Qualitative Research in Practice : Stories From the Field - Blogs Unpad
Qualitative Research in Practice : Stories From the Field - Blogs Unpad
Qualitative Research in Practice : Stories From the Field - Blogs Unpad
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<strong>Qualitative</strong> research <strong>in</strong> practice<br />
however I constructed and reconstructed my research<br />
questions, <strong>the</strong>re was always one that I returned to—<br />
how do women who have been sexually abused as<br />
children make sense of that experience? The strength<br />
of that orig<strong>in</strong>al idea, and my concern that women’s<br />
perspectives had been miss<strong>in</strong>g from <strong>the</strong> research <strong>in</strong> this<br />
field, won through <strong>in</strong> <strong>the</strong> end. I conducted two <strong>in</strong>depth<br />
<strong>in</strong>terviews each with ten women—one lengthy<br />
<strong>in</strong>terview <strong>in</strong> which <strong>the</strong>y talked about <strong>the</strong>ir experiences<br />
of childhood sexual abuse and <strong>the</strong> impact <strong>the</strong>y felt it<br />
had had on <strong>the</strong>ir lives, and a shorter <strong>in</strong>terview, about<br />
four to six weeks later, <strong>in</strong> which <strong>the</strong>y talked about how<br />
<strong>the</strong>y had experienced <strong>the</strong> first <strong>in</strong>terview. The second<br />
<strong>in</strong>terviews provided some useful <strong>in</strong>sights about what it<br />
is like to be a research participant and I have <strong>in</strong>cluded<br />
some of this material later <strong>in</strong> <strong>the</strong> book.<br />
Ca<strong>the</strong>r<strong>in</strong>e McDonald—Institutionalised organisations?<br />
Ca<strong>the</strong>r<strong>in</strong>e McDonald used a mixed method approach <strong>in</strong>volv<strong>in</strong>g a<br />
survey and semi-structured <strong>in</strong>terviews for this study (McDonald,<br />
1996). Ca<strong>the</strong>r<strong>in</strong>e talks here about how she became <strong>in</strong>terested <strong>in</strong> <strong>the</strong><br />
application of neo-<strong>in</strong>stitutional <strong>the</strong>ory to <strong>the</strong> non-profit sector <strong>in</strong><br />
Queensland. We talk with her aga<strong>in</strong> about her use of mixed<br />
methods and how she used a deductive approach to analyse her<br />
<strong>in</strong>terview data.<br />
Ca<strong>the</strong>r<strong>in</strong>e: The PhD came out of me wonder<strong>in</strong>g [why] everybody<br />
says that <strong>the</strong> non-profit sector is different. There are<br />
<strong>the</strong>se assumptions embedded <strong>in</strong> all discourses and<br />
conversations about <strong>the</strong> sector that it is somehow<br />
different from <strong>the</strong> state or <strong>the</strong> market, and I accepted<br />
those assumptions for quite a long period of time until<br />
I started do<strong>in</strong>g a PhD . . . so I was look<strong>in</strong>g at an organisational<br />
space, a social space, that was large,<br />
complex, heterogeneous ...a whole field of organisations<br />
known as <strong>the</strong> community sector or non-profit<br />
sector. So it’s a lot of organisations, and I wanted to<br />
know why <strong>the</strong>y were . . . different from organisations<br />
<strong>in</strong> <strong>the</strong> state and organisations <strong>in</strong> <strong>the</strong> market . . . this is<br />
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