LS322 Chapter Notes - Chapter smithson: Focus Group

• School: University of Waterloo
• Department: Legal Studies
• Course: LS322
• Professor: Holland

Document Summary

Using and analysing focus groups: limitations and possibilities - janet smithson. A key issue for researchers is the complex relation of focus group talk to everyday talk. The author argues that the focus group method is not merely a quick way to pick up relevant themes around a topic, but a social event that includes performances by all concerned. From this perspective, language is viewed not as a neutral conveyor of information, but as functional and constructive, as a medium which people use to achieve a variety or actions. Focus groups have been described as useful at an early stage of research as a means for eliciting issues which participants think are relevant, which can then be used to inform design of larger studies. The problem of a dominant voice overriding other voices is supposedly dealt with by the technique of making the focus groups homogeneous for example in terms of age, experience, education, and current occupational position.