Reviews of recent research literature – 6

Citation

Nazari, M. (2013), "Reviews of recent research literature – 6", Online Information Review, Vol. 37 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/oir.2013.26437aaa.001

Reviews of recent research literature – 6

Article Type: Reviews of recent research literature – 6 From: Online Information Review, Volume 37, Issue 1

The literature of research, including theory, method and methodology, has become a substantial subset of the publishing industry in its traditional, electronic and hybrid forms. In this occasional series of reviews we focus on recent titles that address the many issues of research. The intention is to inform both established researchers and students of research. The reviewer’s assessment of each title is indicated by the number of stars (five being the highest recommendation). In this issue four titles are reviewed. The first three discuss various issues contributing to the theory and practice of quantitative (survey) research. The fourth title reports findings from a research project addressing issues that contribute to improved research dialogue through the use of social media in the Web 2.0 era.

Feminist Measures in Survey ResearchCatherine E. HarnoisSAGE PublicationsLondon2013 [March 2012]164 pp.£20.99 soft coverISBN 9781412988353Assessment * * * *

Doing Q Methodological Research: Theory, Method and InterpretationSimon Watts and Paul StennerSAGE PublicationsLondon2012238 pp.£24.99 soft coverISBN 9781849204156Assessment * * * *

Tests and Measurement for People Who (Think They) Hate Tests and Measurement 2nd ed.Neil J. SalkindSAGE PublicationsLondon2013 [March 2012]399 pp.£47.99 soft coverISBN 9781412989756Assessment * * * *

Handbook of Social Media for Researchers and Supervisors: Digital Technologies for Research DialoguesShailey Minocha and Marian PetreThe Open UniversityMilton Keynes2012140 pp.gratis pdfwww.vitae.ac.uk/CMS/files/upload/Vitae_Innovate_Open_University_Social_ Media_Handbook_2012.pdfAssessment * * *

Feminist Measures in Survey Research offers a new approach for viewing and doing quantitative survey research. The author terms this the “multiracial feminist approach”; it is not about using new statistical tests or advanced modelling procedures but rather presents a new methodological approach that enables “critical reexamination of the basic assumptions embedded in our everyday research practices” and offers “a new and important framework for critiquing and producing survey research on a wide range of issues”.

Harnois begins by discussing the role of multiracial feminist scholarship in deepening our insights into the social world. In doing so she addresses three main questions:

1. 1.

   How can multiracial feminism inform social science survey research?

2. 2.

   What would it mean, in practical terms, to bring an “intersectional” approach to survey design and statistical analysis?

3. 3.

   How might such an approach change our conclusion about the social world?

To answer these questions Harnois focuses on three main issues (sexism, racism and feminism) in six chapters. Chapter 1 offers an overview of feminist research and the various approaches taken to study women. Criticising these approaches and their deficiencies in uncovering what actually constitutes “feminist research” in accordance with feminist theory, Harnois argues for her multiracial feminist approach in which social scientists and feminist scholars are invited to treat gender as a social, rather than a physiological, element in survey research. Chapter 2 then investigates how scholars in different disciplines have used survey research to understand contemporary feminism. She concludes that each discipline has captured some, but not all, aspects of multiracial feminism. In her view disciplinary boundaries are very significant in survey research on feminism. This establishes Harnois’ argument for the multiracial feminist approach in which survey researchers are called “to move beyond narrow disciplinary boundaries, to engage with the theoretical and methodological insights from a variety of intellectual fields, and to situate their own research within a broader intellectual context”.

In Chapters 3-5 the author examines the methodological implications of multiracial feminism for understanding discrimination based on race and gender. Highlighting issues of meaning, measurement and modelling, the author demonstrates three different approaches for bringing a multiracial feminist framework to social science survey research. This includes using large-scale general surveys with a focus on sexism, multi-item scales with a focus on racism, and small-scale survey research with a focus on feminism. She uses data from the General Social Survey (GSS) to demonstrate one of the many ways of combining insights of multiracial feminism with survey research.

Harnois employs large national surveys of men and women from diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds to illuminate how intersecting systems of inequality shape individuals’ experiences of discrimination. She also elaborates on the findings from existing surveys on contemporary US feminism in her discussion of how multiracial feminist theories can be used to critique the theories and methods driving much of this research.

In the final chapter the author reviews the methodological findings from the previous chapters and suggests six considerations for thinking about survey research from a multiracial feminist perspective. Although these are only some of the many ways that multiracial feminist survey research can be approached, these considerations do assist in stimulating our minds to develop further approaches to this type of survey research.

This book is strongly recommended to researchers interested in designing and conducting surveys to gain deeper insights into the social world from a multiracial feminist perspective. The work does “make feminist theory, and multiracial feminist theory, in particular, more accessible and relevant to survey researchers”, as promised by the author.

The second title in this set, by Simon Watts and Paul Stenner, address Q methodology, which the authors define as “a research technique designed to capture the subjective or first-person viewpoints of its participants”. This is an adaptation of Spearman’s method of factor analysis, developed by William Stephenson and which appeared in Nature in 1935. In this book Watts and Stenner deliver a step-by-step guide to doing quality Q methodological research suitable for publication in high impact journals.

Doing Q Methodological Research is designed in three sections and eight chapters. The first section (Chapters 1-2) focuses on the technical and theoretical aspects of Q methodological research, which provides the reader with an historical and theoretical context. In Chapter 1 the authors introduce Q research, its origins and the motivations behind its birth. This is supplemented by a list of useful resources on the Q methodological community. In Chapter 2 the authors elaborate on the theoretical issues and conceptual links with quantum theory. Watts and Stenner then introduce the more recent “reinvention” of Q methodology as a social constructivist research tool in the qualitative tradition.

The second section highlights Q methodology as “a method of impression”. It focuses on the potential of Q methodology for research participants to impose their personal meanings or psychological significance onto the items in the Q set. More precisely, it discusses the basic method that the reader will need to set up, run and analyse a piece of Q methodological research. It consists of four chapters. Chapter 3 deals with basic design issues (single- and multiple-participant designs), including potential research questions, conditions of instruction and Q (or item) set development. Next, Chapter 4 offers advice on doing fieldwork. This includes issues regarding the nature and number of participants and considerations for effective sampling that would guarantee validity and generalisability of the emergent results from Q research. There is also a full discussion on the data-gathering tool design and procedure, including issues on the conduct of online studies.

Chapters 5 and 6 focus on the analysis process and the technical and practical considerations to take into account when conducting Q methodological factor analysis. This is more about decision-making skills, as the researcher should be able to select different kinds of factor analysis and the solutions they offer in the context of his or her study. Because of the challenging nature of such decision-making, the authors have designed these two chapters in a way that helps researchers “conduct sound and acceptable analyses” in the shortest time.

The third section focuses on interpretation of the results, a less-discussed issue in the research literature, in two chapters. Chapter 7 discusses the “how-to” of factor interpretation and the considerations to take into account in this regard, especially if we have high publication ambitions for our research. The investigator’s aim of doing factor analysis is one of those key elements. It will tell about the number of factors, his selection of rotated solution, factors he may decide to interpret, and the audience and context of the interpretation. Altogether these will influence the depth and breadth of interpretation in Q research. Taking these variables into account, the authors offer a “simple and consistent method” for factor interpretation. Finally, Chapter 8 provides the reader with clear instructions and useful advice on how to design various sections of a Q research paper and tips on being published in high impact journals. A useful appendix containing general instructions for completing a Q methodological study supplements the text.

For anyone new to the field of Q methodology, this is an important “must-read”, especially in view of the powerful drive to become published in top journals.

The second edition of Neil Salkind’s Tests and Measurements presents its content in a very accessible, humorous and well-designed manner. Knowing that many practitioners and researchers feel inept in the face of tests and measurement, Salkind offers his wisdom in a simple and fun yet thorough manner, with numerous examples understandable by almost anyone. Salkind has written this book with the aim of providing “an overview of the many different facets of testing, including the design of tests, the use of tests; and some of the basic social, political, and legal issues that the process of testing involves”.

The book is presented in five parts and 19 chapters, each supplemented with practical exercises.

Part 1 discusses the “why” of tests and measurement, its history, and the various things we test. He classifies tests into six categories: Achievement, Personality, Aptitude, Ability or Intelligence, Performance and Vocational or Career.

Part 2 presents the fundamentals of tests needed for developing and using tests. It consists of three chapters. First, reviews different levels of measurement and how they can be used. The reader will learn “how different levels of measurement coincide with different amounts of information that a particular measure conveys”. Second and third, discusses theory and practice of reliability and validity, their many different types, and that when or for what purposes each is suitable. The final chapter provides the reader with a review of test scores and how to best understand them.

Part 3 focuses on the “how-to” of testing. It consists of many different ways to create, use and test items. In particular, it aims to help the reader to learn “how to distinguish the different types of test items” (such as true-false and matching) and to understand “how they are created and when they are best used”.

Part 4 takes the reader to the more practical level of learning. It focuses on different types of tests and what they do, in five chapters, each elaborates on the five types of tests mentioned in the first part of the book. This includes all except the Performance test. Part 5 gets the reader thinking about activities should be done after testing. It consists of two chapters. The first one discusses issues on the interpretation and implications of tests, bias-free. The second one addresses legal topics related to testing and assessment. In particular, it introduces the reader to “major legislation and policies that affect the use of tests” in the USA.

Although the author uses US statistics and the US context to illuminate his explanations, the simplicity and creativity of the writing and presentation make it easy for readers to think of ideas in their own contexts.

The book has been supplemented with three informative appendices. The first offers an easy-to-use toolkit for those who seek a shortcut for learning tests and measurement. The second appendix contains useful information about various resources and practical guidelines on how to learn tests, and the final appendix delivers prompt answer to the practices of each chapter. The book has also a glossary and index which make the content more accessible to the reader.

For anyone wanting to learn or teach tests, undertake valid and meaningful tests, learn how to interpret test and discuss implications, understand tests presented in journal papers, or just improve one’s knowledge and ability in testing, this is a highly recommended text.

The Handbook of Social Media focuses principally on how to bring more quality to research discourse and present that discourse to the world using social media tools offered through Web 2.0.

Social media (e.g. wikis, blogs, social bookmarking tools, social networking websites) are “a new form of communication that is changing behaviour and expectations of researchers, employers and funding bodies”. These media have many advantages and pitfalls. To benefit from the advantages and skip the pitfalls, one needs to know both aspects well, and then be able to choose the most suitable tools for a particular purpose, and know how to use them effectively.

The work in hand is a well-designed report of an extensive empirical study on social media tools and their effective evaluation and use for research discourse. It is the result of surveys of both primary and secondary data on the use experiences of social medial tools in research. The primary data emerged from an analysis of social media use experiences of 105 researchers, supervisors and research managers in the UK, USA, Europe and Australia who have actively used social media tools for research dialogue (to conduct and manage research). The data were gathered through several face-to-face meetings, workshops and email interviews during 2011-2012.

The secondary data emerged from the analysis of several literature surveys on: “how social media tools can help in research and the development of research skills”; how individual social medial tools (Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn etc.) can support research dialogue; and how to act professionally and avoid risk when doing research that involves social media tools.

The work, available only as a PDF download, is arranged in 20 sections. The first two sections present details of the project and deliver a synopsis of the handbook. Sections 3 to 20 contain a suite of resources to assist researchers and supervisors to evaluate and choose social media tools, and to develop a social media strategy for their research discourse with peers, project teams, and the community at large.

This includes:

• •

  a list of social media tools and their applications for five main purposes in research dialogues;

• •

  the preferences of researchers and supervisors using social media tools and the factors influencing their choice;

• •

  social media strategy and how to create one – that is, how to decide on “with whom, what, how and when” to communicate;

• •

  11 tips and hints on social networking for research dialogues;

• •

  ethical issues for social media use in research dialogues;

• •

  strengths and weaknesses of different social media tools in terms of their level of interactivity and the challenges and recommendations for adoption and professional use of social media in research dialogues;

• •

  cloud computing and its impact on research data storage;

• •

  using Apps on mobile phone and iPad to support research; and

• •

  digital research and digital scholarship.

A wealth of online resources and guidelines on the corresponding issues supplements each section. Although there are many sources of information on the web delivering the experiences of researchers who are using social media tools, they do not “constitute an organised and convenient set of resources for researchers and supervisors to learn about the opportunities and challenges of using social media tools in their research discourse”. This handbook can be treated as a basic resource for this purpose, but because of the “once over lightly” treatment in some sections, researchers wanting more detailed discussions of particular media or approaches will want to look for more focused discourse or case studies in the journal literature.

Maryam NazariUniversity of Tehran