Implicit assumptions guide choice of qualitative method: how and why do numerous and distinct methods demonstrate a preference over others.
By Vivian Yang
Introduction
Qualitative research, as opposed to the other paradigms are commonly seen as a naturalistic and interpretative approach that emphasises on words rather than numbers (Bryman and Bell, 2011). Despite the fact that numerous researchers (Silverman,1993; Denzin and Lincoln, 2005, cited Bryman and Bell, 2011) have questioned the nature of qualitative research being too subjective, difficult to duplicate, hard to generalise and lack of transparency, qualitative research has becoming widely used and accepted in social science, in which fluid and unobservable elements such as perceptions, feelings, motivations and values contribute to (Riley et al., 2000). According to Phillimore and Goodson (2004), the underlying premise of majority of the qualitative researchers is that people, which is the subject being studied, do attribute meanings to environments and events. Therefore, qualitative research is suitable for researcher who are seeking for the “deep meaning”, “inside view” and “initial causes” underneath the surface of human behaviours (Sechrest and Sidani, 1995, cited in Velez, 2011).
Research methods, which are often associated with various types of research designs, are defined by Bryman and Bell (2011) as approaches used by researchers for primary data collecting. Scholars have various thoughts in regard to the identification of qualitative research methods. The majority of the researchers (Locke, Silverman and Spirduso, 2010; Creswell,2009; Marshall and Rossman,1999, cited in Thomas et al., 2011) agree that the most frequently employed data collection methods that have been developed to study phenomena in natural occurring settings include observation, interviews, and review of documents. Nonetheless, Bryman and Bell (2011) specified observation as ethnography and participant observation whilst Newby (2010) categorises the qualitative approaches in a completely different way by identifying them as ethnography, action research and case study. Furthermore, focus groups is also considered as one of the major approaches. Regardless of the complexity in categorisation, Snape and Spencer (2003) state that it is crucial to understand that there is no universal way of conducting qualitative research.
Carnaghan (2013) emphasises that a certain set of beliefs and implicit philosophical assumptions are embedded in choices of researchers. Researchers’ choices of a distinctive method is largely influenced by ontology (their beliefs and theories of the social entities), epistemology (their theory of nature of knowledge or what should be considered as acceptable knowledge), aim of the research, characteristics of the research participants and environment of the researchers themselves (Ritchie and Lewis, 2003). Being able to acknowledge the implicit assumptions of the researchers own research decisions, helps avoiding weaknesses in the chosen method in order to generate a more satisfying result(ibid). Therefore, researchers should be aware of assumptions underlying their research enterprises which will assist them more appropriately in choice of approaches and that will contribute to the development of science (Slife et al., 2005, 2008; Ponterotto, 2005; Slife, 1998;Hoshmand, 1989, cited Gelo, 2010).
Extremely limited insights have been shed to the underlying assumptions that influence the research process and choice of research methods. Aiming to investigate the implicit assumptions that guide certain choice and why numerous and distinct methods demonstrate a preference over others, the author decided to firstly find out which methods in particular are utilised most frequently by qualitative researchers in recent years. Bearing this in mind, the author randomly selected numerous articles that employ qualitative research methods in International Journal of Hospitality Management which were published within the last two years to generate the table below.
Title Method used
Exploring customer experience with budget hotels: Dimensionality and satisfaction (Ren, et al., 2015) Interview
Performance, labour flexibility and migrant workers in hotels: An establishment and departmental level analysis (Yaduma et al., 2015) Review of documents
Consumer reviews and the creation of booking transaction value: Lessons from the hotel industry (Torres et al.,2015 ) Review of documents
The physical appearance of hotel guests: The impact on service providers’ communication and quality of service (Knežević et al., 2015) Observation
Analysis and benchmarking of greenhouse gas emissions of luxury hotels (Huang et al., 2015) Review of documents
Professionalism: A contemporary interpretation in hospitality industry context (Cheng and Wong, 2015) Interview
Does size matter? Corporate social responsibility and firm performance in the restaurant industry (Youn et al., 2015) Review of documents
The effects of tipping policies on customer satisfaction: A test from the cruise industry (Lynn et al., 2015) Review of documents
A demand-driven analysis of tourist accommodation price: A quantile regression of room bookings (Masiero et al., 2015) Review of documents
Applying mixed methods to identify what drives quick service restaurant’s customer satisfaction at the unit-level (Soulek et al., 2015) Interview
Constructing a professional competence scale for foodservice research & development employees from an industry viewpoint (Ko,2015) In depth interview
Conceptualizing transformative guest experience at retreat centers (Fu et al., 2015) Review of documents
Identity-conscious vs identity-blind: Hotel managers’ use of formal and informal diversity management practices (Manoharan et al., 2014) Interview
As the table indicates, among the randomly selected journal articles, review of documents, which has not been considered as “a major part of data collecting” (Marshall and Rossman, 2006), surprisingly surpasses other methods and results in the most frequently employed method. Therefore, the author would like to elaborate and further investigate on the reasons and implicit assumptions that lead to such choices in the following contents.
Review of documents
Referring to Bryman and Bell (2011), documents appears in different forms from personal documents, public documents, organisational documents, mass media outputs, visual documents to virtual documents. Researcher imply this method due to its most crucial advantage: since documents are not created specifically for the purpose of the research, it reflects reality to a certain extent. Furthermore, research can be conducted without disturbing the original setting Marshall and Rossman (2006). In other words, such methods are unobtrusive and nonreactive. Which sources to obtain the data from is highly relevant to what the focus of the inquiry is.
Ritchie and Lewis (2013) suggest that use of documents appear to be particularly valuable when the focus of the research inquiry is written communications, e.g. organisational research, or when ethnography and participant observation or interview is not available (Hammersley and Atkinson, 1995, cited Ritchie and Lewis, 2013). On contrary to their argument, use of documents, especially, virtual documents, which are documents appear on the Internet, has been rapidly and continuously growing in recent years due to its vastness and its accessibility. For instance, Fu et al. (2015) investigate the conceptualisation of guests experience at four popular retreat centres in Thailand. In order to see through the participants eyes, to hear their real voices, gather their genuine opinions and understand their perspectives, Fu et al. (2015) gathered data through TripAdviser, an online platform where reviews of accommodations are generated by users. Compared to traditional forms of data, online user generated data is capable of providing rich and unbiased first hand data for researchers (Kozinets, 2010). Zhou et al., (2014, cited Fu et al., 2015) stress that in particular to emerging markets that are yet to be fully understood, use of this source appear to be extremely appropriate.
There is no doubt that user generated data, as well as other online documents have proliferated and have huge potentials as source of data in business research in service industry (Mauri and Minazzi, 2013; Bryman and Bell 2011). Numerous scholars express their scepticism towards it. Researchers needs to keep in mind that lack of authenticity and credibility can discount the quality of data largely due to false or distorted information which can be easily display or edited on internet (Bryman and Bell, 2011). Moreover, owning to the dynamic nature of internet, it is essential to consider not only record but also print out contents consulted.
One other major concern is the comprehension and interpretation of the materials. Even though researchers aim to reveal the “truth” or underpinning reality, possibilities are that interpretation of the material may consequently lead to distortion (Fisher et al., 2010). Factors including one’s own belief, cultural, life experience, all contribute to the way how one comprehend and interpret the material. As a result, conclusions deriven from these outputs will inevitably be a reflection of researchers’ personal interpretation.
Researchers who choose to review existing documents often tempt to assume that there is a social reality to be revealed underlying those materials (Bryman and Bell, 2011). Namely, organisational documents ought to uncover the organisational cultural and ethos. Nonetheless, Atkinson and Coffee (2004) are incredulous about such way of viewing documents. Conversely, their thought reflected in ontology, in which they believe a document, regardless its form of demonstration has it own, distinctive reality. Namely, documents should be view as how it is, how it is written, rather than a reflection of certain aspect of an organisation or a society. Hence, they suggest that, in order to see through the surface and reveal the reality, a multiplicity of documents as sources of data should be taken into consideration simultaneously.
Conclusion
Qualitative research has its own set of assumptions which has been examined by numerous researchers. For instance, It seeks to understand the reality of the society in its own term and expresses its concern of gaining access of inside experience and deeper understanding (Gall et al., 2003). As the preceding discussion indicates, a certain set of beliefs and implicit philosophical assumptions are embedded in choices of researchers (Carnaghan, 2013). Moreover, researchers’ assumptions regarding different method consequently lead them to various choices. Nonetheless, there is no universal way of conducting research and the choice of a certain research method is highly relevant to and dependant on the centre of the enquiry. Therefore, it is crucial for those who are about to conduct their researches to understand what they pursue and what are the implicit assumptions behind certain choices, to better situate their approaches in the broader field of qualitative research, as well as to avoid unwanted weakness that may constrain the quality of the eventual outcomes .
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