Exhibit 4.0 Focus group discussion (Photo courtesy
of Republic Polytechnic).
Qualitative research (qual)
reveals what people think and feel, and explores issues by understanding how
people’s attitudes and motivations influence their behaviour. It relies on
implicit models of analysis of the participants’ verbal and non-verbal
communication, their actions and reactions to interpret why people feel
the way they do.
The distinguishing characteristic of qual is that
it is primarily concerned with “how” and “why”; while it serves to explore and
investigate, qual does not attempt to measure.
Group discussions and depth interviews, the two
commonly used modes of qual are moderated by trained qual researchers. The
researchers make use of open-ended interviewing techniques to explore
participants’ feelings and bring forth emotions into the open in a way that
they feel comfortable with.
As shown in Exhibit 4.0, which depicts a focus
group in progress, the setting is controlled, and the proceedings are recorded.
Note also the use of the one-way mirror to unobtrusively observe the group
discussion.
The chapter highlights the difference between qual and quant
research, discusses the use of user-generated content, and clarifies what type of marketing
problem each of these methods is best suited to resolve.
It covers various aspects of qual including group discussions, interviews,
observation, online qual, the design and preparation of a qual study, projective and enabling
techniques, and body language.
For the practitioner, the chapter chalks out guidelines for moderating
groups. It serves as a guide to the use of qualitative research and imparts an understanding
of how to conduct qual studies.
