Step 6: Writing of stories
4.7 Section 5: Ensuring trustworthiness and authenticity
In conventional quantitative research, integrity of the research is explained through principles of validity and reliability being ensured. ‘In quantitative research, researchers are concerned about specific inferences made from test scores’ (Creswell, 2000, p. 125). However, ‘in qualitative research, investigators make use of the views of participants to analyse data’ (Creswell, 2000, p. 125).
Researchers usually decide on the most appropriate period to remain in the field until saturation. Patton (1980) iterated that ‘the investigator in qualitative research normally goes back to the data several times to make sense of the constructs, categories, explanations and interpretations’ (Creswell, 2000 p. 125).
Furthermore, Altheide and Johnson 1994 termed the sense-making process as
‘validity-as-reflexive-accounting’ (Creswell, 2000 p. 125). The validity procedures present labels such as trustworthiness and authenticity (Creswell, 2000 p. 126).
4.7.1 Trustworthiness
Lincoln and Guba (1985) and Travis (1999, p. 1043) argued that ‘there are appropriate approaches to ensure trustworthiness in qualitative study and they
145
defined these criteria as credibility, dependability, transferability and confirmability’. ‘Credibility is used instead of internal validity, dependability instead of reliability, transferability rather than generalisability or external validity’.
Guba and Lincoln (1989) and Travis (1999, p. 1043) proposed that credibility is the degree of correspondence between the realities of the participants and the closeness that the researcher interprets their intentions and realities. They posited that confirmability is equivalent to objectivity. However, Travis (1999) viewed both dependability and confirmability to be parallel to reliability as he argued that multiple realities exist in research using the interpretivist paradigm.
Rapport (1970) and Travis (1999, p. 1043) also agreed that ‘the interpretivist acknowledges bias and subjectivity in data collection and works within a mutually acceptable ethical framework’ (Travis, 1999, p. 1043). Guba and Lincoln (1989), explained ‘dependability is where the stability of the data can be traced or tracked’. Guba and Lincoln continued by arguing ‘confirmability is the extent to which interpretations are rooted in the natural contexts and persons’ and not simply fictitious. Guba and Lincoln (1989) found that data could be traced from their sources and in the logical and coherent structuring of the interpretations into explicit and implicit in the narrative of a case. Moreover, a qualitative study should contain rich details to show transferability of the outcomes where the receivers can make judgements.
Since, this study is a qualitative study, the constructs of trustworthiness were ensured through collection of data from multiple sources. The data from one source would inform data from other sources. For instance, learners were asked to transfer their understanding of the concepts through drawings and they were then interviewed on their drawings. Besides, observation was used to capture the learners’ interaction when they were learning through the digitised resources. All these sources of data helped in enhancing the trustworthiness of the research.
4.7.2 Authenticity
Another major ‘methodological issue that researchers face in qualitative research is the reliability and representativeness of the sample’ (Seale & Silverman, 1997, p. 379-380). The term authenticity is used instead of reliability in qualitative research. Authenticity is reached when the data about people’s experiences is
146
‘authentic’ and usually open-ended questions are mostly used (Seale &
Silverman, 1997, p. 379-380). Since qualitative study are done with small sample size, the interviewer’s and the respondents’ rapport can be established better to ensure authenticity of the data. Table 4.6 illustrates the ethical considerations that were considered using the Guba and Lincoln (1989) constructs of trustworthiness and authenticity.
Table 4.6 : Ensuring trustworthiness and authenticity in the research
Criterion Description How the criterion was ensured in the study
Brickhouse (1992) advanced that in case studies research, the investigator
depends on the subjects for data and trust and cooperation is crucial.
Correspondingly, the researcher planned for an introductory session of two weeks with all the students in the classes and the teacher to familiarise the students with the equipment and the researcher.
This prolonged period of time before data collection allowed the researcher to build trust and rapport, thus enhancing the credibility of the research.
As a former primary school teacher, the researcher had experience of working with primary school learners and being a lecturer in the field of education, the researcher’s position was reviewed to that of the researcher while embarking the field.
Data was collected using multiple sources: observation, interviews,
147
Criterion Description How the criterion was ensured in the study
drawings, videos, researcher’s reflective journals.
The videos were transcribed at very short time intervals.
Creswell (2003) posited that the researcher should ensure that ‘respect the rights, needs, values and desires of the participants’ are considered (p. 202).
Thus, all students (whether directly or indirectly involved in the research) were asked to carry out the drawing activity to maintain trust in the participants.
Dependability Refers to the stability of findings over time
The researcher engaged into a reflexive mode by taking notes in researcher reflective journal for each participant organised by time and date.
Peers were asked to review transcripts of the interviews and the videos and then the researcher discussed with them to align the transcriptions with the data from the video and the audio recordings.
Transferability Refers to the degree to which the data can be transferred to other contexts (Anney 2014).
Empirical evidences of learning through digitised learning resources were
gathered in natural classroom situation in Mauritian primary schools. Moreover, dummy cameras were placed in the classes two weeks before starting data collection to ensure that the data remains authentic and trustworthy as well. Hence,
148
Criterion Description How the criterion was ensured in the study
the data could be transferred to a context similar to Mauritian primary school
context.
Confirmability Refers to the extent to which the outcomes of
participants were children of eight to nine years old, the researcher could not engage in member checking the
transcripts but used multiple sources of data to ensure that the interpretations were not fictitious but were derived from data from the field and also to confirm the outcomes.
The two professional who videotaped the lessons were not involved in the
interpretation of the data. Moreover, videotaping of the lessons allowed me to confirm the data with the transcripts.
The chronological order of the collection of data was intentional to probe deeper into confirming the data collected by the different methods. Hence, the analysis and discussions were derived from the multiple sources of data.
The authenticity was ensured as the participants were observed in their natural classroom situations.
Authenticity was also reached through the participants’ drawings. The researcher
149
Criterion Description How the criterion was ensured in the study
stimulating others and empowering others are ensured. (Travis, 1999).
ensured fairness as all the students in the class participated in the drawing activity.
Moreover, each drawing was the participant’s unique and authentic representation of his learning. The questions asked was based on the
drawings which enhanced the authenticity of the research.
Adapted from Guba and Lincoln (1989) and Anney (2014)
4.8 Conclusion
This chapter has described the research design and methodology adopted. It justified the choice of the interpretivist paradigm and the qualitative research approach. Furthermore, the researcher’s ontological and methodological stances were declared. The methodological approach of the study was the case study methodology where the participants were Grade 4 learners. This chapter also describes gaining entry into the field processes and working with primary school learners. Following this, it presented the sampling procedures with appropriate justifications. It also detailed out the route for data production where a description and justification of the research methods and tools was given. Consequently, various methods and tools were used to actually enhance the confirmability of the research findings. In doing so, the researcher was able to observe the participants’ learning through the digitised learning resources in their natural classroom contexts and in different ways. This chapter also described the procedures for presentation and analysis of the findings; the elaboration of the construction of stories from the data collected and the analysis of these stories to arrive at a higher level of abstraction. Furthermore, a detailed account of how ethical issues were considered and addressed in the study was provided. The last section of this chapter described how the researcher ensured authenticity
150
and trustworthiness during the study. The next chapter steps into the data analysis phase where the researcher starts to build more insights about the phenomenon to finally contribute to the body of knowledge.
151