Coast, Ernestina

Hennink, Monique

Hutter, Inge

Nzioka, Charles

Puri, Mahesh

English

LSE Research Online

  Ernestina Coast, Monique Hennink, Inge Hutter, Charles Nzioka, Mahesh Puri  Qualitative research in demography: a review of the last decade    Coast, Ernestina and Hennink, Monique and Hutter, Inge and Nzioka, Charles and Puri, Mahesh (2011) Qualitative research in demography: a review of the last decade. In: Sixth African Population Conference, 5-9 December 2011, Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso. This version available at: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/41004/  Available in LSE Research Online: May 2012  © 2012 The Author   LSE has developed LSE Research Online so that users may access research output of the School. Copyright © and Moral Rights for the papers on this site are retained by the individual authors and/or other copyright owners. Users may download and/or print one copy of any article(s) in LSE Research Online to facilitate their private study or for non-commercial research. You may not engage in further distribution of the material or use it for any profit-making activities or any commercial gain. You may freely distribute the URL (http://eprints.lse.ac.uk) of the LSE Research Online website.     Is the published qualitative research in demographic journals fit for purpose?Est-ce que les recherches qualitatifs, publies dans les revues demographiques sont adapte a l’usage?E. Coast[1], M. Hennink[2], I. Hutter, C[3]. Ntozi[4], M. Puri[5][IUSSP Panel on qualitative methods in demography][1] London School of Economics  [  e.coast@lse.ac.uk ][2] Emory University, USA[3] University of Groningen, Netherlands[4] University of Nairobi, Kenya[5] CREHPA, NepalObjectiveTo systematically and transparently describe the extent, and quality, of qualitative research in demography journals.Rationale• Qualitative research methods (either alone or mixed with quantitative methods) in demography has increased substantially post-2000. • Little discussion about the quality of that research.Method• Top 10 ISI citation rated demographic journals• Pre-piloted search terms• Coding framework (tested)• Excluded articles – Without an abstract– Not written in English– Published before 1997• All included articles coded• Themes developed through group discussionWhy review published (peer-reviewed) articles?• Evaluation by peers• The gold standard of judging the credibility of knowledge claims• A social transformation of information into knowledgeResults• 3381 articles– 120 duplicates• 3261 articles screened on the basis of their abstract• 186 articles included in the review1/9: Clarity of article purpose• Without a clear idea of what the paper is setting out to do, it is hard to assess whether the methods, analyses and conclusions are achieving what they set out to do.• Common to all research, but possibly more complex in mixed methods research.2/9: Substantive focus on sexual and reproductive health• Low representation of research dealing with fertility, mortality or migration that uses qualitative or mixed methods.• Might this undermine future attempts to use qualitative methodologies for other topics?– Qualitative methods closely identified with SRH, and not considered appropriate for other demographic research questions?3/9: Descriptive analysis• Predominantly descriptive analyses• Description is good and necessary• BUT• Qualitative research is not being used to its full potential in demography4/9: Depth of methodological description• Under-specification of– Respondent selection– Who collected the data– How respondents were accessed– How data were collected and recordedThey all affect the data collected5/9: Context• Rare to find context-setting information about the research• Limited to socio-demographic description of the respondents• Research is abstracted and decontextualised6/9: Internal checking: validity, reliability and “groundedness” of findings• Evidence usually = quotes• Difficult to assess whether sufficient original information presented• Little evidence of guarding against selectivity in the use of evidence• Few cases of presenting data that might refute the findings• Low levels of triangulation7/9: Author reflexivity / positionality• Rarely done• When it is done, it is done well8/9:Limitations and their implications• Many articles did not mention their limitations• When they did, just a description of the limitations• Research needs to consider the implications of the limitations for findings9/9: Ethics• Very wide variation in reporting• Often just a mention that have got ethical clearance• Rare to find mention of when ethical issues arose during the research (and how they were dealt with)• How was research explained to the respondents?– This shapes the data producedSome practical suggestions: journals• Longer word limits for articles that use qualitative and / or mixed methods approaches?– With more words, the reviewer and reader is given the opportunity to engage critically with quality by being able to assess the research. • More explicit guidance for reviewers (and authors) about how qualitative/mixed methods research is being assessed.  • To use self-rating of reviewers in terms of both their substantive and methodological expertise, and that these ratings are taken into account when their reports are reviewed by the editor(s).

Qualitative research in demography: a review of the last decade

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

LSE Research Online