Narrative Inquiry and Interview

Conducting an interview is thought to be a useful way to get a wide

variety of information quickly and systematically. In this study,

either a one-to-one face-to-face or phone interview was conducted

with each individual participant. Participants could choose between

face-to-face versus phone interview according to their preference.

Nevertheless, it is recognized that face-to-face interview would

yield better results as it allows better rapport to be established

between the researcher and the interviewee.

Besides, a narrative inquiry method was also employed to extract

the life story learning events from the participants. They were asked

to recall three incidences when intergenerational teaching and

encouraged to describe the specific learning events in detail, to

comment on their teaching, learning or sharing experience, to

discuss and reflect on their past actions and experience of learning

in the family.

As far as possible, the sessions were conducted in a causal way. The

researcher tried not to interrupt or intervene when the participants

were telling their stories. Prompting questions would be given only

as requested by the participants. After the anecdotes were told,

participants’ views on the concepts of ‘lifelong learning’, ‘family

learning’, ‘learning culture’ etc, were extracted.

Each session lasted for about 20-30 minutes and was audio-taped

and then later transcribed. The transcription of the narratives and

the interview content was then sent to the respective participant

2. Questionnaire (Appendix 2)

A questionnaire was employed aiming to collect information for a

more comprehensive analysis supplementary to other descriptive

data obtained. It was given to the participants before the interview,

and was accompanied by thorough explanation of the objectives

and the procedures of this study. The purpose was to set the scene

for the interview and story-telling session.

The content of the questionnaire covered demographic data and

background information of the teenage participants as well as their

parents. Guiding questions were included at the end of the

questionnaire to prepare them for the interview and story-telling

session in the areas of family culture, learning events, learning

behaviour, attitudes and other attributes which might contribute to

building a learning family. The questions were designed based on

the assumptions and research questions of this study. Both positive

and negative statements were included and they were randomly

Two sets of questionnaire with similar content but modified

wordings were prepared for the parent and the teenager groups

respectively. The questionnaire was filled in individually by each

participant without influence by their counterparts. Moreover, they

were encouraged to elaborate their answers to the statements though

simple ‘Yes’, ‘No’ and ‘Can’t decide’ options were provided.

3. Quiz (Appendix 3)

The objective of setting the quiz was to investigate whether there

are ‘knowledge gaps’ between the Generation X parents and

Generation Y teenagers. Both groups were asked to fill in the same

quiz and their scores would be compared and analysed. The content

of the quiz was made up of short-forms and abbreviations

commonly used in the local context. The quiz consisted of two parts.

Part A contained the short-forms and abbreviations extracted from a

local newspaper (South China Morning Post, 9 February 2006). Part

B consisted of abbreviations and symbols which were used by and

popular among Hong Kong youngsters.

Participants were reminded not to communicate or discuss with

their counterparts when doing the quiz. They were asked to finish

the quiz in 15 minutes as they were not expected to search nor ask

someone else for the answers.

TECHNIQUES

A close, trusting relationship was needed to elicit responses from

the interviewees. The researcher therefore made every effort to build a

trusting relationship and allowed the interviewees to tell their stories in

a relaxed and comfortable environment. Guiding questions were given

well in advance to stimulate them into describing the key concepts

when telling their stories. They were given the research questionnaire

before the actual interview was conducted so they would have ample

time to mentally prepare their stories and answers.

For narrative inquiry to be professionally conducted, it was

suggested that we had to unlearn about facilitation. It was harder than it

appeared for the researcher to keep silent. The researcher tried not to

Nevertheless, the teenagers sometimes requested questions to be asked

to prompt them for further elaboration of their points. Prompting

questions would be given only upon request or as required.

To foster a sense of ownership, participants were promised a copy

of the transcript of the audio-taped stories and conversation. The

transcript was sent through email and they were asked to confirm the

accuracy of the content. Amendments or comments on the transcript

were welcome. There were only minor amendments received and some

of them expressed their interest in knowing the results of the study.

(Refer to the feedback from participants in Table 29, p. 231) They

would be given a copy of the abstract when the thesis is completed.

Confidentiality was strictly observed. Anonymity and

confidentiality were guaranteed. Data and transcription were all coded

with no names identified. All the written as well as audio data were

kept confidential and this was guaranteed before the recording of the

session was started. Even the parents of the teenage participants would

Guiding Questions

Guiding questions were designed to stimulate and guide the

participants into describing the key concepts addressed in this study

when telling their intergenerational learning stories. They were

open-ended questions and descriptive in nature so as to stimulate more

in-depth thoughts. With these in mind, some guiding questions covering

the concepts of our research questions were presented at the end of the

study questionnaire. (Refer to the end of Questionnaire in Appendix 2)