Hi - this is very interesting to me, and I speak as a political scientist/policy analyst. (I am also a qualitative researcher).
Would it be possible to get a link to your report? I'm not questioning your study design, but as someone who works in policy fields I wonder if the problem might lie in how policy-makers understand the word "recommendations?" In one sense, as I understand the message below, they may be right in that no study with 11 respondents--no matter how well done, or how sophisticated the methodology--can provide a basis for generalizing to a population. So, if they expected concrete recommendations that "map" to the actual community (the sort of traditional "internal validity/external validity" criteria) then this was likely where the problem arose.
On the other hand, you are also right that well-done qualitative studies can elicit underlying issues and insights that won't come up in quantitative analysis! And, if the policy-makers didn't realize on the front end what they were asking for in commissioning qualitative research, that could also be evidence of the "disconnect" between academia and policy-making--an issue that I think is still crucial in social science.
Anyway, without seeing the recommendations, I can't comment further, but look forward to hearing other opinions.
Cheers,
Amy
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I became a good pitcher when I stopped trying to make them miss the ball, and started trying to make them hit the ball.
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Amy Fletcher, PhD
Senior Lecturer
Political Science Programme
University of Canterbury
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From: qual-software on behalf of Petra T Buergelt
Sent: Thu 9/25/2008 7:22 p.m.
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Recognition of the value of qualitative findings
Dear all,
I just completed a qualitative study exploring the psychological and environmental factors influencing preparing for pandemics. The study drew upon symbolic interactionism and used grounded theory as research methodology. The data was collected via in-depth interviews and analyzed using grounded theory analysis strategies and Atlas.ti. I theoretically sampled 11 participants with very diverse backgrounds regarding preparing/not preparing and demographic factors. Before submitting the final report, I presented the study findings and recommendations to the government. I emphasized that the study didn't aim at representativeness, but at exploring and understanding citizens' perspectives - at information richness and depth and at the interactions between the psychological and environmental factors. Despite the government specifically commissioning a qualitative study, since nothing was known about citizen's perspectives regarding preparing for a pandemic, the government officials questioned the value of the study because it only investigated 11 participants and thus, the validity of the recommendations.
I would think this is an issue often encountered. Thus, I would be very interested to find out if you had similar issues and how you went about dealing with this issue - how you constructed your argument and what literature you used to back up your argument. I would be very grateful if you could be so kind and share your experiences with me and others who might encounter similar issues :-)
Very best wishes
Petra
Petra T Buergelt
PhD student
Massey University, School of Psychology
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