For this theme, I chose to nurture my interest in multicultural communication and how it is enabled by media technology. The study by Chan and Nyback investigates how students learn about values, meanings, and beliefs concerning health, well-being, caring, and nursing, from peers from another country. The background for the study is the increasingly international social interactions that nurses worldwide face.
The studied sample was a group of 20 students, aged 19 to 28. Half of the participants were nursing students at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University (HKPU), and the other half at the Novia Univeristy of Applied Sciences (Novia UAS).
The method
The researchers collected data (individual assignment, a joint assignment, and individual reflections submitted after an online seminar) through a web based learning platform. The data was transcribed and used as one sole unit of analysis. The researchers had an inductive approach and performed a qualitative content analysis. Since the data was inductive, the approach was general rather than specific, meaning that particular statements and reflections from individual students were combined into joint statements, representing the group.
The researchers used open coding and grouped the data in clusters that formed several categories and themes during their analysis. This abstraction process continued until the themes were formed and named using words that characterized their contents.
Methodological benefits and limitations
The benefits of performing a content analysis by open coding is the flexibility it offers the researcher. Unexpected results are less likely to be ruled out, compared to when the codes are set a priori. One downside of the method is the possibility of gaining too many categories or themes, making the study hard to close. Further, the sample was very modest, and hence the results might be more relevant should the study have had a larger number of participants.
Further problematics of the study
The researchers emphasized the importance of clear instructions and statements of the researchers' expectations, especially since the study was conducted virtuality and hence with limited supervision. However, much of the course was "left to the learners' flexibility, adaptability, and creativity." This is a clear flaw in the paper's method - if the research is reliant on individual traits, how can it ever be reliable?
The participants were told to approach their teachers to get more specific information on the research project, meaning that each participant had to actively search for information. In the paper, the process is described as "information about the project and the various assessments were provided until the students had no further questions." This is another flaw of the method. Could the researchers ever ensure that the participants had gained all the information needed, if the source of its spreading was based on their ability to ask the right questions? I believe that a simple way of improving the method would have been to make sure that all students get the exact same information, and that it would be up to the teachers to make sure that they receive it.
Learning outcomes of reading the paper
1) Open coding enables flexibility, and compared to using quantitative methods researchers can be flexible in how they work and interact with their data in further extent.
2) Qualitative studies are generally interested in the totality of the issue; the results are slightly more nuanced than such of quantitative studies.
3) Qualitative studies can feel "un-academic", due to their lack of formalized structure.
What is a case study?
A case study examines in-depth, purposeful samples to better understand a given phenomena. Case studies hence focus on samples within single setting, drawing conclusions that are specific rather than general. The research strategy typically combines methods such as archives, interviews, questionnaires, and observations, in the obtaining of data, and the evidence can be both qualitative and quantitative (which is a clear differentiation from qualitative studies, with which the case study method often is confused). The formost benefit of case studies is their enabling of placing subjects in context; subject are put directly in their context, making very specific studies possible.
The researchers got started with their case study by clearly
stating the research question; they strived to identify the
impact of social media on public discussion in the case
on the closing of the University of South Florida Polytechnic.
The authors distributed
a survey and collected online comments from
students on the campus, and hence crafted instruments that enabled their studying.
The descriptive data was reported and later analyzed in order to investigate whether any
factors predicted greater concern or involvement (e.g. signing petitions and
contacting politicians). This part of the case study is one of the paper’s main
strengths in my opinion. The researchers showed great understanding for their setting
(and sample), and their analysis is proof of that.
When shaping hypotheses, researchers can work in two steps.
By 1) refining the definition of the construct and 2) building evidence which
measures the construct in each case, the case studied can be tackled in a more structured
way. The researchers in this particular study did this very well. For example,
they used four data mined sets to analyze the students’ online commenting on
the school closing online. This helped build evidence which allowed measurement
of the specific constructs.
Theoretical
saturation can only be reached if researchers accept their own collected data,
and hence so can closure. Time and money might predict how far a study can be
taken, but so could researcher subjectivity. The researchers entered this case study with a belief that students used contemporary communication methods such social media in the discussion on the campus closing. However, that was not what the data entailed. Hence, the researchers in this particular case study showed proof of professional excellence when accepting (and celebrating) the unexpected results!
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