Trustworthiness

The aim of this research was to understand the perceived value and impact of feedback on learning from the perspectives of those involved with the feedback experience. To achieve this aim it was crucial that I was able to elicit full and accurate detail of participants’ perceptions and it is paramount that I am able to be authentic to the voice of the

participants within this thesis. This focus on authenticity of voice is significant given that I am presenting my own interpretations of participants’ accounts. The trustworthiness of a research design impacts on the worth of the research findings, and Lincoln and Guba (1985) suggest that trustworthiness is influenced by the credibility, transferability, dependability and confirmability of the research. I will now consider each of these dimensions in turn and indicate the strategies that I have used within this research to, collectively, maximise trustworthiness within this research.

Credibility

Credibility concerns the truth of the findings. From the outset of this research I recognised my own presuppositions and fore-conceptions, and my chosen methodological approach of interpretive phenomenology allowed for me to acknowledge these. My use of interview processes permitted an iterative style of questioning. Whilst there was a semi-structured interview schedule for the initial interviews with the students, there was no interview schedule for the interviews that followed the individual episodes of participant observation.

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This purposive lack of structure permitted participants the opportunity to share with me what they perceived to be the important aspects of their feedback experiences, without my imposition of an agenda. This openness to my capturing the voice of the participants increases the “truth value of the findings” (DePoy & Gitlin, 2016, p. 320), supporting the credibility of the research.

Reflexivity and the examination of my own role within this research process (DePoy & Gitlin, 2016) is another way in which I have increased the credibility of this study. Section 3.8 within this chapter discusses my reflexive approach in more depth, but purposive use of my supervisory team in a discussion of my findings allowed me to explore and confirm my interpretations within the process of analysis. Following my creation of the initial template, this template was scrutinised by and discussed in detail with a research colleague with extensive experience of using template analysis (King, 2012; King & Brooks, 2017) such that I could be confident that my interpretation of the data was accurately reflective of the data gathered.

To enhance credibility further, I have situated my research within the context of peer- reviewed published literature, drawing on feedback literature extensively in order frame my study and identify the gap in the current evidence regarding healthcare education. This critical exploration of existing work has allowed me to identify that some of my data is consistent with previously reported findings around feedback. This confirmation of existing knowledge has, in turn, supported the integrity of my research in identifying new

knowledge.

Transferability

The purpose of my research was not to generate findings that could be generalised to a wider population (Bryman, 2004) as the lived feedback experiences that this study explored could only ever have meaning for the individual participants involved in them. The social context of the feedback experience provides the experience with the nuances that make it unique to those involved, and I have maintained this social context within my interpretation of the data.

Transferability, as opposed to generalizability, is possible from human science research (DePoy & Gitlin, 2016) and I make selective and tentative suggestions within my findings- discussion chapters (Chapters 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8) as to how my findings might be relevant outside of the social contexts from which they came. These suggestions are intentionally

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cautious and serve to offer no more than insight into how these findings might be used to inform further research and influence pedagogical practice.

Dependability

The consistency of findings and repeatability of method enhance the dependability of a research process, so informing its trustworthiness. Within this thesis, I have provided detailed information about the methodological designs employed to gather, analyse and interpret the data generated within my research such that they might be repeated. My use of an experienced researcher to scrutinise my initial template, as discussed above in the “credibility” section, allowed me to confirm the consistency of my findings. My overt process of employing template analysis (Appendices 5, 6 and 7) shows my stages of progression in achieving a final template, and the clear definitions of my themes and sub-themes within these templates enabled me to ensure that I was coding my data consistently.

Confirmability

The confirmability of this study – i.e. the extent to which the data and not the researcher informs the research findings - was enhanced through my use of an experienced researcher to scrutinise my initial template and verify my interpretation of findings for consistency. This verification allowed me to be clear about the definitions of my themes and sub-themes and ensure that I was interpreting the data without bias.

Throughout the research process, I was overt about the presuppositions and fore-

conceptions that I brought to this study. I have acknowledged my beliefs (Delamont, 2002) and selected a methodological approach in the form of interpretive phenomenology that permits me to recognise these within the research process. These strategies support the confirmability of my research findings.