Fundamentals of Qualitative Research Methods: Developing a Qualitative Research Question (Module 2)

hi I'm Leslie curry from the Yale School of Public Health welcome back to our series on qualitative research methods this module is on developing a qualitative research question to remind us an overview of the modules our goal in this series is to enhance our capacity to conceptualize design and conduct qualitative research in the Health Sciences there are six modules in the series the first is what is qualitative research the second developing a qualitative research question the third and fourth address major qualitative study designs interviews and focus groups the fifth presents an overview of qualitative data analysis and the last module addresses the issue of scientific rigor and qualitative research this module in this module we'll explore developing a qualitative research question well-formed questions are key to good research for a number of reasons first a well-formed research question defines the purpose of the research this is very important to set boundaries around the edges of our research question to identify the gap in the literature that we're trying to address well-formed research questions can help us determine the appropriate methods in order to answer that question we don't want to begin with I have students who come to me and say I want to do a study using focus groups or I'd like to do a study using interviews with patients and family members well we don't start with a methodology rather we start with a research question the knowledge gap that we're trying to fill and work then in that direction to determining the methodology that suits that question a well-formed research question can also guide our study planning so if we're very precise in scripting our research question this will help us in guiding efforts to allocate resources and time in order to implement the study and provide enough time for analysis and reporting and lastly a well-formed research question is critical it's important in quantitative methods as well but critical in qualitative methods for helping frame the analysis and the findings as we'll see in the modules on in-depth interviews and focus groups these approaches generate voluminous amounts of data often hundreds of pages of narrative transcripts and many potential directions could be followed in the analysis a well scoped research question will remind us what is the primary focus of this question and will help us focus ourselves in both the analytic process and in the dissemination the writing of the findings so there are a number of topics that are well suited for qualitative research let's review together just just a few examples the first is the role of organizational context in implementing a new technology or practice so for example you might imagine elan electronic medical records and a new software for EMR being implemented in a primary care clinic setting what is the role of the organizational the broader environment in the implementing of that technology what are the barriers and facilitators in that specific environment a second broad area of topics are complex social processes you might imagine the dynamics between formal and informal caregivers and caring for a frail homebound older adult living in the community what are those dynamics like the third patient perceptions of healthcare access and quality in this instance we might be interested in the patient experience of informed consent discussions with a physician and lastly the beliefs and motive motivations underlying health behaviors is a potential focal area for qualitative research for example what is an individual's preference around preventive screening procedures for breast cancer colon cancer so these are just some give you a sense of some topics that are well suited for a qualitative methodology but of course there there are a whole range of possibilities so let's move to conceptualizing a qualitative research question what does it mean to to develop a question that's going to give us those benefits that we reviewed earlier first a qualitative research question must be inductive and exploratory we don't come to the question with any assumptions or hypotheses about what is going on rather very open exploration of the phenomenon of interest a qualitative research question is framed as a research question an aim or objective again there are no hypotheses that we're setting out to test per se conceptualizing a research question in qualitative traditions really requires very careful attention to focusing on a single phenomenon concept or idea again because the risk the risk is that there will be much generated and by way of the data that may be relevant to our topic but also perhaps tanzen tangential so the focus is really very critical for feasibility and for answering that particular gap with precision so let's look at writing a research question we begin to research questions stating the goal using a verb so common verbs are to characterize to describe to understand the second sort of principle in writing a research question is to identify the topic of interest so we begin with our verb we're going to characterize understand describe and then the topic of interest what is it specifically that this research study will address important to use neutral or non directional language this gets back to the principle of being exploratory again we don't have assumptions so we're not looking for instance only two facilitators of adoption of a new practice in a little setting but rather non directionally exploring the process of implementation itself both positive and negative dimensions a research question must define the sample and the setting again with as much precision as possible the precision is really critical in a qualitative research question again because it it gives boundaries to to the question so let's review together some sample qualitative research questions this first question was from a study done by a clinical scholar and the Robert Wood Johnson program Kelly Duran who is interested in the care of patients in the emergency department this is the research question for her study she sought to understand interpersonal and system level factors relevant to delivering health care to emergency department patients who are homeless so if we look back at those guiding principles we begin with a verb we're going to understand this phenomenon we name the topic with with boundaries around the edges of what we're interested in looking at he or she was very clear to say she was interested in both interpersonal and system level factors that might be relevant to delivering care in the Eady and again what is the patient setting the patient population and the setting she's interested in patients who are homeless and so this very clearly outlines the objective of her particular research study let's look at another example here a study by Emily teacher Ellen and her team here at the Yale Global Health leadership institute this is a study interested in hospital performance and care of patients with heart attacks and the research question for this project was to identify hospital discharge processes that may be associated with better performance in hospital ami care as measured by mortality rates so here again we have the verb she's going to identify these processes the topic itself and the setting and lastly this study our team undertook here at the global Leadership Institute to describe the experiences of people who are in leadership roles in sub-saharan Africa and this research question is to characterize the experiences of individuals in key health care leadership roles in sub-saharan Africa so again to name the topic the population and the setting very clearly in the research question so let's take a couple of minutes together to critique a research question this is a question brought to me by a student he wasn't interested in contraception use broadly and he came with this research question the purpose of this study is to understand the knowledge attitudes beliefs preferences and barriers regarding contraception use among women so if we parse this a little bit against the criteria that we reviewed earlier we want to be careful that the the study as its defined in the research question is feasible and that there are boundaries that are manageable and that the specific phenomenon we're interested in is very clear so here if we look at the topic as being knowledge attitudes beliefs preferences of barriers it's really quite a waterfront to cover frankly impossible maybe in our lifetimes and also we want to be precise about the setting and the population women is just you know rather broad so we work together to craft a question that would meet those criteria that we reviewed together earlier and the final question looked like this the study was to characterize barriers to contraception use so very specifically focused on the barriers themselves among young latina women at high risk for unintended pregnancy this this question addressed a very specific gap in the literature was clearly much more feasible to implement and very precise in the nature of what was going to be looked at in terms of the data collection and analysis focusing so a few concluding comments a well-developed research question is essential for the success of a study for the reasons that we've described so it's not as simple as it seems and yet it's critically important to the success of a study so spend time developing and honing your research question invest time in defining the knowledge gap really so important to be sure that we are in fact contributing to the advancement of science and so really critical to master the literature to know what is known and what is not known about your focal topic ensure the question is feasible if we think back to the study on contraception you know unpacking all of those dimensions of contraception use among women would not have been feasible use the research question to guide the choice of method and set the boundaries for analysis finally this applies to really all the research that we do be sure it passes the sowhat test so thank you for your attention

Channel: YaleUniversity

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Keywords: Qualitative Research (Literature Subject), Research (Industry), Dr. Leslie Curry

Id: _0HxMpJsm0I

Length: 12min 10sec (730 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 23 2015