Tags
beauty, bodydiversity, constructive, mixedmethods, researchdesigns, researchmethods, surveys, transformative
So as I previously talked about in one of my last few blogs, there are four philosophical worldviews that influence the practice of research and need to be identified: post positivism, advocacy/participatory or transformative, constructive, and pragmatism. These worldviews can be influenced by education, religion, home life, and media. I am a constructive transformative, click here to read that blog post.
As you continue to read you will find my research design, role as a researcher, and methods for data collection, recording, and analysis along with the proposed structure and some ethical considerations.
Design
The data collection procedure for my proposal is under a mixed methods approach and I’m going to be using a survey that will get both qualitative and quantitative results. I want to do the survey on anywhere from 50-250 participants in a secure office site that involves the survey, follow up interviews with audio materials, and a social media check to see what people think about body shaming on social media and how they understand or interpret it.
My role
The researcher’s role is to make statements that help the reader understand the connection between the researcher and the study, be honest about bias, and indicate steps taken to protect the rights of participants. Ethical practices as a part of the researcher’s role are to discuss steps taken to gain entry to the setting and to secure permissions to study the participants or situation, as well as, addressing any sensitive content that may arise before collecting data.
Data collection
This part of the proposal study is where we, as researchers, must identify some key elements of how we will collect data. This includes but is not limited to:
- identifying purposeful sites and individuals
- identifying the number of sites and participants that will be involved
- identifying and stating the type of data collection (observation, interviews, documents, audio and visual materials, ones that go beyond these conventional methods, etc.)
Data recording procedures
This is the stage of the proposal where planning happens. You must plan to develop and use a protocol for the recording the observations, interviews, as well as, putting together a log of records like heading, instructions, questions, follow up questions, thank you statements, and other. The data recording procedures for my proposal will be to record audio interviews using a secure device where participant’s identities are private, and having surveys formatted by section headers to match the questions and a thank you statement at the end of it all.
Data analysis procedures
In order to write up findings a researcher must preserve all data and reconstruct or replace any missing data. Interpretation is the final step in the process. For my proposal I will write my findings in a way that relate to how different genders and age groups survey results relate to the “ideals” of female body image in social media from 2005 until now and relate the analysis of results to different artifacts or situations in society.
Validation of findings
The researcher checks for the accuracy of the findings by employing certain procedures and indicates that their approach is consistent across different researchers and different projects. There are plenty of validity strategies such as triangulation, bias, debriefing, and having an external auditor, as well as, there are various reliability procedures such as checking transcripts, checking for consistency within definition of codes, and even having an intercoder agreement.
Proposed structure
Important sections in a qualitative design include identifying the specific design that you will be using and provide references to the literature that discusses the approach (Procedures & References), providing some background information about the design (Background), discussing why it is an appropriate strategy to use in the proposal study (Purpose of Design), and identifying how the use of the design will shape many aspects of the design process (Explanations of Design).
Ethical considerations
In order to establish validity and reliability I will create a procedure for reporting accuracy of findings, as well as, keeping raw data to refer back to in case of confusion or need for exact quotes. I will also report any bias or personal opinions I have about the topic as I go through the different sections of the proposal. I will double check for consistency in my analysis and report of results.