The aim of this study is to achieve a greater understanding of the provision for academic creativity and innovation in HE professional practice in Ireland and to uncover the factors which have impact on academic creativity and innovation within Irish HEIs, specifically within Irish Institutes of Technology (IOTs). The selection of NPDV for close examination provides the
opportunity to observe how structural limitations interact with creative practice inside the HEIs. The expectation is that analysis of this process would improve understanding of how the climate in Irish IOTs might be optimised to facilitate and support academic creativity and innovation in practice.
Choosing constructivist grounded theory
To determine which methods to employ to meet research objectives, I discussed the possibilities with my supervisor and reviewed research studies in similar higher educational contexts. Elaine Keane’s research explored experiences of groups of undergraduate students at an Irish university (Keane, 2014). Keane’s research context and intent to gather socio-cultural experiences from participants was similar to mine, though the characteristics of the participant differed: this study relates to academics’ experiences and Keane’s, student experiences. Keane conducted two rounds of semi-structured interviews and transcribed interviews verbatim. She employed QSR NVivo data analysis software to facilitate coding and conducted multiple rounds of informal and formal analysis. Keane’s data analysis detail and transparency appealed to me. Her use of constructive grounded theory to construct “a complex substantive theory that offers multiple perspectives for policy and practice” (Charmaz, 2014, 248) in higher education had a significant influence on my research design.
Grounded Theory emerged from the tensions between quantitative and qualitative sociology research in the United States in the 1960s. Early methodological texts “emphasised data gathering and fieldwork roles […] rather than qualitative analytical strategies” (Charmaz 2014, 5). Anselm Strauss and Barney Glaser (Glaser & Strauss, 1967) developed systematic research methodologies in their study on death and dying in hospitals, refocusing “qualitative inquiry on methods of analysis” (Charmaz, 2014, 5). These strategies:
Advocated developing theories from research grounded in qualitative data, rather than deducing testable hypotheses from existing theories (Charmaz 2014, 6).
Glaser and Strauss’ methodological text sparked increased interest in qualitative methods and countered prevailing quantitative researcher assumptions of qualitative methodologies as unsystematic and biased (Charmaz, 2014). Glaser & Strauss’ Classic Grounded Theory proposed the rationality of systematic qualitative inquiry. Abstract theoretical explanations could now be constructed from social processes employing their methodology which included: simultaneous involvement in data collection and analysis; construction of analytic codes from data rather than from preconceived deduced hypotheses; the employ of the constant comparison method, comparing data at each analytical stage; advancing development of theory at each step; memo-writing during the process; sampling not for population representation but towards theory construction and conducting literature review after independent analysis (Charmaz, 2014). This method challenged preconceptions about qualitative analyses being unsystematic and lacking in theoretical substance. Glaser brought many quantitative principles to the method: rigorous codified methods and a specialist codified language. Strauss’ experience of Chicago school symbolic interactionism brought the study of action and processes, social and subjective meanings and problem-solving practices to grounded theory. The symbolic interactionism perspective assumes that interaction is dynamic and interpretive, how people interact changes meanings and actions.
Glaser and Strauss each led grounded theory into divergent directions: Glaser’s approach is led by an epistemology of realism, where findings emerge from within the data. In contrast, Strauss’ epistemological approach is guided by context, where “findings are constructed by inter-subjective understandings” (Dwyer & Buckle 2009, 54). This difference is manifest in the determination of the role of the researcher in Glaserian grounded theory or in Straussian grounded theory. For Strauss, the researcher must be personally engaged with the research to understand the world as perceived by participants. The relativist Glaserian approach requires the researcher to be a more objectively detached observer (Dwyer and Buckle, 2009). Strauss and Corbin added to grounded theory, acknowledging the importance of a multiplicity of perspectives on reality (Corbin and Strauss, 2008) and the interpretive nature of the method. Like Strauss, Mills et al. emphasise the
contextual dimension, relating participants’ stories to the world in which the participants live (Mills, Bonner and Francis, 2006).
Given that relating participants’ views to the educational context they inhabit is an integral feature of my research, the contextualised Straussian approach appeared to fit with my research requirements, particularly as I would, by virtue of my role as an employee within the research context, become personally engaged with the research participants. I acknowledge the importance of researcher reflexivity in taking this approach.
Keane’s (2014) research alerted me to the further development of the grounded theory method by Kathy Charmaz (Charmaz, 1995, 2014). Leaning towards the Straussian perspective, Charmaz termed her revision as Constructivist Grounded Theory (CGT). Charmaz’ methodological descriptions (1995) position the researcher as involved in the construction and interpretation of the data, as a co-producer of data. She advocates the addition of a description of the context, situation, interaction, affect and researcher’s perceptions (Charmaz, 1995, 33). Charmaz’ positioning provides me with a method of legitimately providing for my position as an IOT employee, within the study context. In CGT, subjectivity and contextualised understanding have a place in the study. Approaching this research with experience of a multiplicity of perspectives, the principle of theory co-construction and interpretation of participants’ multiple realities appeared to fit and signalled this methodological route. I understood I had to engage in careful reflexivity via memoing at every stage of data collection and analysis to mitigate against data contamination due to my involvement in the research context. Employing CGT rigorously in this fashion, would regulate the risk of bias in my findings.
Combining grounded theory and case study: challenges and strengths My investigation would require interviews of academics in multiple research venues and therefore there would be multiple data sources, I needed to find an effective method of structuring the data. The case study structure presented a viable possibility. In newer and less well-developed research areas, in particular where examination of context and dynamics of a situation are important, Darke et al. suggest that the use of the case study for
research is useful (Darke, Shanks and Broadbent, 1998). Context and dynamics are important in my research and this is also in a lesser well- developed research area. The case study design accounts for context and allows for depth of content. However, I was alerted by my supervisor to the challenges associated with the combination of the case study with grounded theory, this I considered carefully in spite of Eisenhardt et al.’s belief in the effectiveness of this combination, they claim that it is one of the best bridges from rich qualitative evidence to mainstream deductive research (Eisenhardt and Graebner, 2007).
Glaser warns that utmost care must be exercised to ensure that the canons of case study research do not distort true emergence for theory generation (Glaser, 1998, 40-2). This is a concern as conventionally, the case study method is aligned with the deductive reasoning approach, where theory is developed in advance of data collection. This is regarded “an essential step in doing case studies” (Yin 1994, 28). Yin’s contention conflicts with the key principle of grounded theory research: that theory must emerge from the data. Having due regard to this discrepancy, it is important that the researcher clearly specify which methodology is driving the investigation, when the research design involves a combination of case study and grounded theory (Hart and Gregor, 2005).
In this study, grounded theory is the primary driver. I used constructivist grounded theory as the principal methodology to study data collected within a case study structure; theory was generated from the data. I employed constructivist grounded theory to drive data acquisition activities. Further to my choice of the case study, consistent with the relatively unresearched process and setting combination that I was exploring, Benbasat et al. (1987) contend that the case study structure is appropriate for a newer research area; that it permits study of data in a natural setting and leads to an understanding of complex processes (Benbasat et al. 1987).
Additionally, having professional experience in the substantive area of my study, constructivist grounded theory was an appropriate choice, as it provided me with a method to deal with my experience, controlling the risk of introducing bias into the study (Hart and Gregor, 2005). The control is
introduced by the constant comparative method, which forces researchers to state their assumptions and their own knowledge as data (in memos) and to compare this with other data emerging from the study. According to Hart et al., constant comparison is a valuable feature of the grounded theory method in this regard, as it reduces, though does not eliminate, the risk of bias-induced distortions.
The combination of grounded theory and case study has been detailed by Eisenhardt (1989) who contends that theory building from case studies is likely to produce “creative insight” (Eisenhardt, 1989, 546). She explains that the process of questioning the data from the start and reconciling paradoxical evidence using the constant comparative method, unfreezes thinking and produces a more valid “theory with less researcher bias than theory built from incremental studies or armchair, axiomatic deduction” (Eisenhardt 1989, 546).
Glaser’s caution regarding the Case study / CGT combination was carefully considered. However, having regard to his and other researchers’ experiences of this approach and my intimate involvement with the research context, the advantages of the CGT approach combined with the case study structure convinced me that this design was the appropriate fit to my research requirements within the research context. The next section of this chapter outlines the research context of this study.