Dear Chris,
I am not claiming that participant observers are not valid in research. Not
at all.
My post attempted to point to a fundamental difference, IMHO, between the
activity of design and the activity of research. In my post I said that
researchers carry out observations without interfering with what is being
investigated. This of course includes participant observers who are
contributing to the activity of research.
While I agree with that observers influence that which they observe,
researchers make conscious efforts to keep this influence at minimum (as far
as I understand since I am comparatively new to the area of research). The
designer on the other hand, as I said in my post, consciously interferes and
shapes what is being ‘investigated’ by her.
Regards,
parag
PhD candidate,
IDC, UL,
Ireland
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