qualitative research

PART ONE

Introduction to Qualitative Research

CHAPTER 1

The Nature of Qualitative Research:
Development and Perspectives

This chapter is an attempt to trace the background of qualitative research, its development and its main features. It also focuses on some epistemological and methodological issues. The aim is to put the more pragmatic and practical sections in the book into a theoretical and methodological context.
Qualitative research is a form of social inquiry that focuses on the way people interpret and make sense of their experiences and the world in which they live. In the words of Atkinson et al. (2001: 7) it is an `umbrella term ', and a number of different approaches exist within the wider framework of this type of research.
Most of these have the same aim: to understand the social reality of individuals, groups and cultures. Researchers use qualitative approaches to explore the behaviour, perspectives, feelings and experiences of people and what lies at the core of their lives. Specifically, ethnographers focus on culture and customs, grounded theorists investigate social processes and interaction, while phenomenologists consider the meanings of experience and describe the life world.
Qualitative methodology is also useful in the exploration of change or conflict.
The basis of qualitative research lies in the interpretive approach to social reality and in the description of the lived experience of human beings.

Qualitative and quantitative approaches: underlying philosophies
Social reality can be approached in different ways, and researchers will have to select between varieties of research approaches. While often making a choice on practical grounds, they must also understand the philosophical ideas on which it is based.
The initial choice is not easy. Approaches to social inquiry consist not only of the procedures of sampling, data collection and analysis, but they are based on particular ideas about the world

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