Focus group discussion is a research methodology in which a small group of participants gather to discuss a specified topic or an issue to generate data. The main characteristic of a focus group is the interaction between the moderator and the group, as well as the interaction between group members. The objective is to give the researcher an understanding of the participants' perspective on the...

This article describes some of the key issues in the use of qualitative research methods. Starting with a description of what qualitative research is and outlining some of the distinguishing features between quantitative and qualitative research, examples of the type of setting where qualitative research can be applied are provided. Methods of collecting information through in-depth interviews ...

Research methods and methodologies are extremely important when conducting research and degree projects. The use and application of the methods and methodologies are considered to be “necessarily vicious” and, unfortunately, often applied after the research has been conducted. The need for applying methods before the actually research and the reasons for doing so are often stressed in the liter...

This report is an overview on co-design in an instructional context with intergenerational teams of adults and children aged 7–11 year old. Adults and children become design partners in the design development process of new technology. I will start by introducing the main ideas of co-design. Then I will focus on the user research methods used in co-design sessions. For describing them concretel...

The purpose of this article is to share lessons learned from implementing community-based participatory research (CBPR) in Indian Country that may be generalizable to other medically underserved communities. CBPR is currently included in multiple grant announcements by the National Institute of Health and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, but information about this methodology vs trad...

Organizational researchers and practitioners have been interested in organizational change for some time. Historically, they have directed most of their efforts at improving the efficiency of planned top-down change. These efforts were strategic attempts at altering parameters leading to transformational change. Most efforts failed to meet their intended purposes. Transformational organizat...

This article presents a description of secondary data analysis and suggests that this type of research methodology may be helpful in facilitating research by the clinical nurse specialist (CNS). The article discusses the advantages and disadvantages of the use of this method specifically in relation to the CNS and offers suggestions for sources of data.

The uncanny valley effect (UVE) is a negative emotional response experienced when encountering entities that appear almost human. Research on the UVE typically investigates individual, or collections of, near human entities but may be prone to methodological circularity unless the properties that give rise to the emotional response are appropriately defined and quantified. In addition, many stu...

These are curious points. Rather than simply “widely held and false beliefs,” a myth, and more specifically, a political myth, can be understood as “an ideologically marked narrative which purports to give a true account of...political events and which is accepted as valid in its essentials by a social group.”2 Our use of the term “myth” was in this sense, an understanding that Ferraz seems to ...