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67 4 Str ategies to Enhance Validity and Trustworthiness Research design is made up of the methods one selects to carry out the study. The methods implement the design—the focus of chapter 3. The discussion of legitimacy of design continues by focusing in this chapter on the qualitative paradigm. Although ways to mitigate threats to the validity of quantitative research are well recognized, ways to mitigate threats to qualitative research are not universally accepted (Toma, 2006). From our postpositivist perspective, we present ways to enhance the design validity of studies. This chapter describes ways to • improve the validity of observational methods • improve the validity of grounded-theory methods • improve the validity of case-study methods • improve the validity of interviewing methods • improve the validity of historical methods • improve the validity of ethnographic research • improve the validity of phenomenological research • configure triangulation and its effects on truth value Observational Methods Observation is a frequent data-collection method used in qualitative research. Observation is frequently categorized in three ways: (1) Participant observation (in which the observer is obvious to and involved with the participants) creates a situation in which the researcher and the participants develop rapport and naturally and comfortably interact with one another over time, (2) Reactive observation is useful when participants are aware of being observed in a setting where the researcher controls the interactions, and (3) Unobtrusive observations occur when participants are unaware of being observed (Angrosino, 2005). strategies to enhance validity 68 Gay (1987) and Mouly (1970) discuss the potential invalidity of observational data when they call for, at the very least, a scientific basis for the observation. Mouly, more specifically, agrees that both the scientist and the layperson observe, “but the scientist starts with a hypothesis and arranges the conditions of his observations to avoid distortions” (p. 282). He warns further about invalidity, especially of participantobservation techniques. As the participant observer adapts more and more to his role as a participating member of the group, he becomes increasingly blinded to the peculiarities he is supposed to observe. As a result, he is less likely to note what would be significant to a more objective observer. As he develops friendships with the members of the group, he is also likely to lose his objectivity, and, along with it, his accuracy in rating things as they are. (p. 289) Despite these pitfalls, there is validity in using the observational method for study of some phenomena, such as nonverbal behaviors. All validity concerns described here affect participant, reactive, and unobtrusive observations. In participant and reactive observation, the researcher is a regular participant in the activities being observed; in unobtrusive observations, the researcher is not a participant in the ongoing activities being observed. Compared to participant-observation strategies, the validity of unobtrusive strategies is greater because there is no reactivity among the participants to the presence of the researcher. This reduction in bias, however, does not cancel out the other biasing (invalidating) effects. Despite these limits on the validity of observational methods, some maintain that it is, nevertheless, a highly appropriate technique (e.g., Hakim, 1987). Lofland (1971), for one, designates a first priority to the observer’s understanding of the participant’s point of view: “In order to capture participants ‘in their own terms,’ one must learn their categories for rendering explicable and coherent the flux of raw reality. That, indeed, is the first principle of qualitative analysis” (p. 7). While this “understanding of the participant’s point of view” is highly regarded, the statements may well be describing only observer bias. However, Becker and Geer (1960), as well as Lombard (1991) and Lincoln and Guba (1985), place the methodology in even higher esteem strategies to enhance validity 69 when they state that participant observation is the “most comprehensive of all types of research strategies.” The most complete form of the sociological datum, after all, is the form in which the participant observer gathers it: an observation of some social event, the events which precede and follow it, and explanations of its meaning by participants and spectators, before, during, and after its occurrence. Such a datum gives us more information about the event under study than data gathered by any other sociological method. (p. 133) The observer’s attention to a setting is described as an evolving role by Boostrom (1994). From his own experience, he shows how the qualitative researcher can move from an “almost inert receiver of visual and aural stimuli” to...

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