Participant observation is now increasingly used within qualitative health research and has been found to offer opportunities for the collection and synthesis of rich data about health and illness experience. This method, often used over an extended period, enables the researcher to build an in-depth understanding of the research context and can be the basis for the development of relationships...

Observation is a research data-collection method used generally to capture the activities of participants as well as when and where things are happening in a given setting. It checks description of the phenomena against what the researcher perceives to be fact in a rich experiential context. The method's main strength is that it provides direct access to the social phenomena under consideration...

Participant observation is now increasingly used within qualitative health research and has been found to offer opportunities for the collection and synthesis of rich data about health and illness experience. This method, often used over an extended period, enables the researcher to build an in-depth understanding of the research context and can be the basis for the development of relationships...

This paper explores the lived experiences of older surgical patients' (aged 74 years and older) experienced challenges during a brief admission to hospital. Age, gender, polypharmacy, and the severity of illness are also factors known to affect the hospitalization process. For an ethnographic study using participant observation and interviews, surgical cancer patients (n = 9, aged 74 years and ...

This article explores informal information exchange in social care, and implications for formal monitoring with an electronic social care record (ESCR). Six homecare settings were studied over 14 months between 2001 and 2002. Participant observation methods were used with the recipients of homecare (n = 7) and in-depth interviews plus participant observation with formal care workers (n = 31). A...

This article focuses on the problems faced by researchers carrying out participant observation in fields where the committal of criminal offences is the norm. Can participation in criminal activity by a researcher be justified on the grounds that it is necessary to prevent the distortion of the field? Alternatively, can the difficulties in gaining and maintaining access in such spheres excuse s...

Video data from three large captures of choreographic dance making was analyzed to determine if there is a difference between participant knowledge – the knowledge an agent acquires by being the cause of an action – and observer knowledge – the knowledge an observer acquires through close attention to someone else’s performance. The idea that there might be no difference has been challenged by ...

s of original studies ............................................................................................................ 10 (1) Interviews with patients own study and a review of 26 published studies ............................... 10 (2) Observations and interviews of physicians: “de-shaming” communication. .............................. 10 (3) Questionnaire study: psychosocial issue...