It's been about a month since my last posting, and I have successfully recruited one participant. As of today, I have contacted 13 people for interviews with 1 acceptance and 1 rejection. I just contacted 3 people today, but aside from them I haven't heard from the remaining 8. What makes my recruitment difficult is that all of my participants are overseas, and I get their contact information from their blogs, microblogs, or vlogs. I assume that some of these bloggers have posted outdated or barely used email addresses. Another assumption for the low response rate is that many people in my target population are getting ready to leave their host country. They are busy enough saying goodbyes and preparing for life at home that they are not ready to commit to a series interviews that may take months to complete.
One of the stickiest issues is the method of contacting my participants. My IRB has approved of contacting them through email, but I have two other methods of contacting them online which IRB may or may not consider "email." One is through Twitter which allows me to send private messages to my those who follow me and public messages to those who don't. Both types of messages are limited to Twitter's well known 140-character limit. This is probably the most difficult to work around as I cannot capture my entire IRB-approved email message within 140 characters. Currently we are working on solutions. If I we come to one, then I will be able to contact 8 more people, one of which I probably have a good chance of recruiting.
There are 12 other people that are best contacted through their YouTube channels. YouTube allows messaging through their service with no character limits. I wrote to IRB today to see if they qualify this as "email." In addition, I would like to send a recruitment video containing the same message as the email. I believe this will be more effective based on the literature I have read and my own feelings since my contacts will be able to see who I am, and it may be easier to build rapport if I don't appear creepy. Furthermore, I believe a link to my recruitment video would be more effective to send on Twitter as well. I'd really like to work on this as soon as I know where IRB stands, then I would nearly double the amount of people to contact.
I am fortunate to have the technological capability with high-tech facilities to record, edit, and link this potential recruitment video. I might as well take the chance since I have this opportunity.
Tuesday, June 18, 2013
Wednesday, May 22, 2013
Now Collecting Data
Since my last posting, I started a full-time job, which is conveniently within a comfortable and reasonable driving distance of my home and my university. The job is thankfully not too similar to my research interest, so I can view my research as a welcoming break from my job and vice-versa. At this early point in my research and job, I can say that I enjoy them equally.
My new job has/had a large learning curve, so I decided to take a one-month hiatus from my research and focus solely on the new job. However, one week after my first month I went to Canada for a 5-day business trip and so I couldn't dive back into my dissertation until returning and recovering from the Canadian trip.
Although I officially wasn't collecting data, I was reading a book written by a potential participant in my study. I decided to read it during the 5-week hiatus to keep my brain interested in my research topic. I did not want to lose complete interest in my dissertation because that would have terrible consequences. For the most part, the pressure to continue my strong work ethic from my co-chairs and my committee is off. Actually, the book really got me excited about participant selection and data collection, so I was ready to start when I got the chance.
When I selected my first participant, I realized that I forgot to contact IRB to make a change to my invitation email. One sentence had to be removed because it no longer applied to my study and it would confuse my participants. Fortunately for me, it took an hour to make the change and two days for IRB to approve the modification. By then, I was six weeks into my job without collecting any data.
This past week is when I started collecting document data from my first participant. I still need to collect interview data, but I already have about 800 pages of document data from the first of up to fifteen participants. That appears daunting, but I would say about 1/3 of those pages do not directly answer my primary research question. I cannot describe anymore than that without violating confidentiality. It's also somewhat less daunting because I have a framework set up to start initial coding. The deeper digging will begin once a pattern emerges from the initial coding process.
Although I have just started collecting data, reading the documents from my first participant and the book by the potential participant (who I may not select at all for reasons I cannot disclose) has been personally rewarding. Doing this research is rewarding professionally and emotionally because my participants have had similar life experiences as me. If I do not complete this research project, I will have gained enough to be personally satisfied. However, I do not intend to give up because I would also like to be professionally satisfied with a PhD, evidence that I can conduct research at a research-intensive university.
My new job has/had a large learning curve, so I decided to take a one-month hiatus from my research and focus solely on the new job. However, one week after my first month I went to Canada for a 5-day business trip and so I couldn't dive back into my dissertation until returning and recovering from the Canadian trip.
Although I officially wasn't collecting data, I was reading a book written by a potential participant in my study. I decided to read it during the 5-week hiatus to keep my brain interested in my research topic. I did not want to lose complete interest in my dissertation because that would have terrible consequences. For the most part, the pressure to continue my strong work ethic from my co-chairs and my committee is off. Actually, the book really got me excited about participant selection and data collection, so I was ready to start when I got the chance.
When I selected my first participant, I realized that I forgot to contact IRB to make a change to my invitation email. One sentence had to be removed because it no longer applied to my study and it would confuse my participants. Fortunately for me, it took an hour to make the change and two days for IRB to approve the modification. By then, I was six weeks into my job without collecting any data.
This past week is when I started collecting document data from my first participant. I still need to collect interview data, but I already have about 800 pages of document data from the first of up to fifteen participants. That appears daunting, but I would say about 1/3 of those pages do not directly answer my primary research question. I cannot describe anymore than that without violating confidentiality. It's also somewhat less daunting because I have a framework set up to start initial coding. The deeper digging will begin once a pattern emerges from the initial coding process.
Although I have just started collecting data, reading the documents from my first participant and the book by the potential participant (who I may not select at all for reasons I cannot disclose) has been personally rewarding. Doing this research is rewarding professionally and emotionally because my participants have had similar life experiences as me. If I do not complete this research project, I will have gained enough to be personally satisfied. However, I do not intend to give up because I would also like to be professionally satisfied with a PhD, evidence that I can conduct research at a research-intensive university.
Friday, March 15, 2013
Research Proposal Meeting
I haven't written much in the past two months because the only thing I had to do concerning my dissertation was schedule and hold my research proposal meeting. If I weren't job hunting in that period of time, I would have considered those past couple of months as an extended break. During this hiatus, I received some advice of how to constructively occupy the time and I took some of that advice.
Hiatus Advice
I also spent the last month brushing up on my Spanish skills using Duolingo, a free online language learning software program. I did this for a number of reasons both personal and professional, and I found it more enjoyable than I expected.
One of the more useful ways of spending my hiatus time was working on my professional blog. I took the opportunity to explore my ideas about incorporating multiliteracies into second language education, a second research interest of mine. I wanted to practice my skills of curriculum development with this new idea as well as learn more about the development of education technology and its effects on learning and pedagogy. This exercise actually prepared me for the job I just accepted.
Research Proposal Meeting
On my birthday, February 14, my co-chairs gave me the green light to schedule my research proposal meeting with my dissertation committee: 3 faculty from my department, 1 from another department within the College of Education, and 1 from my cognate area of Sociocultural Anthropology. I used Doodle to schedule it, and found that March 7 was the best earliest time for everyone.
By request, I sent 4 committee members a digital copy of my proposal (the first 3 chapters of my dissertation) and 1 member a hard copy in a 3-ring binder. They all received their copies within a week of February 14.
A series of winter storms swept passed Iowa, about one a week, leading up to my proposal meeting. One of these storms prevented one of my co-chairs from attending the meeting, but the meeting proceeded well without her.
I spent the first 10 minutes presenting a synopsis of my research proposal, ending it with some of my concerns. And over the next 80 minutes, I discovered that my concerns overlapped quite well with my committees. Nobody's questions or concerns took me by surprise, and I was very happy to receive such constructive feedback. I'm not sure how typical this is for PhD candidates as I haven't met many who like to share details about their meeting.
By the end of the meeting, I had a good idea of how to make changes to my first 3 chapters before collecting the data. At that time, it seemed like these changes would take a few months and I could start collecting data by mid to late summer 2013. I was surprised after reconnecting with my co-chairs that I did not have to make as many drastic changes as I was ready to make. The best outcome for me is that it seems that I do not need to go through IRB again.
Today, I just submitted my action plan to my co-chairs. And if all goes well, I should be able to start collecting data as soon as late spring/early summer 2013. In the meantime, I will be starting my new job, which will most likely slow things down. I don't mind as much now that my family and I are more financially secure.
Hiatus Advice
- Submit some manuscripts to scholarly journals. A colleague and I had been planning to submit our co-written paper to a journal for a few months, and this hiatus provided the best opportunity to finally submit it.
- Begin another research project. I played around with this idea, coming up with different research questions involving the same population under investigation in my dissertation. I limited myself to brainstorming research questions and doing some preliminary literature searching.
- Submit proposals to conferences. In my case, the deadlines for proposals for many upcoming conferences had already passed. I spent a little time brainstorming ideas for proposals for conferences during the 2013/14 academic year.
- Work more on the pilot study. I already had two opportunities to work on my pilot study since August, and I didn't want to adjust or add anything more being so close to the research proposal meeting.
I also spent the last month brushing up on my Spanish skills using Duolingo, a free online language learning software program. I did this for a number of reasons both personal and professional, and I found it more enjoyable than I expected.
One of the more useful ways of spending my hiatus time was working on my professional blog. I took the opportunity to explore my ideas about incorporating multiliteracies into second language education, a second research interest of mine. I wanted to practice my skills of curriculum development with this new idea as well as learn more about the development of education technology and its effects on learning and pedagogy. This exercise actually prepared me for the job I just accepted.
Research Proposal Meeting
On my birthday, February 14, my co-chairs gave me the green light to schedule my research proposal meeting with my dissertation committee: 3 faculty from my department, 1 from another department within the College of Education, and 1 from my cognate area of Sociocultural Anthropology. I used Doodle to schedule it, and found that March 7 was the best earliest time for everyone.
By request, I sent 4 committee members a digital copy of my proposal (the first 3 chapters of my dissertation) and 1 member a hard copy in a 3-ring binder. They all received their copies within a week of February 14.
A series of winter storms swept passed Iowa, about one a week, leading up to my proposal meeting. One of these storms prevented one of my co-chairs from attending the meeting, but the meeting proceeded well without her.
I spent the first 10 minutes presenting a synopsis of my research proposal, ending it with some of my concerns. And over the next 80 minutes, I discovered that my concerns overlapped quite well with my committees. Nobody's questions or concerns took me by surprise, and I was very happy to receive such constructive feedback. I'm not sure how typical this is for PhD candidates as I haven't met many who like to share details about their meeting.
By the end of the meeting, I had a good idea of how to make changes to my first 3 chapters before collecting the data. At that time, it seemed like these changes would take a few months and I could start collecting data by mid to late summer 2013. I was surprised after reconnecting with my co-chairs that I did not have to make as many drastic changes as I was ready to make. The best outcome for me is that it seems that I do not need to go through IRB again.
Today, I just submitted my action plan to my co-chairs. And if all goes well, I should be able to start collecting data as soon as late spring/early summer 2013. In the meantime, I will be starting my new job, which will most likely slow things down. I don't mind as much now that my family and I are more financially secure.
Wednesday, January 16, 2013
An Interesting Tweet
This past weekend, I received a tweet (on Twitter) to participate in a study that is similar to mine. The researcher is also a PhD candidate, but she is from a university that I just learned about from a job position announcement last week. Although the job announcement is mostly irrelevant, I am very interested in this candidate's study. I am not too worried about our study being too similar because our participant populations have a very low chance of overlapping.
I agreed to take participate in her survey and found that we asked roughly the same demographic questions, but the other research questions differed a little. Although I am using survey software, my research is more like an interview. However, at the end of taking her survey, I was asked if I would like to participate in an online interview via Skype. I agreed and was a bit jealous that her IRB allows her to use an easier method of data collection, although there is a greater risk of losing confidentiality through Skype.
Our studies are also similar in that I assume that we would both qualify as participants in our own studies, meaning I could in mine and she in hers. However, I am not sure if she would qualify for mine. We are also similar, I believe, in that I assume that she has worked in the same English Language Fellowship I have.
I wonder about the ethical and other implications of interviewing a participant like me who may know the research theories and frameworks quite well. How would this benefit or contaminate her data collection? It is her choice to make as I felt it was my ethical duty to let her know I was conducting research on a similar inquiry. Perhaps this is someone I can collaborate with once our dissertations are defended and our PhDs earned. It would be interesting to compare and contrast our studies once completed.
I agreed to take participate in her survey and found that we asked roughly the same demographic questions, but the other research questions differed a little. Although I am using survey software, my research is more like an interview. However, at the end of taking her survey, I was asked if I would like to participate in an online interview via Skype. I agreed and was a bit jealous that her IRB allows her to use an easier method of data collection, although there is a greater risk of losing confidentiality through Skype.
Our studies are also similar in that I assume that we would both qualify as participants in our own studies, meaning I could in mine and she in hers. However, I am not sure if she would qualify for mine. We are also similar, I believe, in that I assume that she has worked in the same English Language Fellowship I have.
I wonder about the ethical and other implications of interviewing a participant like me who may know the research theories and frameworks quite well. How would this benefit or contaminate her data collection? It is her choice to make as I felt it was my ethical duty to let her know I was conducting research on a similar inquiry. Perhaps this is someone I can collaborate with once our dissertations are defended and our PhDs earned. It would be interesting to compare and contrast our studies once completed.
Tuesday, January 8, 2013
Email Interviews
I have learned an interesting detail about conducting asynchronous online interviews. Last year, I read through the literature on online interviews to learn that the most common method of asynchronous online interviews was via email. Many studies have used this approach to collect all or some of their interview data. However, the Internal Review Board at the University of Iowa acknowledges that email is not a secure method of data collection. Therefore I run the risk of losing confidentiality through this process. The literature also mentions this risk; nonetheless, the researchers were able to conduct email interviews. However, the IRB does not advise this method, and I am not too surprised. Although I agree that email is not the most secure method of collecting interview data, the risk is not much lower with other methods. And the University of Iowa's IRB is known to be more cautious than most others. The main issue here is not contacting participants or sending them questions via email; it is the receipt of written responses. It is my responsibility to provide my participants with a secure method of answering my interview questions.
My alternative plan is to use a web survey software program supported by the University of Iowa. This program is widely used by researchers, so I assume that IRB will find this a safer alternative to email. Although this plan will consume a little bit more of my time, I will be building research skills associated with the utility of web survey software programs. Perhaps it will end up saving me time at the end of the data collection process. The lesson I learned is that even though most of the literature reports mostly positive results of a certain data collection method, it may no longer or may not be the safest or best possible way.
My alternative plan is to use a web survey software program supported by the University of Iowa. This program is widely used by researchers, so I assume that IRB will find this a safer alternative to email. Although this plan will consume a little bit more of my time, I will be building research skills associated with the utility of web survey software programs. Perhaps it will end up saving me time at the end of the data collection process. The lesson I learned is that even though most of the literature reports mostly positive results of a certain data collection method, it may no longer or may not be the safest or best possible way.
Monday, October 29, 2012
Another Pilot Interview
Yesterday, I conducted a very rough pilot interview for mainly one purpose: to get a sense of how long it would take to have a respondent answer all the questions in one sitting. It was very rough because the respondent did not match my target population well. He would have been disqualified for two reasons. First, I know him (too) well. Second, he had lived in the target country before and had family/friend living there. Because of these two reasons, I already knew about 1/3 of his answers well and about another 1/4 could not be answered, thus the interview probably went faster than with someone who fit the target population description better.
Anyway, I learned that the fastest a one-sitting interview would probably take is 45 minutes. I would estimate that it would take at least 90 minutes with a fully qualified participant. My pilot study from last summer, showed me that about half of the participants elaborated or expanded upon their answers, thus adding 50-100% more to the allotted time. So a very rough estimate would be 45-90 minutes for uncooperative or reserved interviewees and 90-180 minutes for cooperative and/or talkative interviewees.
Fortunately for me, I do not plan to ask all the interview questions to the respondents in one sitting. The only way this would happen is if the respondent prefers to get it all done in one sitting and that I have at least 3 hours of my own free time. I do not expect this to happen often if at all.
I prefer to do a hybrid of synchronous (web-conferencing) and asynchronous (email) interviews. My pilot respondent yesterday told me he would have preferred to answer all by email, which would help me in terms of not transcribing any audio recordings. But I do like to engage in a little spontaneous conversation about the topic, especially when talking about concepts that can lead to ambiguous answers. From this interview, I learned that I should give my participants the option to do more web-conferencing or more emailing.
However, I'm not confident enough yet, so I plan to conduct a few more interviews using both formats so I can find my level of confidence.
Anyway, I learned that the fastest a one-sitting interview would probably take is 45 minutes. I would estimate that it would take at least 90 minutes with a fully qualified participant. My pilot study from last summer, showed me that about half of the participants elaborated or expanded upon their answers, thus adding 50-100% more to the allotted time. So a very rough estimate would be 45-90 minutes for uncooperative or reserved interviewees and 90-180 minutes for cooperative and/or talkative interviewees.
Fortunately for me, I do not plan to ask all the interview questions to the respondents in one sitting. The only way this would happen is if the respondent prefers to get it all done in one sitting and that I have at least 3 hours of my own free time. I do not expect this to happen often if at all.
I prefer to do a hybrid of synchronous (web-conferencing) and asynchronous (email) interviews. My pilot respondent yesterday told me he would have preferred to answer all by email, which would help me in terms of not transcribing any audio recordings. But I do like to engage in a little spontaneous conversation about the topic, especially when talking about concepts that can lead to ambiguous answers. From this interview, I learned that I should give my participants the option to do more web-conferencing or more emailing.
However, I'm not confident enough yet, so I plan to conduct a few more interviews using both formats so I can find my level of confidence.
Wednesday, October 24, 2012
Online Interviews
Today I have been reading more in depth about conducting interviews online, and I was quite happy to discover that some of the protocols I used based on my common sense as a researcher are supported by what I am reading. The purpose of today's post is to share what I am learning about online interviews.
As with most interactions online, there are two types of interviews: asynchronous and synchronous. The most common example of asynchronous interviews online are email exchanges. The easiest example of synchronous interviews online to image are Skype or Google Hangout meetings, although web conferences are used more in research.
When I decided to incorporate online methodologies into my study, I imagined the synchronous interviews as the main source of data collection. This imagination came from taking several qualitative research courses and applying traditional face-to-face protocols to online research. Although I planned to use emails to help establish rapport and set up the synchronous interviews, I did not think about relying more on emails to collect my interview data...until today.
Looking at my interview questions, there are a few that would be difficult to answer spontaneously in a synchronous interview. My respondents would answer better if they were given more time to think through their response, and the response itself would be quite lengthy, or so I hope. I had intended on reserving those few questions for email, but I plan to revisit my research questions to analyze which ones do not call for synchronous interviews.
I still want to do synchronous interviews because my topic covers a lot of fuzzy concepts that I want to be able to clarify for my respondents, and I also want them to clarify their thoughts and opinions as well. I feel that emails would be a bit pestering if I asked them to clarify, and then to elaborate, and then to elaborate more. My pilot data has shown me that a few respondents prefer to give short answers, especially in the beginning of the interview.
One of the bigger surprises in the reading was to discover that I was on the right track with building rapport. To help my respondents in the pilot study become more comfortable with me, I shared my professional website with them to let them know who I am and that I was legitimate in that I was who I said I was, a PhD candidate collecting data for his dissertation. In addition to that, the literature said I should also make myself more personable or easier to relate to. In one way, I am in that my teaching experience is similar to my participants' experience and we've lived in the same cultural context in terms of national borders. The literature further states that the researcher should share family information, which is something that I used to have on my professional site, but I took it off because I'm applying for jobs now and that doesn't seem appropriate.
Based on my pilot study, I feel that conducting online interviews comes natural to me. And I hope that I can contribute to the social sciences by sharing my experiences and findings from this and future research. I feel that acquiring these research skills adds to my value as a researcher in addition to the knowledge gained from answering my research questions.
As with most interactions online, there are two types of interviews: asynchronous and synchronous. The most common example of asynchronous interviews online are email exchanges. The easiest example of synchronous interviews online to image are Skype or Google Hangout meetings, although web conferences are used more in research.
When I decided to incorporate online methodologies into my study, I imagined the synchronous interviews as the main source of data collection. This imagination came from taking several qualitative research courses and applying traditional face-to-face protocols to online research. Although I planned to use emails to help establish rapport and set up the synchronous interviews, I did not think about relying more on emails to collect my interview data...until today.
Looking at my interview questions, there are a few that would be difficult to answer spontaneously in a synchronous interview. My respondents would answer better if they were given more time to think through their response, and the response itself would be quite lengthy, or so I hope. I had intended on reserving those few questions for email, but I plan to revisit my research questions to analyze which ones do not call for synchronous interviews.
I still want to do synchronous interviews because my topic covers a lot of fuzzy concepts that I want to be able to clarify for my respondents, and I also want them to clarify their thoughts and opinions as well. I feel that emails would be a bit pestering if I asked them to clarify, and then to elaborate, and then to elaborate more. My pilot data has shown me that a few respondents prefer to give short answers, especially in the beginning of the interview.
One of the bigger surprises in the reading was to discover that I was on the right track with building rapport. To help my respondents in the pilot study become more comfortable with me, I shared my professional website with them to let them know who I am and that I was legitimate in that I was who I said I was, a PhD candidate collecting data for his dissertation. In addition to that, the literature said I should also make myself more personable or easier to relate to. In one way, I am in that my teaching experience is similar to my participants' experience and we've lived in the same cultural context in terms of national borders. The literature further states that the researcher should share family information, which is something that I used to have on my professional site, but I took it off because I'm applying for jobs now and that doesn't seem appropriate.
Based on my pilot study, I feel that conducting online interviews comes natural to me. And I hope that I can contribute to the social sciences by sharing my experiences and findings from this and future research. I feel that acquiring these research skills adds to my value as a researcher in addition to the knowledge gained from answering my research questions.
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