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Arts-based research - Specialized uses of Qualitative research
Arts-based research is an approach to qualitative study that uses art as data or for reporting. (Barone, Savin-Baden). The approach recognizes that artful text (such as a poem or play script), performance art (such as a dance performance or instrumental music concert) and visual art (such as painting or sculpture) can be analyzed and interpreted to contribute to a researcher’s understanding of emerging themes. (Savin-Baden, Onwuegbuzie). Art-based research includes participant-produced art either as visual data (Saldana, Onwuegbuzie) or for elicitation purposes (Onwuegbuzie), and researcher-produced art as a means for reporting (Saldana, McCormack & Elliott).

References for Arts-based research
Barone, T and Eisner, E.W. (2012). Arts based research. Los Angeles, CA: Sage. ISBN 978-1-4127-8247-4

McCormack, B., and Elliott, J. (2003), In appreciation of wisdom: The voice of the older person. Inaugural professorial lecture. University of Ulster, Northern Ireland.

Onwuegbuzie, A. J., Leech, N. L., & Collins, K. M. (2010). Innovative Data Collection Strategies in Qualitative Research. The Qualitative Report, 15(3), 696-726.

Saldana, J. (2011). Fundamentals of qualitative research: Understanding qualitative research. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 20 Savin-Baden, M. & Major, C.H. (2013). Qualitative research: The essential guide to theory and practice. New York: Routledge.

Data collection
Qualitative researchers face many choices for techniques to generate data ranging from grounded theory development and practice, narratology, storytelling, transcript poetry, biographical narrative interviews, classical ethnography, state or governmental studies, research and service demonstrations, focus groups, case studies, participant observation, qualitative review of statistics in order to predict future happenings, or shadowing, surveys (including telephone surveys and consumer satisfaction surveys), among many others. Qualitative methods are used in various methodological approaches, such as action research which has sociological basis, or actor-network theory.

The interview (structured, semi-structured or unstructured) is a common source of data on the qualities/categories of interest. Interviewees are often identified through sophisticated and sometimes, elitist, snowballing techniques. In fields that study households, a much debated topic is whether interviews should be conducted individually or collectively (e.g. as couple interviews).

Another method of qualitative data collection is the use of focus groups. The focus group technique (e.g., Morgan, 1988) involves a moderator facilitating a small group discussion between selected individuals on a particular topic, with video and written data recorded, and is useful in a coordinated research approach studying phenomenon in diverse ways in different environments with distinct stakeholders often excluded from traditional processes. This method is a particularly popular in market research and testing new initiatives with users/workers.

In participant observation researchers typically become members of a culture, group, or setting, and adopt roles to conform to that setting in order to collect a variety of data. In doing so, the aim is for the researcher to gain a closer insight into the culture's practices, motivations, and emotions. It is argued that the researchers' ability to understand the experiences of the culture may be inhibited if they observe without participating.Participant observation is a strategy of reflexive learning, not a single method of observing. and has been described as a continuum of between participation and observation. The ways of participating and observing can vary widely from setting to setting as exemplified by Helen Schwartzman's primer on Ethnography in Organizations (1993). or Anne Copeland and Kathleen White's "Studying Families" (1991).

Other sources include observation (without a predefined theory like statistical theory in mind for example), reflective field notes, texts, pictures, photographs and other images, interactions and practice captured on audio or video recordings, public (e.g. official) and personal documents, historical items, websites and social media.

Move to Analysis section:
The data that is obtained is streamlined (texts of thousands of pages in length) to a definite theme or pattern, or representation of a theory or systemic issue or approach. This step in a theoretical analysis or data analytic technique is further worked on (e.g., gender analysis may be conducted; comparative policy analysis may be developed). An alternative research hypothesis is generated which finally provides the basis of the research statement for continuing work in the fields.

To analyse qualitative data, the researcher seeks meaning from all of the data that is available. The data may be categorized and sorted into patterns (i.e., pattern or thematic analyses) as the primary basis for organizing and reporting the study findings (e.g., activities in the home; interactions with government). Qualitative researchers, often associated with the education field, typically rely on the following methods for gathering information: Participant Observation, Non-participant Observation, Field Notes, Reflexive Journals, Biographical Narrative Interviews, Structured Interview, Semi-structured Interview, Unstructured Interview, and Analysis of documents and materials.

Move to Recursivity section:
In qualitative research, the idea of recursivity is expressed in terms of the nature of its research procedures, which may be contrasted with experimental forms of research design. From the experimental perspective, its major stages of research (data collection, data analysis, discussion of the data in context of the literature, and drawing conclusions) should be each undertaken once (or at most a small number of times) in a research study. In qualitative research however, all of the four stages above may be undertaken repeatedly until one or more specific stopping conditions are met, reflecting a nonstatic attitude to the planning and design of research activities. An example of this dynamicism might be when the qualitative researcher unexpectedly changes their research focus or design midway through a research study, based on their 1st interim data analysis, and then makes further unplanned changes again based on a 2nd interim data analysis; this would be a terrible thing to do from the perspective of an (predefined) experimental study of the same thing. Qualitative researchers would argue that their recursivity in developing the relevant evidence and reasoning, enables the researcher to be more open to unexpected results, more open to the potential of building new constructs, and the possibility of integrating them with the explanations developed continuously throughout a study.

Is there a section on reporting? Should there be?
The research then must be "written up" into a report, book chapter, journal paper, thesis or dissertation, using descriptions, quotes from participants, charts and tables to demonstrate the trustworthiness of the study findings.

Specialized uses[ edit]
There are several different research approaches, or research designs, that qualitative researchers use. In the social sciences, the most frequently used qualitative research approaches include the following:


 * 1) Basic/generic/pragmatic qualitative research, which involves using an eclectic approach taken up to best match the research question at hand. This is often called the mixed-method approach.
 * 2) Ethnographic research.  An example of applied ethnographic research is the study of a particular culture and their understanding of the role of a particular disease in their cultural framework.
 * 3) Grounded theory is an inductive type of research, based or "grounded" in the observations or data from which it was developed; it uses a variety of data sources, including quantitative data, review of records, interviews, observation and surveys.
 * 4) Phenomenology describes the "subjective reality" of an event, as perceived by the study population; it is the study of a phenomenon.
 * 5) Biographical research is aligned to the social interpretive paradigm of research and is concerned with the reconstruction of life histories and the constitution of meaning based on biographical narratives and documents. The starting point for this approach is the understanding of an individual biography in terms of its social constitution, as influenced by symbolic interactionism, phenomenological sociology of knowledge (Alfred Schütz, Peter L. Berger, and Thomas Luckmann), and ethnomethodology (Harold Garfinkel).
 * 6) Philosophical research is conducted by field experts within the boundaries of a specific field of study or profession, the best qualified individual in any field of study to use an intellectual analysis, in order to clarify definitions, identify ethics, or make a value judgment concerning an issue in their field of study their lives.
 * 7) Critical Social Research, used by a researcher to understand how people communicate and develop symbolic meanings.
 * 8) Ethical Inquiry, an intellectual analysis of ethical problems.  It includes the study of ethics as related to obligation, rights, duty, right and wrong, choice etc.
 * 9) Social science and Governmental Research to understand social services, government operations, and recommendations (or not) regarding future developments and programs, including whether or not government should be involved.
 * 10) Activist research which aims to raise the views of the underprivileged or "underdogs" to prominence to the elite or master classes, the latter who often control the public view or positions.
 * 11) Foundational research, examines the foundations for a science, analyzes the beliefs, and develops ways to specify how a knowledge base should change in light of new information.
 * 12) Historical research allows one to discuss past and present events in the context of the present condition, and allows one to reflect and provide possible answers to current issues and problems. Historical research helps us in answering questions such as: Where have we come from, where are we, who are we now and where are we going?
 * 13) Visual ethnography. It uses visual methods of data collection, including photo, voice, photo elicitation, collaging, drawing, and mapping. These techniques have been used extensively as a participatory qualitative technique and to make the familiar strange.
 * 14) Autoethnography, the study of self, is a method of qualitative research in which the researcher uses their personal experience to address an issue.
 * 15) Cognitive testing, or pilot testing, is used in the development of quantitative survey items.  Survey items are piloted on study participants to test the reliability and validity of the items. This approach is similar to psychological testing using an intelligence test like the WAIS (Wechsler Adult Intelligence Survey) in which the interviewer records "qualitative" (i.e., clinical observations)throughout the testing process. Qualitative research is often useful in a sociological lens. Although often ignored, qualitative research is of great value to sociological studies that can shed light on the intricacies in the functionality of society and human interaction.