Case studies and content analysis

Question 1

What’s a case study?

Answer 1

detailed study of an individual/group

-may involve a variety of techniqs (interviews, observations and examination of past records)

-often involve longitudinal study

Question 2

Give some techniques used in case studies

Answer 2

Diff methods u can use

-IQ test
-observations
-Interviews
-Questionnaire (not fr indiv)

Question 3

Give a strength of case studies

Answer 3

-offer Rich, in depth data compared to quantitive methods.

-BC they use a variety of methods to gain info and often study a person over a long period of time

Question 4

Give a limitation of case studies

Answer 4

Difficult to generalise findings from individual case studies
-BC a person may show unique beh/exp which may not be applicable to wider pop

Question 5

Give a 2nd limitation of case studies

Answer 5

-interpretation of case studies may involve researcher bias

Eg- if they build a bond with the ppt they’re studying

Question 6

What does content analysis involve

Answer 6

analysing material ppt have produced according to themes or categories

EG( diary, texts interview script)

Question 7

What’s content analysis a form of

Answer 7

indirect observation- observing things that people have produced

Question 8

What data does content analysis produce and how do we produce it?

Answer 8

quantitive

-info must be categorised so it can be counted (coding)

(Can’t come up with categories before hand, they emerge through content analysis)

-once categories identified, count how many times they appear

Question 9

4 MARK Q- CONTENT ANALYSIS

Researcher was interested to know whether theres a gender difference in driving beh and decided to conduct a content analysis of film clips of male and female drivers

Answer 9

-watch clips of driver beh to establish categories to use

-categories could be. Speeding, cutting corners and checking mirrors

-rewatch clips and tally each time (coding) the beh is seen

-compare driving beh scores of male and female driving

Question 10

What’s thematic analysis

Answer 10

-identifying themes that keep cropping up
-themes are broader and less specific than categories used in quantitive data

-produces qualitative data

Question 11

How do we produce the qualitative data from thematic analysis

Answer 11

-once themes are established, quotes can be used to support themes

EG) Theme- violence
Quote- knife wielding skits attacks innocent

Question 12

How do we assess the reliability of a content analysis

Answer 12

-use inter rater reliability
(More than one rater indep codes material using same categories)

-correlate findings of each rater
-correlation coefficient of +0.8 or above means good inter observer reliability

Question 13

How do we improve the reliability of the content analysis (3)

Answer 13

-train raters beforehand how to use the cats on small sample

-check cats are clear and make changes if necessary

-the 2 raters are checked for consistency to show improved agreement

Question 14

Give 2 strengths of content analysis

Answer 14

-less ethical issues as often looking at communications that already exist in public

-high ex val bc studying materials produced by people in every day life

-can be replicated and tested for reliability

Question 15

Give 2 limitations of content analysis

Answer 15

-studying indirectly, the material can lack context (cant ask follow up qs)

-researcher bias- relies on subjective interpretation, may be some bias in planning cats as ignore ones u dont like for eg