PSYC 2110 Chapter Notes - Chapter 16: Ethnography
PSYC 2110 Chapter 16 Notes
Introduction
Developmentalists
• Although many developmentalists have used case studies to great advantage, there are
major drawbacks to this approach.
• Because the boys protected and developed their identities and self-presentation in the
conversation, this group case study reveals information that is different from what we
might glean in an individual case study.
• Extensive cultural or subcultural descriptions are particularly useful to investigators
hoping to understand cultural conflicts and other developmental challenges faced by
minority children and adolescents in diverse multicultural societies (Segal, 1991; see
also Patel, Power, & Bhavnagri, 1996).
• But despite these clear strengths, ethnography is a highly subjective method because
researhers’ o ultural alues ad theoretial iases a ause the to isiterpret
what they have experienced.
• In addition, ethnographic conclusions pertain only to the culture or subculture studied
and cannot be assumed to generalize to other contexts or social groups.
• An example of ethnographic research was conducted by Posada colleagues (Posada,
Carbonell, Alzate, & Plata, 2004).
• Because the various questionnaires and behavioural coding schemes typically used to
assess caregiver–infant interactions were developed in studies using Caucasian middle-
class participants from industrialized countries, Posada and colleagues chose
ethnographic methods to assess mother–infant interactions in middle- to lower-
middleclass families in Bogotá, Colombia.
• They then compared the results derived from observations made in the Colombian
households to results derived using previously developed assessments.
• In a traditionally ethnographic manner, observers made eight to nine two-hour,
unstructured visits to 27 Colombian homes.
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