RESEARCH TOPIC UNDER DISCUSSION
In this section, the summary and conclusions of the qualitative research methodology, which was followed for the purpose of this study are presented to demonstrate the usefulness and the appropriateness of the qualitative approach.
5.3.1 Research approach
Whereas some kinds of information cannot be adequately recorded using quantitative data, Bless et al. (2006:44) assert that a qualitative research approach is best used.
They further argue that language provides a far more sensitive and meaningful way of recording human experiences. In this case, the researcher was investigating the experiences, challenges and coping resources of AIDS-orphans heading households in Zamdele. As compared to the quantitative approach that has a step-by-step plan or a fixed recipe to follow, qualitative approach is more flexible wherein the researcher’s choices and actions determine the strategy (Fouché in De Vos et al., 2005:269). This helped the researcher during her research process to create the strategy best suited for her study.
As stated by Creswell (2009:175-176), some of the main characteristics of the qualitative approach are as follows:
Qualitative research takes place in a natural setting, therefore the researcher collected data in the field where the selected participants experienced their challenges, experiences and coping resources in heading households.
In qualitative research, the researcher is the instrument in the process of data collection. The researcher carried out the interviews herself. In addition to this, the researcher was involved in field work that is, she went physically to her participants in their homes and conducted interviews with them.
Multiple sources of data are employed for the purpose of data collection.
Qualitative researchers typically gather multiple forms of data, such as interviews, observations, and documents, rather than rely on a single data sources. Then the researcher reviewed all of the data, make sense of it, and organize it into categories or themes that cut across all of data sources.
An inductive approach to data analysis is followed in qualitative research. The researcher builds her patterns, categories, and themes from the bottom up, by organizing the data into increasingly more abstract units of information. This inductive process illustrates working back and forth between the themes and database until the researcher had established a comprehensive set of themes. It may involve collaborating with the participants interactively, so that participants have a chance to shape the theme or abstractions that emerge from the process.
Participants’ meanings are central in qualitative research. Therefore, the researcher focused on learning the meaning that the participants held about their experiences, challenges and coping resources as heads of households and not the meaning the researcher brought to the research or what writers express in the literature.
In qualitative research, an emergent design is preferred. This means that the initial plan for the research cannot be tightly prescribed, and all phases of the process may change or shift after the researcher enters the field and begins to collect data. For instance, the questions may change, the form of data collection may shift, and the individuals studied and sites visited may be modified. The key idea behind qualitative research is to learn about the problem or issue from participants and to address the research to obtain that information.
Qualitative researchers often use a lens to view their studies, such as the concept of culture, central to ethnography, or gendered, racial, or class differences from the theoretical orientations discussed. Sometimes the study may be organized around identifying the social, political, or historical context of the problem under study.
Qualitative research is interpretive. It is a form of interpretive inquiry in which researchers make an interpretation based on what they saw, heard and understood. Their interpretation cannot be separated from their own backgrounds, history, contexts and prior understanding. After a research report is issued, the readers make an interpretation as well as the participants, offering yet other interpretations of the study. With the readers, the participants, and the researcher all making interpretations, it is apparent how multiple views of the problem can emerge.
Qualitative research provides a holistic account of the topic investigated.
Qualitative researchers try to develop a complex picture of the problem or issue under study. This involves reporting multiple perspectives, identifying the many factors involved in a situation, and generally sketching the larger picture that emerges.
In view of the aforementioned characteristics inherent in the qualitative approach and the fact that qualitative research concerns itself with the study of people in their natural environment as they go about their daily lives and by trying to understand how people live (Neuman, 2006:92), the researcher concluded that this approach was well suited to realize the goal of this study.
From this qualitative stance, the researcher wanted to come to an understanding of the experiences, challenges and coping resources of AIDS-orphans heading households.
Within the qualitative approach, the research designs used are explained in the next sub-section.
5.3.2 Research design
A research design entails the researcher’s overall plan on conducting the research (Babbie & Mouton, 2001:74). Burns and Grove (2001:223) assert that, for a
researcher to attain the intended goal, one must be guided by the design in planning and implementing the study. This overall plan entails what the research question should be, what data will be required to answer it, from whom the data will be obtained and how best to gather the data. The research design for this study incorporated exploratory, descriptive and contextual designs.
5.3.3 Population and sampling methods
The study population for this research was defined as AIDS-orphans heading households residing in the urban area of Zamdela, Free State. Snowball and purposive non-probability sampling techniques were used to obtain a sample from the stated population. Non-probability sampling was used in this case because the researcher did not know the population size (Strydom in De Vos et al., 2005:201). The researcher chose Zamdela as the area for her study because of easy accessibility and knowledge of the area.
5.3.4 Aspects of data collection
Data for the study was collected by means of face-to-face individual interviews. The purpose of data collection is to gather information to answer the emerging research question (Creswell, 2007:118). The research question guided the researcher on what data to collect. After data collection, data was analysed. The purpose of the analysis was to reduce data to a legible and interpretable form so that the relationships of the research problems could be studied and conclusions drawn. Qualitative data analysis took place throughout the data collection process (Henning et al., 2006:127).
5.4 SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS ARISING FROM THE RESEARCH