Here, you can hear the experiences of researchers who are using these different methods, why they chose the pragmatic paradigm and how they chose their particular methodology. You will also hear a little about their experience of using the technique.
Hi there, my name is Mariam and I am going to describe my experience of using Q methodology in my PhD thesis, which was focused around an understanding of the faculties that influence technology adoption in health care education.
You may be asking yourself ‘what about Q methodology?’ Frankly, I did not know prior to choosing a methodology to answer my research question. In essence, Q methodology is a mixed-method pragmatic research paradigm. It has subjective (qualitative) and objective (quantitative) characteristics. You start by creating a series of statements that represent your research question, from all the available literature, and then you ask appropriate individuals to sort these onto a grid from those they strongly agree with to those they strongly disagree with. Statistical factor analysis is then used to uncover the relationships between the different sort patterns to uncover the characteristics of the different groupings of sorters.
It was as I undertook the sorting that I started to realize that the findings of the study were becoming recognizable, resulting in three factor (grouping) solution; that is three distinct groupings of characteristics of how people responded to the adoption of technology in this project.
Q methodology enabled me to get beyond the usual surface features to explore the importance of deeper factors, but to do this is a way that was still framed within known theoretical frameworks.
To learn more about Q methodology and my experiences of it,
why not read my whole account.
Hi there, my name is Mariam and I am going to describe my experience of using Q methodology in my PhD journey. I started my PhD wondering what subject to choose and why. I was eager to solve one problem facing us as educators in higher education. As an academic, endeavouring to support students in higher education, I strongly feel that technology can provide great support to students, if it is chosen and used effectively to support pedagogical outcomes. I chose my topic related to technology and its effects in higher education. After identifying the research question, the next step is to select the best methodology to answer it and achieve the research objectives. I felt overwhelmed when confronted by the diverse and complex methodologies commonly used in advanced academic research, thus I decided to take a module called ‘Research Philosophy’. At the time, I did not know what research philosophy is, and I was confused by the barrage of philosophical words used in the literature, including ontology, epistemology, axiology – everything seemed to be an ‘ology’!
However, studying the ‘Research Philosophy’ module and reading and thinking about the literature gradually increased my understanding, and towards the second year of my PhD programme I had a strong understanding. By this time, you may be asking yourself ‘what about Q methodology?’ Frankly, I did not know what Q methodology was prior to choosing a methodology to answer my research question, but my discovery of this paradigm was suitable to achieve the aims of my research. I gradually learned about the theoretical background of Q methodology, and its practical steps, including how to develop statements, how to make a Q grid, and how to do factor analysis. I read about it, and searched on the net for additional information. I also sent emails to experts and discussed it with my supervisors and colleagues.
After developing a focussed study aim and objectives, and searching and critically reviewing related literature, I started to collect the study concourse, discussing this with my supervisors. I then started to develop statements, removing duplicates, and reviewing statements with experts, correcting spelling and grammar along the way. I followed a validity process for the statements, to make sure they were valid. after that I was thinking about how to make the Q grid, for the statements to be sorted by the participants during data collection. This is not easy for beginners in Q methodology like me, so I reviewed the literature and built the Q grid with similar numbers of statements as existing studies I could follow and understand. I thus used 45 statements, each of which was written on a card, with a Q grid containing 45 boxes in A0 paper.
I then piloted the statements, and corrected or amended them as necessary, in consultation with my supervisors and other experts in Q methodology. From my experience, I found the process of Q statement development to be long, laborious, and exhausting, but it is the core of Q methodology, as these statements have to cover the study topic. I read in the literature that I am not alone in this; most researchers developing Q statements find the process to be time-consuming and highly demanding, but the result at the end is amazing. Finally, my study statement completed and I was happy. I then built the instructions for the data collection and wrote the qualitative question that I would ask participants during the data collection phase (Q sort step). While this was not easy, nor was it difficult, with support from my supervisors and communication with the Q community, who have an easily accessible website offering lots of advice and support. I was happy to receive ethical approval from the University and the study site.
In essence, Q methodology is a mixed-method pragmatist research paradigm, although there are some debates about the position of Q methodology and whether it is qualitative or quantitative. In my experience, it is a mixed method. This is because it has subjective (qualitative) and objective (quantitative) parts. Q methodology is intrinsically mixed (Tashakkori and Teddlie (2009), but it should be noted that it is not a statistical procedure to analyse data, although it does include a statistical element; rather it is a holistic methodology that includes philosophy, theory, and procedure, in addition to statistical analysis techniques (Brown, 1980).
Progressing with the research, collecting data through Q sort, I started to enter the data in PQM, which is a software dedicated to Q methodology. At this point I become stressed again, wondering how many factors to extract, and how to have a strong justification of the number of these factors. My supervisors supported me, and I read a book entitled Doing Q Methodological Research by (Watts and Simon, 2012)Watts and Simon (2012), which showed me how to do the extraction and rotation for the factors, and which helped me in the interpretation of factors. I continued to communicate with my supervisors and the Q methodology community, and to read articles and theses in any speciality that used Q methodology. Hence, I completed factor analysis with PQM software and double-checked my work with Q Ken software; at this point I started to realize that the findings of the study were becoming recognizable, resulting in three factor solutions. After that, I interpreted the findings using the crib sheet from Watts and Simon (2012), and in discussion with my supervisors, the findings were completed, and now I am finalizing the write-up of my thesis, developing my discussion chapter.
Aside from these particular academic issues, I have experienced challenges as a PhD student with different roles and activities, but I learned to embrace these challenges and be positive, and to find the support I need. I also developed consistent time-keeping and scheduling skills to finish my tasks on time, and I spent a lot of rewarding effort to learn about research philosophies and methodologies. I am satisfied that I have developed academic and professional skills and that I am now a person who can do research in Q methodology, and part of the Q methodology community as a pragmatist researcher. I found that Q methodology is really unique, easy to use (when you know how!), and applicable to explore the subjective objectively, as described by its creator, William Stephenson (1953).
Hello there! My name is Manny. My PhD thesis focused on the experiences of families with children diagnosed with Cerebral Palsy.
Using Pragmatism as the philosophical underpinning generic qualitative enquiry as the methodology and Frank’s illness narratives as the explanatory framework, semi-structured interviews were used as the method of data collection and thematic and narrative analysis as the analysis methods. I discovered that the existing research on Cerebral Palsy was dominated by the voice of the mother, with the voices of other significant family members rarely reported. Incorporation of the voices of other family members therefore was deemed important for a holistic understanding of the experience of living with a child with Cerebral Palsy. My choice of Philosophy, Methodology and Methods did not occur at random, but rather were determined by the research question that my study posed and that is, what are the experiences of families with children diagnosed with Cerebral Palsy.
Pragmatism offers individual researchers the freedom of choice and it also means that researchers are free to choose their methods, techniques and research procedures that will best meet the needs and purposes of their enquiry. This concept of pragmatism coincided naturally with my position as a researcher and also emphasises the interaction between the researcher and the researched. Having considered other approaches I realised the best way to answer the research question, was to use the generic qualitative design, a methodology which does not pay allegiance to any methodological tradition but is open to all traditions and may adopt methods as and when appropriate for the purpose of this study. Pragmatism enabled me to find the required depth of analysis that was required to truly uncover the experiences of families of children diagnosed with Cerebral Palsy.
Why not read the whole of the account that I have provided to find out more about my research and the role pragmatism has played within it?