Stage Two – Qualitative Interviews

The value of conducting qualitative interviews as a secondary stage of data collection to explore the survey data further, is that interviews have the potential to generate rich descriptions of the participants’ thought processes. Furthermore, as the focus is on reasons why a phenomenon has occurred, for example, from the evidence of the survey data, why do dyslexic students experience higher levels of academic anxiety than non-dyslexic students? the qualitative interview method provides a more detailed account of the phenomenon of anxiety and coping, than could be established from the survey data.

On the other hand, the interview method is not without its weaknesses as Gibson pointed out when stating in interviews ‘we are dealing with people, and people have the peculiar habit of changing (their mind, their circumstances, their perspectives)’ (Gibson, 2016, p.56). Consequently, although the interview may well be relying on a person to accurately and honestly recall details about their lives which may fluctuate, the interview still, however, enables the experiences of the dyslexic university student in relation to their emotional responses to studying, and their ways of coping with this to be heard. Additionally, a key objective with

the interview method was to identify themes and emergent issues unfolding from the data, specifically in connection to the emotions of studying and coping techniques used, which is the reason for having conducted twenty interviews in firstly, a deductive, followed by secondly, an inductive process. Thus, this specific focus on emotion words used by participants in response to study tasks at university and the description of what they do to cope both cognitively and emotionally is the rationale for selecting the qualitative, open-ended, semi- structured interview as my primary method for the second stage of the study.

4.11.1 Design

The twenty interviews were conducted in a staged nature, going from an initial deductive and working towards a more inductive approach. For example, as a starting point, the first five individual interviews, utilised a modified version of the questionnaire used in the IFS study combined with elements from the Study Skills Checklist to create a structured interview guide (please refer to Appendix A for a copy of the questionnaire used for the IFS study; Appendix D for a copy of the Study Skills Checklist and Appendix E for the first interview guide created from these two documents). The study skills checklist is used during my working practice with new dyslexic students during introductory sessions for firstly, establishing a rapport with the student on their academic work, and secondly, to identify areas of academic weakness. Thus, this checklist provided a valuable template and framework which could be modified for gathering information on emotional responses to study tasks. Thus, for my first set of five interviews, this revised checklist was used as my information gathering tool on: emotional responses to each of the academic tasks listed; types of coping strategies used to tackle each task; and whether any strategies are being used to cope with the emotional response. The collection of data from the first set of five interviews therefore, although using a deductive initial approach through using a pre-existing study skills framework for gathering initial information, still however, provided a

useful first step for enabling a search for any patterns, similarities, and unexpected, unpredicted data to be identified from the first five individual transcripts. This initial more structured interview approach, then led to a more open method being adopted during the second stage of ten interviews (please refer to second interview guide in Appendix F) and finally, during the third stage with the ultimate five interviews, although a guide was still partially referred to (please refer to third interview guide in Appendix G) these interviews were conducted through utilising a much more inductive, flexible, free flowing interview method. This was to capture and explore any unanticipated data.

Sociologists Glaser & Strauss (1967) argued that rather than testing theory, theory should be built from inductively analysing a social phenomenon. In other words, as described by Merriam & Tisdell in (2015) an ‘important characteristic of qualitative research is that the process is inductive, that is, researchers gather data to build concepts, hypotheses, or theories rather than deductively testing hypotheses as in positivist research. Qualitative researchers build toward theory from observations and intuitive understandings gleaned from being in the field. Bits and pieces of information from interviews, observations, or documents are combined and ordered into larger themes as the researcher works from the particular to the general’ (Merriam & Tisdell, 2015, p. 17).

Consequently, the rationale for using a deductive to inductive three staged approach to interviewing was due to my focus being on both emergence of consistencies in themes observed between the individual sets of data; and a desire to search for any unexpected responses to questions. As such, a top-down whilst working towards a bottom-up approach was used, as this was the most appropriate method for generating an understanding of firstly, consistencies around the phenomenon of anxiety in its interaction with dyslexia and coping in the context of the academic environment, whilst secondly, this also enabled a probing and exploration of any unexpected issues discussed by participants during

the interview process through an open and flexible approach to allow for freedom of expression from participants.

4.11.2 Participants

The convenience sampling method was used to recruit the participants for the interviews by asking students when in attendance at their support sessions, or through emailing students who had recently been receiving support from my work place consultancy whether they would like to take part in the study.

Robson defines convenience sampling as ‘choosing the nearest and most convenient persons to act as respondents’ (Robson, 2011, p.275). As noted previously, admittedly, convenience sampling does have limitations for representativeness, and I would argue that participants who voluntarily choose to be involved in the research process may perhaps differ from those who decide not to take part. Therefore, it may be questionable as to the extent that the findings can be said to be generalizable to a larger population of university students with a diagnosis of dyslexia. However, as Robson argues ‘appropriate uses of convenience sampling include getting a feel for the issues involved’ (Robson, p.275), which I would argue, considering that the interviews were conducted through a deductive to inductive process, the use of the convenience sampling method to recruit the participants, did enable an understanding of not only consistent issues, but also revealed unexpected issues in the data.

Twenty participants, all University students with a formal diagnosis of dyslexia who were undertaking, or had recently attended, one-to-one study support sessions within my work place institution therefore agreed to be interviewed. The justification for selecting a relatively large sample of twenty interviewees for the research was due to the twofold aim of wanting to, firstly; have a large enough sample to identify consistent themes emerging in the responses to be able to drill down further in the second round of interviews, and secondly; to be able to do

more open interviews in the third round and to look for any irregularities in the data. Accordingly, five males and fifteen females undertook qualitative interviews arranged at a suitable and convenient time for each participant to attend which were conducted at my work place office (please see Table below for details of the participants). The participants will be referred to by pseudonym only for the purposes of confidentiality.

Table 4:2 - Interview Participants

Name Gender Age University Course

Dean Male 30 Kings

College, London

BSc Nursing

Naomi Female 25 Royal

Vetinary College

BSc Medicine

Sue Female 21 University of

Brighton

BA Science

Tina Female 21 Kings

College, London

BSc Nursing

Laura Female 25 Kings

College, London

MSc Sociology

Alison Female 27 Kings

College, London

MSc

Humanities

Cara Female 33 Kings

College, London

MA Arts

Chloe Female 35 Kings

College, London

MA Education

Sam Female 52 University of

East London

Debra Female 30 Kings College, London

MA Arts

Lisa Female 19 Kings

College, London

BSc Nursing

Alan Male 30 Kings

College, London

MSc Sciences

Ada Female 29 Kings

College, London

PhD Sciences

Helen Female 22 Kings

College, London

BSc Sciences

Charlie Female 24 Kings

College, London

MA

Humanities

Abu Male 28 Kings

College, London

MA Arts

Henry Male 23 Kings

College, London

BA Philosophy

Fiona Female 22 Kings

College, London

BSc Sciences

Cate Female 22 Kings

College, London

BA English