Now that you’ve completed the second major project for this class, I’d like you to take a few minutes and reflect on this assignment. First, what was it like to do qualitative research, i.e., observations and interviews, for this project? What distinguishes this kind of research from our first project? What did you learn as a researcher from this assignment?
Second, what was it like to write in this genre, i.e., in the format of a social-science study? What did you do differently as a writer to successfully meet the expectations of this situation? What did you learn as a writer from this experience?
I enjoy qualitative research, especially the field note aspect. I think that by sitting in a location and just observing and trying to take it all it, you are able to learn a lot and it is a fun and informative experience. This assignment was much different from our first one on many different levels. For the first assignment, we were looking at someone else's work and analyzing it from an objective standpoint. For this assignment, we took our own experiences, observations, and conversations as the main meat for our paper. Also, the role of sources played a very different role. For this assignment, they were more used to look at what other information is available on the topic we were discussing as opposed to using it to show how successfully or unsuccessfully an author used rhetoric. As a researcher, I learned how important it is to have an organized plan. In order to do this kind of research, one must really have a strong reason as to why this location is important to study and also thoroughly explain the way you gathered your research.
ReplyDeleteBefore this paper, I had never used APA. I felt that this format is very helpful and straightforward for this type of assignment. I like the different sections and the headers that were used to both visually and literally break up the flow of our paper. I liked that we had to first explain how we gathered our research (methodology) then in a different section, talk about what we found, and lastly discuss it. I also liked how we were supposed to use sources as a way to show the past research that had been conducted but quote less from them and be able to talk about and draw attention to the findings from our observations. In order to successfully write in APA, I was organized and made sure that I had all the components necessary for each section. I was able to stay organized and thorough with this technique.
I was slightly concerned going into this project. I was unsure how best to approach the requirements, having never had to conduct research on human participants before. I was afraid that I would mess up the interviews, or be too shy or awkward around the interviewees.
ReplyDeleteWhen I went into my first observation, I was also unsure about what to say if people would approach me and ask about what I was doing there that day. However, when it happened the first time, after I got over the initial surprise that someone had approached me, I managed to turn it around into an interview. Once I managed to do the first one, it seemed a lot easier to do the others. I wasn’t quite so worried anymore.
The research being done in this project was really different from the research done for the first one. For this paper, we had to actually go out and gather the information ourselves, instead of piecing together information from other’s observations. It was a different, but certainly very interesting experience, and it was surprisingly really fun to do.
When writing this paper, I was a lot more comfortable with how to do it than with the last paper. Having grown up with parents who write research papers frequently, and being a biology major, writing research papers is a lot easier for me than writing more casual, op-ed like, popular audience pieces. One thing that I learned from this experience was how to take notes with absolutely every minutiae of detail in them. Because otherwise, even though you think you’ll remember it later, you probably will end up forgetting that person’s grandmother’s name, or how many kids her sister-in-law adopted, and even if you don’t think at the time that you’ll need it, it could be valuable information later on.
I was not the biggest fan of this assignment. It was very difficult for me to be made to care about it before I changed topics to the library because I felt as if I was trying to make up a generalization about how a group of people use the space, and I knew that no matter what I did, the park survey was going to be a lot of BS on my part. I generally do not like writing BS papers, especially given the price of attendance at DU, so I decided to change topics so that I would actually be motivated to genuinely put effort in on my part by writing about something that interested me.
ReplyDeleteThe interviews were something that I familiar with, so I was not too put out by actually doing them, except that I was petrified by the prospect of asking somebody that I do not know, and who is obviously doing something else to interview with me. I felt as if my observations were not terribly productive for my papers because I already knew about how people use the library from spending many hours there last quarter when I needed a place to study.
I am used to writing in the third person for papers similar to this, and have also conducted a number of research and interview based writing assignments in the IB program. I also was in a class last quarter that was all about deconstructing and then constructing social science concepts, so I was used to the general format. I learned how to use APA, which I have never used before.
Doing qualitative research for this project pushed me outside of my writing comfort zone. Interviewing people was difficult because I never know quite how to approach people--however I was pleasantly surprised by the reactions I got. People were very willing to speak with me. Also, I literally had to block out periods of time to do my observations. With our previous paper, all of the research was through secondary sources, so we could each move at our own pace. However, with this project, I couldn't rush anything. I couldn't speed up time and make my observations happen faster. I simply had to be patient and thorough.
ReplyDeleteIn some ways, writing this paper was easier than the first. I'm used to writing lab reports for my science classes, and the format of this paper was more similar to that than the first was. I didn't necessarily have to convince anyone of anything--I just had to present my findings. However, it was much more difficult to find secondary sources for this project. This project was much more specific, and pertinent scholarly sources were not easily accessible. I ended up making an appointment with the research librarian, and she helped me find sources in obscure databases and she also taught me how to use sources which were not perfectly relevant to my benefit.
I learned, as I did in my first project, that my initial assumptions (or even ones that I formed throughout the process) were not necessarily correct. I had to keep returning to my field notes and supporting sources in order to find trends. A trend or interesting subject which I discovered at the beginning of my research was not necessarily the one that I ended with. I've learned that writing is a process--nothing is concrete, and we can always learn more about our topic of research.
I enjoyed writing this paper much more than the first. I thought it was interesting to develop an idea from my own observations. I enjoy people watching normally, so it was not hard to make myself sit down and do nothing but observe. I had more trouble in conducting my interviews though because I am somewhat shy. I had to almost force myself to go up to talk to people. In the end, everyone I talked to was very nice and no one turned me down for an interview.
ReplyDeleteI felt like the research for this project was more personal. We were able to draw our own conclusions, unlike in other papers, where we must draw from the conclusions of others. From this assignment, I learned that it is often difficult to distance yourself from stereotypes, but this is an important ability to have to gain objective findings.
I found it a bit more difficult to write in a scienific format. I had a hard time writing in a more scholarly, straightforward way at times. However, to meet the expectations of this situation, I tried to break my findings up into specific pieces to make them easier to understand. I also used less flowery language and wrote in a more precise manner. I found myself thinking about the specific words I used more than in past papers I have written. From this experience, I found that I like this type of writing more than writing I have done in the past. I liked that I did not have to have a clear thesis in mind when I began, and instead was able to develop it as I worked through my findings.
At first, I thought it was silly to conduct interviews because, as a member of the community I was researching, I thought knew all there was to know about the Columbine Memorial. But after I conducted a few interviews and qualitative observational sessions, I found that I actually had not thought of everything. The people I interviewed were so insightful. Without their input, my project would be nowhere near as comprehensive as it is now. My interviews went well. I had one lady (respectfully) decline an interview, which was okay, because all I had to do was move on to another person. I found it was easy to hold a conversation with the people I interviewed. I think this is partly due to the fact that I am so familiar with the situation and am not just a third-party observer.
ReplyDeleteThis paper has much more of a scientific organization to it than other papers I have composed, including the first project. It is just as "academic-sounding" as the other, but the fact that it has sectioned headings makes it feel like a recipe or formula.
As a researcher, I learned how to ask appropriate questions. My top is a fairly sensitive one, so I had to be careful not to step on the toes of those whom I interviewed.
Social science can be a tricky genre to write in. My project dealt a lot with personal opinion. I found it difficult to interpret the opinion without putting in my own bias. As a writer, I learned how to research and write about sensitive topics. Up until this point, I had mainly written about happy and carefree topics. This project opened my eyes to the more serious subjects.
I did not like doing qualitative research. My brain works very scientifically, moving from hard evidence to hard conclusions. This assignment seemed non-scientific to me because the research conducted was conducted through my eyes and my thought process alone. Quite frankly, I don't think I'm smart enough to draw accurate conclusions based on other people's behavior that simply observe. If another individual were to have sat in the lounge when I did, seen what I saw, gathered the interviews I gathered, and investigated the sources I investigated, then it is very possible that that other researcher would draw a different conclusion. To me, this assignment was just as much about exploring my own perception as it was about what I was perceiving. In a science experiment, there is no room for perception. It does not change the result of the experiment. In this assignment, only a mild change in perception could uproot my entire argument. Perhaps I am a poor qualitative researcher, but I would argue that a change in perception would have a heavy impact on every qualitative study.
ReplyDeleteMy paper is not complete so it is difficult for me to discuss what it is like to write in this genre. One reason why my paper is not complete is because I have struggled mightily with my distaste for qualitative research as a whole. Because I don't appreciate the genre itself, it makes it difficult to write within. Thus far, my biggest struggle is that I can't determine what I'm arguing in my paper. It feels awkward to make a claim about a very specific place and just my opinion about that place supported by limited evidence that, itself, is dependent on my perception.
I thought the actual process of conducting qualitative research was a very challenging and valuable one. I generally consider myself fairly extroverted and confident when it comes to social interactions, but I found the process of going to a location and engaging in activities that lay outside expected social norms (like asking random people for interviews) was uncomfortable. Having been successful in gathering good data from these interviews and observations, I find that this has been the most gratifying research experience I have ever had and I think it is something that every student should be required to do at some point in their education.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, because I got into my mind that the qualitative research was the bulk of this assignment, I ended up not allowing ample time to comfortably gather previously published material. Even though this type of research is the one I have more experience in, it was this part of the project that I found most challenging and time-consuming. As a researcher, I learned that I need to divide my time more equally gathering first-hand observations and searching for outside sources.
Now that I have tried this inductive type of essay-writing, it is hard to imagine going back to the more typical, deductive reasoning paper. I particularly liked having the headings to sort out my thought processes. However, I also learned that switching writing styles is not a quick process, and if I ever have to do something similar again, I will allow for much more time in which to become accustomed to the new style.
Conducting primary research was satisfying, but also took a lot of thought (e.g., into survey design and how to code data). It was a lot more time-consuming than I initially thought it would be. But I really enjoyed actually “discovering” things for myself, instead of just reading them in books and articles. This kind of research is significantly different from the first assignment because, in my mind, it just takes a lot more creativity and thinking. Book research can be conducted basically by scanning the tables of contents and picking out sections that look relevant to your thesis. As a researcher, I learned from this assignment how to organize and sort through data; how quotes from respondents often “speak for themselves;” and how much time I need to allow if I’m going to do a thorough job on a research project like this—particularly once I’m conducting research with a sample that’s larger than 12 respondents!
ReplyDeleteI had never written in the format of a social sciences study prior to this assignment. I think I learned how to sound professional and objective. I enjoyed writing this sort of report because it was relatively easy to organize and I could just say exactly what I meant, rather than worrying about the language being “pretty.”
At first I found—and to some extent still find—qualitative research to be an uncomfortable process. While I understand the mechanics of observations, I found it bothersome that I was unable to determine what qualitative…qualities…would be most important (and, therefore, imperative to record). With interviews, again, I am comfortable with the mechanics, but less than comfortable with approaching people at a site and attempting an in-depth interview from which I could glean qualitative details. This was particularly unsuccessful during my first topic, but was relatively successful during my second.
ReplyDeleteOur first research project was a fundamentally different type of research. While in our current project we had to observe and gather qualitative information from which would eventually arrive at a conclusion, our first project was more focused around finding scholarly work (research that had already been conducted) that presented a cohesive argument about a thesis.
While it is occasionally difficult, I enjoy the MRAD format used in social science studies—it seems like a more literary version of the scientific method, which I find appealing. However, I don’t know that it was the most appropriate form for what my study ended up becoming.
This was my first time writing about qualitative research. I have never had to conduct interviews before and found it very intimidating at first. I found that recording observations was very enjoyable to me. Seldom do I stop to really take in my surroundings. I have always been a people watcher, but just a people watcher. It was enlightening to watch people interact with a physical space. It was also interesting to see what aspects of the cafe stood out to me on one visit that they didn't during another. This distinguishes the research from the first project for me because it focuses on a collective group and observations of their interactions. However, the first project I did was focused on one person. Another difference was that the first projected centered on how a woman tries to portray herself to the public eye through forceful rhetoric. For this paper, I was observing the natural rhetoric of a public space that came freely without judgement. As a researcher the biggest lesson I learned was simply to listen to people and not do all the talking. It is a feeling of just being one with the space and observing everything and everyone run their natural course. Also, next time I ever have to do a project like this, I am planning on using a recording devise whether it is on my computer or a tape recorder. I did all my interviews by hand which was difficult to keep up with.
ReplyDeleteIt was a weird feeling at first to try to write in this genre. I'm very used to flowery writing that is built upon exaggerated descriptions and emotions, and this required me to be brief and to the point about my findings and observations. What really helped me to successfully meet the expectations of this paper was to read other papers that were in the same genre. Reading and helping analyze my peers' papers also helped me to realize aspects to change in my own paper. As a writer, I learned that there are many types of writing that I am unfamiliar with and have much more to learn.
The observations for this particular research project seemed somewhat easy and very enjoyable. It consisted of me sitting on 16th and Broadway and observing the people passing by. The more significant and intriguing aspect of my research was conducting interviews. In fact, these interviews were also the most difficult process of the project. The hard part wasn't making the call, it was getting the interviewee to answer. If I were to do this project over again, I would probably show up in person instead of relying upon others to return my calls. Obviously this research differs from our first project because during this project we conducted research in the field and obtained the information first hand.As a researcher I learned that to be effective, I must be assertive. People won't listen to you if you aren't confident and engaging. This genre of paper is much different than a rhetorical analysis. For instance, I used a lot of first person narrative, especially to explain my methodology. This was new to me as I usually avoid from this perspective.
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