PSY309H1 Chapter Notes - Chapter 6: Naturalistic Observation, Participant Observation, Content Analysis
Document Summary
Observational methods can be classified either as quantitative or qualitative. Qualitative research focuses on people behaving in natural settings and describing their world in their own words. Qualitative researchers generally collect in depth information on relatively small samples. Quantitative research based upon statistical analysis of data. Quantitative research tends to focus on specific behaviours that can be easily quantified. Qualitative conclusions are based on interpretations drawn by investigator. Example: one is interested in describing the ways teenagers think. Quantitative approach would be to develop a questionnaire and to assign numbers to the answers and to perform a quantitative statistical analysis. Qualitative approach: one may conduct a series of focus groups in which you gather together groups of 8-10 teenagers and engage them in a discussion about their perceptions with the world of work. A qualitative description of the findings would focus on the themes that emerge from the discussions and the manner in which the teenagers viewed the issues.
