An Exploration of the Relationships between Data and Theory in Qualitative Research

周 剛

Abstract:This article has explored the relationships between data and theory in qualitative research from an enthnographic perspective. It has also explicated the discovery of theory from data systematically obtained from enthnographic research, the Participant Observation approach based on inductive logic, that is, grounded theory.

Key words:data qualitative research ethnographic Research

1.Introduction

In social science research, although a researcher may do either quantitative or qualitative research work to his or her own preferences or to his or her own research purposes, some researchers have suggested combining one or more research methods in the one study (called triangulation). And sometimes in their research work, some researchers do combine the two research methods to carry out their social research projects. Many studies have shown that qualitative methodology and quantitative methodology are not mutually exclusive. Strauss (1967) holds that the two methods should be used as supplements, as mutual verification.

Qualitative research can be simply defined as research that produces descriptive data based upon spoken or written words and observable behavior (Sherman,1994). In other words, qualitative researchers are mainly concerned with exploring peoples life histories or everyday behavior (Silverman, 2001). They study and explain social and cultural phenomena. In general, qualitative research covers the following research methods: participant observation, direct observation, case studies, analysing texts and documents, interviews, recording and transcribing, all of which typically yield qualitative data. In reality, these are the procedures commonly used by qualitative researchers for identifying the presence or absence of something, or describing the amount of something in words.

2.Ethnographic Research and Data Collection

2.1 Data Gathering

According to Erlandson (1993), the primary purpose of gathering data in qualitative research is to gain ability to construct reality in ways that are consistent and compatible with the constructions of a setting's inhabitants. This requires that the researcher be able to experience what the "natives" experience and to see that experience in the way that they see it. The primary instrument in the research is the researcher him- or herself, which involves utilizing his or her five senses plus intuition to gather, analyze, and construct reality from data.

The researcher has several methods for collecting empirical materials, ranging from the interview to participant observation and direct observation, to the analysis of artifacts, documents, and cultural records, to the use of visual materials or personal experience. The researcher may also use a variety of different methods of reading and analysing interviews or cultural texts, including content, narrative, and semiotic strategies. These are the basic means or sources of data collection in qualitative research.

In qualitative data gathering and analysis, attention should be given to constructing a comprehensive, holistic portrayal of the social and cultural dimensions of a particular context. It is the researcher's job to illuminate the obvious and subtle dimensions of this context. In the collection and analysis of data it is sometimes hard to distinguish between when the collecting ends and when the analysis begins, for gathering and analysis are complementary, ongoing, and often simultaneous processes (Erlandson, 1993). The analysis of data usually begins shortly after the data collection commences and continues during data collection and beyond.

2.2Ethnographic Research

Ethnography is a method of studying and learning about a person or group of people. Typically, ethnography involves the study of a small group of subjects in their own environment. Typical ethnographic research employs basically the following kinds of data collection: interviews, observation, researcher-designed instruments, and content analysis of human artifacts (Goetz, 1984). This in turn produces relative kinds of data: quotations, descriptions, and excerpts of documents, resulting in one product: narrative description. Ethnographic methods can give shape to new constructs or paradigms, and new variables.

Participant observation, or the qualitative method, is known as "ethnography" (Sherman, 1994). Because ethnographic methods, rely substantially or partly on "participant observation" (Atkinson & Hammersley, 1998). Participatory observation and interviews are those without which no researcher can conduct an ethnography (Lecompte, 1999). In this article, "Participation observation" method will be focused on as an example to further illustrate how data in qualitative research is being collected, although doing ethnography is a complex process that requires multiple sources of data, each of which is used to confirm the accuracy of the other.

Participant observation is the primary technique used by ethnographers to gain access to data. In participant-observation research, to record information or to assemble data, the participant-observer might include non-natural sources like case studies and diaries or the writing of fieldnotes, and use mechanical devices such as cameras, videos and tape-recorders. The more complete and accurate the field notes, the easier it is for the researcher to catalogue, code, and use them as data. Lecompte (1999) believes that writing good field notes involves detailed and concrete observation and recording on a regular basis.

Then, what might the researcher do with those recorded observations or field notes afterward? He or she will begin processing the firsthand data, rewriting and organizing his or her notes, creating files, coding. These ways will help him or her get ready for interpreting, analysing the data and finally generating categories and constructs.

3 Inductive Logic and Theory Development

3.1 Interplay of Theory and Data

According to Babbie (1994), a theory is a systematic set of interrelated statements that intends to explain some aspect of social life. Schensul and Lecompte (1999) believe that theory is what makes sense of a series of observations, statements, events, values, perceptions, and correlations. It is the glue that aggregates facts into a hypothetical description of a given time and place, which then can be used to predict or explain events in another time and/or place. To the degree that it fails to predict events accurately for that next time and/or place, any initial formative theory will require modification and further testing. This occurs naturally during the ethnographic process.

As Layder (1998) points out, that the development of theory includes the collection and analysis of quantitative and qualitative data, historical analysis, sampling, interviewing, coding, memos and the construction of typologies. He goes on arguing that theory and concepts emerge through data collection and analysis in qualitative research. And Silverman (2001) also holds that in observational research, data collection, hypothesis construction and theory building are not three separate things but are interwoven with one another. To the ethnographic researcher, the formulation of theoretical propositions, the observations of empirical events, and the evaluation theory are typically all part of the same ongoing process. He or she develops theories, or generalized understandings, over the course of his or her observations, data collection and analysis. According to Glaser and Strauss (1967), theory should be viewed as a constant and flexible accompaniment to the incremental collection of data and the unfolding nature of the research.

In ethnographic research, theory helps the ethnographer to select what to look for, ask about, and leave out in the process of data collection (Schensul and Lecompte, 1999). Theory initiates the research process by helping the ethnographer to deal with the observation of real-world complexity in the field setting; it ends the research process by facilitating reorganization and elaboration of the initial formative theory through concepts that have been identified and verified by repeated observation in the field.

3.2 Inductive Logic

Field research is one place where the mode of reasoning is especially evident and important (Babbie, 1995). Very often, social scientists begin constructing a theory through the inductive method by observing aspects of social life, and then seeking to discover patterns that may point to more-or-less universal principles. Glaser and Strauss (1967) coined the term grounded theory in reference to this method of theory construction that begins inductively.

Grounded theory is a research method that seeks to develop theory that is grounded in data systematically gathered and analyzed. According to Glaser and Strauss (1967), grounded theory is an inductive, theory discovery methodology that allows the researcher to develop a theoretical account of the general features of a topic while simultaneously grounding the account in empirical observations or data. The major difference between grounded theory and other methods is its specific approach to theory development - grounded theory suggests that there should be a continuous interplay between data collection and analysis. Laine (1997) has pointed out that grounded theorizing', where theory is developed out of data analysis, and subsequent data collection is guided strategically by emergent theory, is consistent with the same process involved in other kinds of ethnographic research that are not devoted to the development of substantive theory.

Inductive research begins with collection of data-empirical observations or measurements of some kind-and builds theoretical categories and propositions from relationships discovered among the data (Goetz and Lecompte, 1984). Inductive research starts with examination of a phenomenon and then, from successive examinations of similar and dissimilar phenomena, develops a theory to explain what was studied. Induction relies more on the initial gathering of empirical data as a means of developing a more general (theoretical) understanding (Layder, 1998).

4 Conclusion

Qualitative research always requires that the researcher explores and sensitively interprets complex data, and avoids pre-emptively reducing the data to numbers. It always requires that researchers record growing understanding, in summaries, annotations or memos or field notes. Qualitative research usually treats as data the records of ideas about these research events and reflections on them.

In qualitative research, data and theory usually interplay or interact with each other. During the course of data collection and theory generation, data collection and analysis help generate theory, and the interpretations or formulations of theory help guide and modify data gathering, and help discover new data and perceptions, and develop new theoretical perspectives.

In short, data and theory in qualitative research cross-validate and enhance each other. But data-gathering often necessarily precedes final hypothesis formulation or is undertaken for descriptive investigation and analysis in exploratory studies. Based on the processes of data collection and theory generation in qualitative research discussed in this paper, we can conclude that the relationships between data and theory are that data usually precedes theory, and theory usually emerges from data in the inductive perspective. However, theory often starts being constructed before data collection and analysis are complete, since theory is an ever-developing process over the course of data collection and analysis.

To end the paper, the author would like to coin an epigram of his, "Theory without data is empty", and "Data without theory is blind."

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