4.4.1 Research design. As the study aimed to obtain a description of the participants’
perceptions of wellness and what affected their own wellness, it was important to find out what their experiences meant to them. A qualitative descriptive research design was thus employed in the study as “…qualitative research accepts that there are multiple ways of interpreting experiences, and that it is the meaning of people’s experiences that constitutes their reality” (Bogdan & Biklen, 1992, p. 39). Cresswell (2003) too emphasizes that all human beings are engaged in the process of making sense of their world.
The features of a qualitative research approach, according to Bogdan and Biklen (1992) namely; (a) that it takes place in a natural setting; (b) that it is descriptive, with data collected in the form of words rather than numbers; (c) that it is concerned with process rather than products; (d) that data is analysed logically – ideas are built as the participants are interviewed; and (e) that meaning is essential, made such an approach most appropriate for the present study. It was vital to find out and describe how community development workers perceived their wellness and what affected it. For this purpose the three important strengths of qualitative research, as proposed by Mouton (2005), were really needed, viz. that people
are studied in terms of their own definitions of the world (insiders’ perspective); that it focuses on the subjective experiences of individuals; and that it is sensitive to the contexts in which people interact with each other.
Moreover, according to Struwig and Stead (2001), descriptive research attempts to give a complete and accurate description of a situation, a description which is, according to Leedy and Ormrod (2001), the disclosure of the nature of certain processes, and thus the impact these processes have at the present time. Qualitative research also displays sensitivity to the context in which the study is situated (Smith, 2003); important for the present researcher who believes that human behaviour is strongly influenced by the setting in which it occurs.
Qualitative methodology therefore seems relevant for exploring the effect of working with individuals and communities infected and affected by HIV/AIDS on the community development workers at the NMB site of the NGO.
4.4.2Participants and sampling. A census sampling technique was employed – all 42 community development workers of the NMB site of the NGO were included in the study (Chanimal, n.d., para. 12). Five of the participants were randomly selected from the population of 42 to be part of a pilot study which took place prior to the actual research process. One more participant had to drop out subsequently owing to absence from work at the time of data collection.Most of the community development workers were Xhosa speaking, with fourAfrikaans speaking participants from the so-called coloured (mixed race) ethnic group. Their ages ranged from 21 to 60 years. The majority of the community development workers had not passed Grade 12 and was low-paid fieldworkers from the surrounding community. Despite their lack of scholastic qualifications the NGO had managed to develop and enhance the educational skills of the community development workers and most of them had had more than 3 years’ experience in the field of HIV/AIDS community work.Table 2 reflects the demographics of the participants in this study, 36 community development workers from the NMB site of the NGO.
4.4.3 Data collection. Focus group interviews, where people are informally interviewed in a group discussion setting, were used as the method of data collection. As Neuman (2003) explains, focus groups have certain benefits: in this case they would provide a natural setting for discussion, participants would thus feel comfortable and free to express their opinions.
Moreover, participants would feel empowered by having their ideas sought. They would also be able to ask one another questions and explain their answers to one another. Focus group interviews were thus viewed to be the ideal method for gaining insight into how participants perceived their world and themselves in terms of wellness, and what this meant to them.
As groups of between six and ten participants allow everyone to participate, while still eliciting a range of responses (De Vos, 2002), the researcher elected to conduct four focus group interviews, each of one hour duration, each with between eight and ten participants.
Participants were requested to be available for two hours to allow for possible delays in Participants’ Demographics
DEMOGRAPHICS VARIABLES NUMBER OF PARTICIPANTS
(N=36)
Nationality South African 36
Other 0
starting the sessions planned to last one hour 30 minutes each. Prior to the four focus group interviews taking place, a pilot study had been conducted in order to investigate the feasibility of the planned research project and to bring possible deficiencies in the data collection method to the fore. Five community development workers, randomly selected, took part in the pilot interview that took place in the offices of the NMB site of the NGO. The session lasted for 90 minutes.
Participants in each group were asked to discuss the same two questions (see Appendix D), namely:
• What is wellness?
• What factors affect your wellness?
The focus group discussions were conducted in English, and the discussions were audio-taped for later analysis. The tapes were transcribed afterwards by the researcher. This was done in order to ensure valid and reliable data. Normally, if saturation is not reached with the planned number of focus groups interviews, the researcher would conduct more interviews in order to achieve data saturation. However, in this situation, as a census sampling method was used, there were no participants left to sample for more focus group interviews.
4.4.4 Data analysis. Once the audiotapes from the focus group discussions were transcribed, the researcher analysed the data according to Tesch`s principles of qualitative data analysis (Creswell, 1998). Thus all the transcriptions were first read through in order for the researcher to gain a holistic understanding of the data. Any ideas that came to mind while reading were jotted down. One group interview transcript was then scrutinized carefully for the underlying meaning and the various topics that were discussed. A list was made of these topics, similar topics were grouped together and a sense was formed of what topics were major, what were sub-topics and what could be called leftovers. The topics were abbreviated as codes and the codes written next to the appropriate section of text. With this preliminary organising scheme the researcher then went through the transcripts of all the group interviews to see if any additional categories emerged. Descriptive wording was found for each category and sub-category. An attempt was made to reduce the number of categories by grouping related topics together. The interrelationship between topics was explored and indicated in the notes. A final decision was made regarding the categories, and the data belonging to each category were grouped together.
Themes identified by the researcher were verified by an independent coder who was experienced in qualitative research to see if the independent coder would find the same major topics or categories and subtopics as the researcher did (for themes from independent coder see Appendix E).