-1/paper206.html].
[Accessed 2005-09-25].
– How do researchers talk about their problems in the course of
pre-search interviews and what are the difficulties they
experience in carrying out their own searches?
– Result: search results are better if the librarian (a professional
intermediary searcher) helps the researchers with searching
for relevant literature

20. Content analysis
 Transcriptions of recorded observations
– What to write and how
– Illustration: Wilson, Appendix 2
 Categorization
– What constitutes a category
– Development of categories
– Illustration: Wilson, Fig. 2
 Search for patterns
– What is repetitive and what do we want to see repetitive
– Illustration: Wilson, Fig. 3, Appendix 3

21. Ethical considerations
 Confidentiality
– Misuse
– Erroneous interpretation
 Successfull researchers establish a very
sincere personal relationship with their
participants. Sometimes they even become
friends. In any case this relationship is based
on MUTUAL RESPECT AND TRUST.

22. Informed consent
 Participants and institutions need to agree to
be studied
 Formal documents:
– Letter asking for access
– Permission from the institution
– Informed consent letter from individuals
 Trust and confidentiality

23. Combination of methods
 Rare use of one method only
– Methods supplement each other
– Triangulation (validation)
 What is the best combination depends on the
research question
– Learn strengths and weaknesses of each method

24. Reliability
Can study be repeated with the same results?
– Did participants tell the truth?
– Does the event change with time?
– Do we get the same results by gathering data with
different methods? (triangulation)

25. Validity
Do your results represent true picture of
events/processes?
– Is the event meaningful considering the observed
patterns?
– Do we get the same results by gathering data with
different methods? (triangulation)
– Is the emerging theory confirmed with new
observations?

26. Organization of the project
 Researcher’s role
 Research plan
 Preparing for the start
 Pilot study
 Changes to the original plan
 Conducting “real” research
 Analysis
 Writing report

27. Researcher’s role
 Researcher is the research instrument
 Obtrusive or covert
 Outsider or participant
 “Computer with two processors”
– Merging into the setting
– Gathering data

28. Research plan 1/3
 Selection of the topic:
– Am I able to conduct such a research project?
– May I gain access to people, organisations,
documents?
– Is the participant or institution neutral?
– Does my research make sense at all?
 Research question:
– Describe the problem
– Formulate the question

29. Research plan 2/3
 Literature review
– Extensive reading of published research and
methodology
– Selective reading (relevant studies)
– Criteria for reading and evaluating published
research
 Learn from errors of other researchers, don’t
make your own mistakes.

30. Research plan 3/3
 Theoretical framework
– Which theories are relevant for my research?
– Verification of an existing theory
– Symbolic interactionist grounded theory,
postmodernist theory, hermeneutics
 Selection of research/data gathering method
 Many loops in the process

31. Pilot study
 Learning from mistakes
 Testing
– researcher
– research plan
– method
– setting
 Improving results:
– re-formulate the research question
– improve research plan
– change or adjust the data gathering/analysis method

32. The real thing!
Conducting research
– How good am I as a research tool
– Data storage or loss
– Differences among participants

33. Data storage
 Video and sound recording
 Notes
– Notes structure

34. Notes structure
Observed data Place, date, time, participant, identification of the particular
observation
Description of
participants
What were they like? (sad, dressed in pink)
Description of the
researcher
I was not in a good mood and I posed questions that
implied answers.
Description of the
setting
Very few users in the library.
Topics A detailed description of an interview or observation.
(verbal communication)
Events A detailed description of events, gestures, movements
during an interview, observation (nonverbal
communication)

35. Types of notes
 Field notes – taken during observation,
interview
 Reflexive notes, journal – taken after leaving
the setting

36. Getting ready for analysis
 Transcription
– Usually a computer file
– Preparing audio and sound recordings for analysis
– Textual form

37. Data analysis
 During data collection and after collection is completed
– During data collection: preliminary analysis, coding
– After data collection: detailed analysis
– Several cycles of analysis
 Content analysis
 Processes:
– Data reduction
 Separating useful from nonuseful
– Data display (charts, flowcharts, maps, etc.)
 Making sense of huge quantity of data
– Making and verifying findings
 Going back to original data

38. A little help from … a computer
 Software:
– Nud*Ist
– The Ethnograph
– and others
 Garbage in– Garbage out!

39. Writing a report
 Special characteristics of research also imply
special characteristics of reports
– Rich descriptions, narratives
– Important elements:
 Methodology: detailed description of research methods, with
explanation of triangulation
 Weaknesses and limitations of selected methods and
research project as a whole:
– Weaknesses of the methods
– Researcher’s weaknesses

40. Sources
 Handouts on the Web:
– Selected annotated bibliography of resources in
English, available at the Jinonice library
– A short list of sources not available at the Jinonice
library
– My published work

41. Thank
you.
Grad Otočec
(1252)