This document provides an overview of participant observation as a qualitative research method used in social science. It discusses key aspects of the method such as defining participant observation, determining the observer's role, sampling, recording observations through field notes, analyzing data, and ensuring ethical research practices. The document also traces the origins and development of participant observation in fields like sociology and anthropology. Challenges like potential ethical issues or dangers in the field are also addressed.

1. Understanding Social
Science Research
Participant observation and the Ethnographic method
Michael Palkowski
M.Palkowski@napier.ac.uk

2. Session aims
●To provide an overview of the goals and processes involved in
participant observation
●To address the practical steps involved in collecting and recording
observational data
●To consider challenges which may occur during participant
observation

3. Defining participant observation
“The participant observer gathers data by
participating in the daily life of the group or
organization he [sic] studies. He watches the
people he is studying to see what situations they
ordinarily meet and how they behave in them. He
enters into conversation with some or all the
participants in these situations and discovers their
interpretations of the events he has observed.”
(Becker, 1958: 652)

4. Key elements of participant observation
●‘Living in the context for an extended period of time’
●‘Learning and using local language and dialect’
●‘Actively participating in a wide range of daily, routine and
extraordinary activities with people who are full participants in
that context’
●‘Using everyday conversation as an interviewing technique’
●‘Informally observing during leisure activities (hanging out)’
●‘Recording observations in fieldnotes’ and
●‘Using both tacit and explicit information in analysis and
writing’
(Dewalt and Dewalt, 2001: 4)

5. Epistemological and ontological
assumptions in participant
observation
• Social constructionism: Knowledge is created by and
made meaningful by individuals. Society is socially
constructed on the basis of how its members make
sense of it.

6. Where did the method originate and why did it
become popular in the social sciences?
• Two concurrent areas of investigation. Empirical based sociology focused on
the urban landscape in America and cultural anthropological studies of far off
tribal populations.
• Empirical forms of sociology emerged particularly in what is termed the
“first” Chicago school of sociology (1920-1932) and the ‘second’ school,
which was just as influential as the first (1940-1955)
• To the Chicago School the city itself was of utmost value as a laboratory for
exploring social interaction. The city was like an organism. For the Chicago
School researchers, true “human nature” was best observed within this
complex social artifice. Wandering around observing in a natural environment
became a powerful way of exploring a whole range of issues like social class,
immigration, homelessness, poverty and race relations.

7. Ernest Burgess
• Using the city of Chicago as
an example, it was proposed
that cities were environments
like those found in nature
• In his influential “concentric
zone model”, Burgess
theorized a ‘structure’ to the
city he lived and worked in,
using participant observation.
He observed people’s living
habits and daily routines and
how people lived.

8. Social/Cultural Anthropology
• Cultural Anthropology became popular with researchers like
Malinkowski (1922) and Mead (1928) who immersed themselves
in the norms and values of tribal societies as participant
observers. Ethnography thus became associated with studying
cultures and societies that were far removed from our own.
Researchers eventually turned the gaze back to our own values,
norms and subcultures and studied them in much the same way
that these researchers studied tribal communities.

9. Why use participant observation?
● ‘Interviews…provide important data, but they reveal only how
people perceive what happens, not what actually happens.
Direct observation may be more reliable than what people say in
many instances. It can be particularly useful to discover whether
people do what they say they do, or behave in the way they claim
to behave’ (Bell, 1999: 156)
● ‘Observation guides us to some of the important questions we
want to ask the respondent, and interviewing helps us to
interpret the significance of what we are observing’ (Whyte,
1984: 96 cited in May, 2001: 159).

10. Stages of Participant Observation
1.Preparation
2.In the field
3.Recording Observations
4.Analyzing Data

11. A non linear research model
Participant Observation does not operate using a linear
research structure. The process is one of a constant
interaction between problem formation, data collection
and data analysis. The analysis of data feeds into
research design; data collection and theory come to be
developed out of data analysis. All subsequent data
collection is guided strategically by the emergent theory

12. Before going to the field:
Preparation
● Building rapport and gaining the support of ‘gatekeepers’ is key. Gatekeepers
are important for you as a researcher as gaining access gets you important
informants and field sites []
● After gaining the support of gatekeepers, ‘snowballing’ can occur. Which is a
naturalistic form of data collection. Starting the ball rolling as soon as possible
is desirable.
● Make sure you have a clear research purpose, a theoretical context and clearly
demarcated observational goals before going to the field.
● Your observer role needs to be decided upon. Will you participate in the
observations you are taking? Will you be detached? Will the people you are
observing know that you are a researcher?
● Consider issues of ‘Impression Management’.
● Make sure you have the right recording equipment, notepads and pens. Often
a mobile phone is the best for taking quick audio notes.
● Ethical concerns should also be addressed before going to the field. This is
usually about gaining ethical clearance from your university. (More on this
later)

13. Basic principles of site selection
• Select a site so that the issue (be it
academic/theoretical or of a current-events nature)
can be studied in a reasonably clear fashion.
• Select a site in which the research will not come to be
seen as a burden on the local population
• (Angrosino 2007)

14. Site selection examples
• Site selection for theoretical interests
• Site selection for policy issues
• Public spaces such as airports and parks.

15. Being in the field
● Becoming sensitized to what is happening around you
● Taking in the bigger picture and then focusing in on
selected areas of interest
● Using time between blocks of observation to make
analytical memos, to make connections between what you
are observing and your research questions, and if necessary,
to pose new questions
● Leaving the field sensitively and courteously

16. What to consider when beginning to
observe in the field
• How the observation may be affected by the sex, sexuality,
ethnicity, class, appearance, age, language, personality, temperament,
attitude, interpersonal behavior, familiarity with the situation,
involvement and concern of the observer
• Whether the observer will stand or sit, or move around a setting.
• How systematic, structured or descriptive the notes will be
• The ‘unit’ of observation (e.g. a teacher, a student; a pair, a small
group, a class)
• What resources are necessary
• Problems that might be encountered

17. Determining your observer role (Angrosino
2007)
• Participants-as-observers (Or “native scientists”)
• Observers-as-participants
• Complete Participants

19. Observer membership (Angrosino 2007)
• Complete Membership (Insider)
• Active Membership (Engaged outsider)
• Peripheral Membership (Detached outsider)
• Evolving Membership (Changing membership due
to a disagreement about the researcher’s role in the
community)
• Complete Observers (Total detachment)

20. Issues to consider when sampling
• Participant Observation tends to use theoretical sampling.
• Three points:
• 1)- Time: attitudes and activities may vary over time so a
study may have to represent this
• 2)- people: people vary so a range of types should be
investigated
• 3)- Context: people do different things in different
contexts so a variety of these will have to be studied.
Contextual sensitivity is vital to an ethnographic project.

21. Garbology
• Some researchers use indirect forms of observation within a
particular cultural setting such as observing the effects of certain
activities. These are called “behaviour trace studies”. They are
complete outsiders and take the role of a non-participant.
• A well known example (which has interesting ethical dimensions)
is a study conducted by Rathje et al (1984) who was interested in
consumer behaviour. The research team started to analyse
garbage from a representative sample of households in several
American municipalities. According to local laws in the study
community, trash placed at the curb for pick up is no longer
considered private property.

22. Writing field notes
Gobo (2008: 208-212) suggests four types of field-
notes:
●Observational notes
●Methodological notes
●Emotional notes
●Theoretical notes

23. Field note method/style
• Goode (2002) described his note taking as follows, “I took
extremely detailed notes, usually within 24 hours after the fact,
during the entire time I spent with NAAFA”
• “I quoted conversations between informants and myself whose
wording is as close to what was said as my notes and the
vagaries of my memory can render them. If the reader
recognizes small poetic liberties taken with inessential
descriptive details, the author begs indulgence on that point at
least. The writing style of this account falls somewhere what
Van Maanen refers to as “confessional tales” and his
“impressionist tales” (1988, pp. 73–100, 101–124). Van Maanen
states that these are legitimate and recognized styles of
ethnographic writing. Here, I take him at his word.”

24. Writing field notes (continued)
● Overt note-taking
● Covert note-taking
● Use of mobile phone/voice recorder/other technology
● Retrospective note-taking
● Contents: description; quoted speech; drawings/diagrams
e.g. floor plan. These can be used to aid memory later.

25. What to observe: Spradley’s (1980)
nine dimensions
1. Space
2. Actors
3. Activities
4. Objects
5. Acts
6. Events
7. Time
8. Goals
9. Feelings

26. Thick Description
• A thick description … does more than record what a
person is doing. It goes beyond mere fact and surface
appearances. It presents detail, context, emotion, and the
webs of social relationships that join persons to one
another. Thick description evokes emotionality and self-
feelings. It inserts history into experience. It establishes
the significance of an experience, or the sequence of
events, for the person or persons in question. In thick
description, the voices, feelings, actions, and meanings of
interacting individuals are heard. (Denzin, 1989, p. 83)

27. Example of ‘Thick Description’: Social Class
and Nightclubbing
“There is a general different in the appearance of the women at the middle-class and
working-class clubs. Dancers perform much more closely to the hegemonic cultural ideals
of attractiveness at Perfections and The Oasis [both ‘middle-class’ clubs] than do the
dancers at the working-club. In these middle-class clubs, there is a narrowly restricted range
of women’s body types. For example, there are very few overweight dancers, women with
short hair, older women, women with strong musculature, or nonwhite women. About half
of the dancers at each middle-class club appear to have breast implants, and most of the
others have naturally large breasts. […] Most of the women wear their hair styled in some
way (i.e., curled, gelled, sprayed), but all wear their hair loose, flowing down their shoulders
and back. Only occasionally will a dancer wear her hair up in pigtails to match a schoolgirl
costume. All of the women wear makeup, and the majority of the dancers heavily
accentuate their eyes with glitter, eyeliner, or eye shadows. Most have long fingernails
painted in light or neon shades that reflect the black lights of the club” (Trautner (2005)
‘Doing Gender, Doing Class: The Performance of Sexuality in Exotic Dance Clubs’, Gender
& Society, 19, (6), 771-788).

28. Another Example of ‘Thick
Description’: Wall Street and Finance
Capitalism (Karen Ho 2009)
• Research conducted from 1996-1999
• Over 100 interviews which were supplanted with
notes that were taken ‘pre-fieldwork’
• Her informants were mainly ivy league university
alumni and professional acquaintances who helped
her gain access to investment banks, outplacement
agencies, conferences, panel discussions and informal
social venues)

29. Key Findings: Socialization into Elite
Status
• Ho argues that wall Street employees go through a process of
socialization. Only the top students from elite Ivy League
universities are hired.
• Once hired, long hours and tough assignments are the norm, which
leads those who remain to internalize the belief that they are among
the smartest and hardest working individuals in corporate America
or, as Ho describes them, “avatars of the market” (p. 99). These
socialization practices are reinforced by Wall Street’s money
meritocracy, which is both an explanation of and justification for
Wall Street’s social order and employee composition
• Corporate Norms: Ho explains how Wall Street’s short-term focus
and culture of job insecurity and volatility spread into corporate
America and became the model of workplace relations. She observes
no relationship between employment cycles and the greater economy
and stock market and that Wall Street employment volatility occurs in
both bull and bear markets.

30. “As with most research, there was both highs and lows. The highs
could be a particularly easy night where nothing went wrong and
no major problems occurred. Colleagues weren’t always the
ignorant thugs they are often portrayed as, and their company
could on occasion be exceptionally entertaining. … The worst
research experiences usually involved some form of violence.
Some violent incidents were easily dealt with and quickly
forgotten, while others remained etched upon the brain for some
time. There was blood, broken bones, threats and curses and
kicks and punches thrown. … Just as bouncers had to engage in
violence, they also had to witness it with alarming regularity, and
what the bouncers saw and did, so did our research.” (Winlow
2001 pp.544-545)
Being in the firing line: the dangers of the field
as an observer

31. Bad ethics in participant observation research?
Erich Goode’s foray into the organizational dynamics of fat rights
activism (2002). Highlights the problem of trying to appease
gatekeepers too much and of not having clearly demarcated
researcher/participant roles.
Alice Goffman’s ethnography of a poor black community in West
Philadelphia, which led to her driving a get away car in a murder
plot (2014)

32. Bad ethics in participant observation (continued)
• Howard Parker’s (1974) participant observation with a group
of young males in Liverpool, UK.
• He found they stole car radios to fund their lifestyle which
involved heavy cannabis use, heavy drinking and fighting. Parker
joined in some of their activities and admits he got so involved
that he actually kept watch while they stole car radios. When
some of the boys were prosecuted for their activities, they turned
to Parker for support and advice.

34. When Prophecy Fails: Discussion
Exercise
• In a study, researchers join a small apocalyptic religious group,
where they covertly observe and interview members of the
group in order to study their reactions when the world was not
destroyed on the date that they predicted.
• Some issues:
• Is covert observation of private meetings in people’s homes an
invasion of privacy?
• Was it legitimate to deceive the participants by pretending to
share their beliefs?
• (See Festinger et al. 1956; Riecken 1956; Erikson 1967; Bok
1978.)

35. Ensuring ethical participant
observation research
• Gaining ethical clearance from the university is important,
but it gives you an opportunity to make your
observational goals and participation agenda clearer.
• Gaining informed consent and protecting participants
from harm. Depending on the context, process consent
might be a better fit, especially if living within and
studying a host community (remember evolving observer
role earlier)
• Confidentiality of participants in transcripts, the use of
pseudonyms. This includes the blurring of faces in
photographs and so on.

36. Strengths of Using Participant
observation
• There is a depth to the data (uses multiple data sources and attempts to
triangulate)
• The method is highly flexible and many different data sources can be used
(Interviews/Observation/Diaries/Focus Groups etc.)
• Naturally occurring data - able to observe how people actually behave
• Can bring subjugated narratives, stories and cultures into view.
• Allows us to develop theory from the ‘ground up’
• Gives us a good understanding of context
• Helps people to record their way of life

37. Weaknesses of Using Participant
Observation
• It can be time consuming
• Can result in significant ‘culture shock’ (in a sea of unfamiliar people,
symbols, activities, social cues)
• Depending on the context, it can be costly.
• Arguably lacks the ability to generalize as meaning is specific to the group
being studied
• Can lose focus of what the field is: the problem of going ‘native’
• Depending on the context, the research can be potentially dangerous to
the researcher.
• Depending on theoretical perspective, the data is subject to observer bias
and thus lacks objectivity
• Can have significant ethical issues as we have discussed.

38. Summary
● Participant observation requires a questioning engagement
with life in a particular setting.
● Participant observation facilitates deep and vivid insights
into the cultures and practices of different groups
● Achieving these insights requires time, patience and good
rapport
● Rich participant observation data is evidenced in part
through ‘thick description’ and through field-notes, which
should bring the setting and its participants to life.

39. Selected references
● Angrosino, V. M, (2007a), “Naturalistic Observation”, Left Coast Press, CA, USA.
● Angrosino, V.M, (2007b) Doing Ethnographic and Observational Research,
London: Sage.
● Becker, H. (1958) ‘Problems of Inference and Proof in Participant Observation’,
American Sociological Review, 23, 652-60.
● Bryman, A. (2008) Social Research Methods, 3rd Edition, Oxford: Oxford
University Press.
● Burgess, R. (1984) In the Field: An Introduction to Field Research, London: Allen
and Unwin.
● Crang, M. and Cook, I. (2007) Doing Ethnographies, London: Sage.
● Gobo, G. (2008) Doing Ethnography, London: Sage.
● Sarantakos, S. (2005) Social Research, 3rd Edition, Basingstoke: Palgrave
● Winlow, S. et al. (2001) ‘Get ready to duck: bouncers and the realities of
ethnographic research on violent groups’ British Journal of Criminology, 41(3): 536-
548.