My generative term for this week is “Grounded Theory
(GT).” This term was used in Dr. Muth’s
paper “Murals as text” and I was curious about its meaning and whether or not
it could be helpful in our 1-2-3 Projects.
A Google search of the Internet resulted in
two findings I felt were worth blogging about. The first a briefing on ground
theory and the second an article on “The Future of Ground Theory.”
The briefing was developed by a Dr Lynn Calman (University
of Manchester, England), titled “What is Grounded Theory.” http://www.methods.manchester.ac.uk/events/whatis/gt.pdf The briefing states that GT may be defined as
“the discovery of theory from data systematically obtained from social research”
(Glaser and Strauss 1967: 2). The briefing goes on to provide the history and development
of GT, its features, data collection methods, etc. Due to due to the requirement in our 1-2-3
Project, Part 3: Discussion Paper, the slides on “Theoretical Sensitivity” caught
my attention. Key extracts from the
slides are:
·
Researchers will become theoretically
sensitive by immersing themselves in the data and trying to understand what the
participants see as being significant and important.
·
Concurrent data collection/analysis
allows the researcher to become theoretically sensitive to the data.
·
Finally, Glaser and Strauss (1967)
indicate that theoretical sampling is the process of data collection for
generating theory whereby the analyst jointly collects, codes, and analyses his
(her) data and decides what data to collect next and where to find them, in
order to develop theory as it emerges (Glaser and Strauss 1967: 45).
In Part 3: Discussion Paper, we are required to “theorize the findings from and
conclusions to your mini study. This theory work should be based on readings
and generative themes from the course, and authors should be cited
appropriately.” Sounds like the
ground theory method could help fulfill this requirement?
Last
but not least, I also found the article “The Future of Ground Theory” by Barney
G. Glaser very insightful. http://groundedtheoryreview.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/GT-Review-vol-9-no-21.pdf
Glaser is one of two sociologist credited
with the development of the Ground Theory method. Published in the “The Grounded Theory Review,”
Dr. Glaser elaborates on many aspects of ground theory to include the fact that
this methodology typically attracts “experienced practitioners seeking a better
understanding of the social patterns that underpin the behaviors they encounter
in their work – those high impact access and controllable variables (Glaser
& Strauss, pp.245-249) that suggest better ways to mobilize often scarce
resources to resolving issues or leveraging opportunities.” As a practitioner, this statement really
resonated with me and I am attracted to GT’s inductive/"bottom up" approach to theory development.
Bob - once again, thank you for providing us with this invaluable mini lesson in grounded theory! These are excellent resources indeed. The two big things to keep in mind are (1) GT is a method that tries to begin the analysis in a totally bracketed mode--i.e., where we try to hold our prior hunches at bay, and let themes bubble up from the utterances of the participants themselves. (2) GT is one point in the research design involving theory (in this case, seeking new lenses and themes from an area where there is much that is unknown). The other points where theory has an explicit role are in the rationale prefatory parts of the study (what we think we already know) and then at the end, after the grounded findings are presented, we look to tie them back to other themes (such as our a priori generative themes) to see how they might relate/qualify/challenge/advance our understanding of them. Does this make sense?
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