Methods: studying talk and action

It is widely suggested (Robson, 2002; Gray, 2009; Yin, 2009) that multiple methods of data collection are used in case studies as no single method will capture the complexity of the case. Yin suggests six commonly used methods in case studies which include interviews and observations as well as other methods which I felt were not suitable for the focus of my study. This is because I wanted to use methods that were best suited to exploring the details of daily practice and the meanings participants made of them. Lofland et al. (2006) suggest a typology of data collection methods for studying social settings in which participant observation gets the researcher closest to the routines of the setting followed by data on talk in action (gathered through observation) and data on talk on action (gathered through formal or informal interviews). Case studies are not ethnography but the boundaries between them can be blurred (Hammersley & Atkinson 2007; Yin, 2009) and in developing a model of good practice for making observations and taking field notes I was inevitably drawn to texts on ethnography.

Ethnography might be defined as a study of a particular culture or setting and the way that culture is shared by a group (Creswell, 2007). The ethnographer studies the ordinary processes and routines of everyday life and tries to give an insider account of them. Hammersley & Atkinson (2007, p.3) define ethnography as “usually (involving) the researcher participating in people’s daily lives for an extended period of time, watching what happens, listening to what is said, and/or asking questions through informal and formal interviews...People’s actions and accounts are studied in everyday contexts, rather than under conditions created by the researcher...The focus is usually on a few cases, generally fairly small-scale, perhaps a single setting or group of people. This is to facilitate in-depth study” (p.3). As I wanted to gain an in-depth understanding of how social workers made

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decisions in their everyday practice elements of an ethnographic approach were suitable for answering the research question.

As I have argued in the literature review my focus for this study was to get close to the routines of every-day practice and to try to uncover the contexts, the unofficial rules and the culture that shaped daily or situated decision making for the social workers and this led to a decision to use participant or qualitative observation and in-depth qualitative interviewing as my data collection methods. As I have suggested, these are the methods of choice if “especially profound and nuanced understandings” of routines and cultures are being sought (Lofland et al., 2006, p.85).

From the beginning I wanted to try and capture as much concrete detail as possible about participants’ talk and action in order to produce a detailed description of the routines and culture within the cases which could then form the basis for further analysis. Description here would be of “practical, situated and lived forms of social action” (de Montigny, 2013, p. 142) rather than abstractions. Routines of talk and action may be seen as “metaphor(s) for how social order is constructed” (Silverman, 2006, p. 101) and “performed” (White, 1997b; Hammersley & Atkinson, 2007, p. 169). These actions become routines because they are regularly repeated and this repetition gives the actions “a degree of intrinsic significance” (Hammersley & Atkinson, 2007, p.169) as they repeat and sustain key aspects of the culture (Gobo, 2008) and they can take on a ritualised, liturgical (Atkinson, 1995) or ceremonial (Strong, 2001) meaning through which professionals construct and communicate their professional identities (White, 1997b, p. 179). These routines are acted out and can be observed but are also re-enacted or reconstructed in interviews. Talk and action are not completely separate as talk is action and can be observed like action as Lofland et al. (2006) argue with their distinction between talk in action and talk on action (or “interview talk” p.87) which is a reconstruction of something that has happened elsewhere spatially and temporally. It is also action because it is activity and performance through which people tell cultural stories, do identity work, explain, justify, account for themselves and attribute motive to others(Silverman, 2006; Hammersley & Atkinson, 2007) rather than give the researcher conveniently direct access to their “inner states”. Treated this way, seen through an ethnographic lens, talk becomes what Hammersley & Atkinson (2007, p. 171) call “situated stories” in which even the most personal accounts are told using culturally shared formulations. As they argue (2007, p.170) “social actors do things with words”.

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As I have argued in the literature review, unofficial, local cultures play a significant role in determining social workers’ actions. They also play a significant role in constructing the knowledge that is available to them. Local knowledge is constructed through the routines and rituals of the workplace and consists of a mix of lay and professional knowledge couched as moral tales (Atkinson, 1995; White & Stancombe, 2003; Scourfield & Pithouse, 2006). Through closely studying talk and action these processes may be uncovered.

From an ethnographic point of view , then, just as talk and action overlap so do the methods of participant or qualitative observation and in-depth interviewing. Certainly they are underpinned by similar ontological and epistemological assumptions: that the social world is best understood by studying the way people subjectively make sense of their worlds through their talk and action (Mason, 2002). Of course these methods will produce different kinds of data and bringing them together will help in understanding the complexity of a case in a way using a single method does not (Yin, 2009). It is useful to, for example, compare what people

do to what they say about what they do. But these are, to some degree, artificial distinctions

and Hammersley & Atkinson (2007) suggest that interviews can be seen as observation: the artificiality of the interview setting providing data on how people behave in different circumstances.

However, they are also different methods that require different ways of gathering and recording data.