Qualitative Research

Qualitative research or qualitative methodology is a research method used primarily in the social sciences relies on methodological cuts based on theoretical principles such as Phenomenology, hermeneutics, social interaction using methods of data collection that are not quantitative, with the purpose of exploring social relationships and describe reality as the corresponding experience it. Qualitative research requires a deep understanding of human behavior and the reasons that govern it. Unlike quantitative research, qualitative research seeks to explain the reasons for the different aspects of such behaviour. In other words, investigates the why and the how a decision was in contrast to quantitative research which seeks to answer questions such as what, where, when. Qualitative research is based on taking small samples, this is the observation of small population groups, as class rooms etc.

Bogdan and Biklen (1982) point out four basic stages in the development of the qualitative perspective: firstly, a phase that extends from late 19th century to the 1930s, where are presented the first qualitative works and are consolidated techniques such as participant observation, the interview in depth or personal documents. A second period goes from the 1930s until the 1950s, where there was a decline in quality production. A third moment occurs in the 1960s era marked by social change and the rise of qualitative methods. Finally, a fourth period started in the 1960s where new both sociological and anthropological perspectives from the evolution of his social theory are introduced. In recent years, attended what Lincoln and Denzin (1994) call a fifth time in the history of the qualitative research highlighting its multiparadigmatic and pluridisciplinary character: the qualitative researcher undergoes a double voltage simultaneously. On the one hand, it is attracted by a wide interpretive, postmodern, feminist and critical sensibility.

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