Throughout this year, the JEPS Bulletin brought to you a number of research stories and experiences that hopefully served to deepen our knowledge of psychological research and scientific publishing. Allow me, then, to point out a handful of the favorite Bulletin posts of 2013. Although it’s a shame to miss out on any of our contributors’ exceptional work, please make sure you don’t overlook this baker’s dozen, which are ranked among the favorite posts of the year.
Tag Archives: qualitative research
A Change of View: Using Visual Methods to Explore Experience in Qualitative Research
The topic of this bulletin arose from a talk given by Dr. Anna Bagnoli, who had used a variety of visual methods in addition to verbal interviews in order to holistically study young people’s identities. Intrigued by the question of how such data could be collected and analysed to contribute to understandings of psychological topics, the author of this post recently carried out an interview with Dr. Bagnoli on behalf of the Open University Psychological Society (Rouse, 2013). In this bulletin post the author will share what she has learnt from this interview and by researching the use of visual methods to explore experience and meaning.
The journey towards discovering people: Why I love qualitative research
Walking down the corridor of a dark, mysterious medical centre to find the empty waiting room on a cold January evening, I had many burning questions ready and waiting to jump from my notepad that I couldn’t wait to discover the answers to. I was waiting to carry out my first qualitative interview with Dr. Cole* for my undergraduate psychology research; little did I know the exciting journey that I was about to ignite …
Evaluating qualitative research: Are we judging by the wrong standards?
Although qualitative research methods have grown increasingly popular,confusion exists over how their quality can be assessed and the idea persists that qualitative research is of lesser value when compared to quantitative research. Quantitative and qualitative research have different historical roots and are based on very different concepts, yet the dominance of positivist ideas about what constitutes good quality, valid research in psychology has often led qualitative research to be evaluated according to criteria, that are designed to fit a very different paradigm. Inevitably, the diverse perspectives which use qualitative methods and their differing views on how people should be studied mean there is disagreement and controversy over how quality should be evaluated. Despite this, it is seen as important to develop common criteria which allow the quality of qualitative research to be evaluated on its own terms.