Part 8 - So how do you know if a piece of qualitative health research is good? In the seven blogposts that have preceded this, I’ve set out a personal critique of some of the problems I see all too often in qualitative research. I read and review dozens of qualitative health research articles each year, and my broader interest in the sociology and philosophy of health means I also get to read a lot of really good stuff too. So I’m claiming that as my mandate to offer some critical comments. So what makes for a good qualitative health research study, and how can you tell if you’ve found a diamond or just a bit of cheap plastic costume jewellery? Well I would say that the first thing … [Read more...] about Qualitative Health Research – A guide for the perplexed
Is qualitative research in decline just as physiotherapy ‘gets’ it?
Over the last few months I've been reading more and more about the demise of qualitative research. This isn't coming from clinical scientists and quantitative researchers, but from people who have been invested in the field since its inception in the late 1980s. The argument they make is that qualitative research has now become too formulaic, systematized and too heavily methodological. It's lost its critical power and forgotten what qualitative inquiry was meant to be able to do. One of the people who explains this best is probably Elizabeth St Pierre Adams, and in this recent video from last year's Australasian Association for Research in Education (AARE) conference, she explains … [Read more...] about Is qualitative research in decline just as physiotherapy ‘gets’ it?