Aislamiento del ARN total y reacciones de RT-PCR

This case study explores communication strategies used in designing and delivering mental health communication programmes in a mass violence situation, with a particular focus on the deliverers’ perspectives. It fits well within a qualitative paradigm where the purpose is to unearth deep, detailed information to help understand human experience and social context (Denzin & Lincoln, 1994 ; Mason, 2002; Patton, 2015).

3.3.1 Why qualitative research?

To belong to the qualitative paradigm, the research must 1) take place in the natural world, 2) use multiple methods that are interactive and humanistic, 3) focus on context, 4) be emergent rather than tightly prefigured, and 5) be fundamentally interpretive (Marshall & Rossman, 2016). Qualitative researchers therefore study things in their natural setting and try to interpret phenomena in terms of the meaning people bring to them. A qualitative approach should be used to “describe, explore, or explain social phenomena…that [takes] place in a naturalistic setting” to gain a deeper, richer, better understanding of, and gaining insight into, an issue (Stewart-Withers et al., 2014 see also Jensen, 2002, p. 236).

While both qualitative and quantitative approaches apply ‘scientific’ procedures, qualitative research is more concerned with the study of processes and meanings, while quantitative research aims to measure and analyse the relationship between variables in terms of quantity, intensity, or frequency (Denzin & Lincoln, 1994 ). These approaches thus produce different outcomes and answer different sets of questions, from which different sets of data emerge: “qualitative research is about generating and building up theory as opposed to being hypothesis-driven, it works in an inductive manner (from the

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specific to the general) rather than deductive (moving down from the general to the particular)” (Stewart-Withers et al., 2014, p. 59).

3.3.2 The qualitative researcher

Considering the above, three features of qualitative research are deeply relevant to this study: the “concept of meaning” (Jensen, 2002, p. 236), which acknowledges that human beings experience every event in their lives as meaningful; the importance of gaining deep knowledge and insight into the participant’s perspective, i.e. considering the emic perspective (analysis through the insider perspective); the need to be concerned with the view of the researcher; reflecting in terms of the etic perspective (analysis through the outsider or observer perspective) (Jensen, 2002).

3.3.3 Researcher’s positionality and reflexivity in qualitative research

This research combines elements of both emic and etic approaches. With my previous experience of working and researching in the mass violence area for 8 years, I understand the participants’ way of life and cultures. Being an insider brings benefits, one of which is that it can increase participants’ willingness to engage in the research (Marshall & Rossman, 2016). However, mental health communication in a mass violence crisis is a sensitive issue and communication processes are mostly conducted by health professionals. As a non-health professional, I also take the role of outsider when observing and looking to make sense of the participants’ activities. The challenge for the researcher who combines emic and etic viewpoints is “to become capable of understanding the setting as an insider while describing it to and for outsiders” (Patton, 2015, p. 338). (For further specifics about my role as the participant observer, see section 3.5.2.). Finally, in reflecting on my insider-outsider status, I am also demonstrating reflexivity and considering my positionality.

The researcher is the core instrument of qualitative inquiry (Lincoln & Guba, 1985; Marshall & Rossman, 2016; Stewart-Withers et al., 2014). The researcher’s background can influence data collection and interpretation. As Patton (2015, p. 3) states, “your background, experience, training, skills, interpersonal competence, capacity for empathy, cross-cultural sensitivity, and how you, as a person, engage in fieldwork and analysis—these things undergird the credibility of your findings”. While the quality of research relies heavily on researchers’ points of view, researchers need to be aware of

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personal values and biases and should aim to pass on the participants’ reflections rather than their own judgments. Stewart-Withers et al. (2014) argue that a qualitative researcher should be an active learner, paying attention to “people’s local realities, and genuinely hearing the voices of those telling the story” (p.61). This study, therefore, acknowledges the impact of the researcher on the research process. In attempting to ensure that the research findings truly reflect the participants’ views, I recognise also the importance of understanding my positionality and behaving reflexively.

Recognising positionality is very important when undertaking qualitative research. Stewart-Withers et al. (2014) suggest when thinking about one’s positionality one needs to think through “gender, religious, class, sexual orientation, race or ethnicity, or other more personal attributes such as age, life experiences or history” (p. 62) and also consider how this positionality may the influence the participants’ relationship with the researcher, their responses, and thus the data. Positionality is not necessarily a weakness of qualitative research as long as the researcher is aware of its influence on the research process. In this study, I acknowledge my background as a university lecturer and communication researcher to be a factor that might affect the participants’ feelings and their reflection responses. For instance, in Thai culture, university lecturers are seen as of high status. To counter this impact of my assumed higher status, I explained to all the participants that the study of mental health issues was new for me and that I am a student who wanted to learn from their experiences. Yet in keeping with the need for transparent, open, and ethical data collection, participants did need to be aware of my university position. The tactics used to try to reduce any potential impact will be outlined later in the chapter.

The researcher-based approach of qualitative research can raise questions about the validity and reliability of a study. That said, what qualitative researchers are really interested in is process and requirements of the researcher to behave reflexively. Sultana (2007) describes reflexivity as the process of “reflecting on self, process, and representation, and critically examining power relations and politics in the research process, and researcher accountability in data collection and interpretation” (p. 376). Reflexivity means the research can be deemed credible and trustworthy (hence reliable and valid). Using field notes or diaries to record ideas and experiences from the field promotes reflexivity (Stewart-Withers et al., 2014). In this study, personal reflexive notes were made after interviews and as part of participant observations (see section

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3.5.2.4). Recording observations and part of the evidence file are provided in Appendix E. Finally, behaving reflexively and thinking about one’s position and impact on the research is in a sense behaving ethically. This next section explores ethics in research in more detail.