Específicos

In line with previous studies related to academics’ research productivity, surveys and interviews were used to collect data. For instance, in the study of faculty at work in public research universities, Blackburn and Lawrence (1995) used surveys and interviews as data sources. Providing reasons for the use of quantitative and qualitative approaches, they stated had both strengths and weaknesses. They chose questionnaires because they needed data from many people in order to test the framework.

Questionnaires, however, could not penetrate to the level that skilful interviews could attain. For in-depth interviews, they assumed that the researcher could explore interviewees’ deep feelings, subtle motivations, and attitudes. Such subtleties were unlikely to be discovered through the questionnaire. In studying the factors related to faculty publishing productivity, Hughes (1998, June) used a postal survey, but she

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received a low return rate (N= 845 from 3,383 respondents). She stated that the use of surveys had been criticised especially when the survey includes potentially sensitive questions, such as questions about attitudes towards colleagues and Department Chairs.

For those reasons, this study used a survey and semi-structured interviews for gathering data. However, the interview was seen as the main tool to gather in-depth data about the academics’ research engagement. The survey was considered as a useful tool to select interview participants for the study. In addition to these tools, documents related to research activities at different levels were reviewed as a triangulation tool.

Survey

The survey in this study was utilised for collecting the data related to academic participants’ research perceptions and the factors affecting their PD activities as well as their research engagement. However, using questionnaires for collecting data has both benefits and disadvantages.

Hannan and Anderson (2007) point out two benefits of using questionnaires. First of all, they provide a wealth of data through the simple counting of boxes or through the content analysis of written responses. Second, the participants may have sufficient time to think of answers before completing the survey. Due to the abstract nature of research perceptions and the sensitivity of providing data associated with the factors impacting on the academic participants’ research engagement, it is necessary for them to have time to think about the answers. Thus, it enabled the researcher to have rich data for later analysis.

There were several other important reasons for using the survey in this study. First, as a researcher I could save time and energy because of the distance of the selected cases in this study from my geographical location. Second, many Vietnamese people tend not to openly discuss their disciplinary areas, organisations, and political issues with strangers (Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada, 2014). Thus, it was useful to employ an anonymous survey to collect information relating to their disciplinary knowledge and organisations from the participants. Additionally, the utility

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of the survey was seen as a means of protecting the participants’ confidentiality and anonymity. Therefore, the participants were more likely to offer reliable data for research.

Moreover, the survey in this study was utilised as part of an interpretive qualitative research approach. This means that there were two reasons for using a survey tool. The first reason was to select relevant participants for the follow-up interview, based on whether the survey participants ticked the box indicating ‘YES’ or

‘NO’. The second reason was to clarify further information related to the informants’

research perceptions and the factors affecting their research engagement. While the survey revealed the research perceptions of the participants, and factors affecting the development of their disciplinary knowledge and professional careers, the participants might not provide enough information in the survey. Consequently, it was important for the researcher to use the survey data as a means of sorting initial information to inform the interviews conducted as a part of this study.

Hannan and Anderson (2007) mention potential risks for researchers when using questionnaires: first, when the question contains ambiguity or bias or when the range of available questions or answers does not allow the respondent the opportunity to state what he or she wishes; second, the agenda is normally set by the researcher, so the respondent feels somewhat constrained to follow planned pathways; and finally, the information given in the questionnaire is often more concrete and fixed than it may be in the dynamic flow of social interaction. To deal with the above risks, in designing the survey, enough space was provided for the respondents to supplement their answers with comments. Related to time for answering the questionnaire, I offered a flexible period for the respondents to complete it. It was hoped that by creating such convenience for the respondents, I was likely to obtain useful data from the questionnaire tool for the following stages of research.

In this study, the questionnaire comprised two main parts: respondents’

background information and survey content (Appendix 1). The first part asked about background information of the respondent including the institution name, the

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discipline/faculty, position, qualification degree, and academic ranks and titles. The second part included items that explored participants’ research perceptions, the factors affecting either positively or negatively their research engagement as well as their research and PD activities. The survey took approximately 30 minutes to complete. The questionnaire was designed using a combination of the selected themes from the findings of previous studies. For instance, the thematic findings of Brew (2001), Bowden et al. (2005), and Åkerlind (2008) were adapted to explore the participants’ research perceptions in this study. To identify factors motivating academics to research, I adapted Chen et al.’s (2010) survey and Borg’s (2009) study findings. Factors de-motivating academics in research were drawn from the study results of Borg and Alshumaimeri (2012). Finally, I translated the survey into Vietnamese to enable the participants to have a full understanding of all the items in the survey. To ensure the correctness of the translation, both English and Vietnamese versions of the survey were verified by a translator working at An Giang Province’s Foreign Affairs.