How I lost my mind trying to write an ethics proposal

So. I know I'm technically on break. Unfortunately as mentioned I am god's specialest little boy and this ethics proposal needs to get done.

A lot of the process has been working out the fine details of how I want the interview process to go, for example how many participants I want for individual interviews and focus groups. I looked at The Research Interview by Bill Gillham for guidance. Both Gillham and Kvale seem in agreement that it's generally best to stick to a small number of participants, on account of the time consuming nature of interviewing. Gillham advises that "as few as four or five interviews" can be effective - so I'm going to hedge my bets and aim for four individual interview participants.

Should I use focus groups?

Louise agreed to give me some help with the ethics proposal because they are so cool and amazing. One of the points we ended up discussing was whether I really need to use both individual interviews AND focus groups, or if sticking to one method would be more appropriate. As Louise pointed out, I don't want to make things unnecessarily complicated for myself. I've been looking at some books on the subject.

Key points

• Focus groups often used in exploratory phase of a research project - Barbour, p.16
• Some argue that focus groups are unsuitable for research into sensitive topics, but this is pretty contested - "Focus groups have proved to be a mainstay of research into sexual behaviour" - Barbour, p.18
• Barbour does advise against using focus groups trying to get narratives from people or (crucially) for measuring attitudes - might be an argument in favour of Louise's suggestion that a-spec participants could take part in a focus group while non-aspec participants take part in individual interviews (along with the main concern that non-aspec participants might find a focus group a bit intimidating if they feel they don't know much)
• THAT BEING SAID some argue that focus groups are useful for encouraging people to participate if they feel they don't have much to contribute - some might find it less daunting than a one-on-one interview. I feel like I'm going in circles here icl
• Focus groups have a "perceived informality" - p.20

Should I use individual interviews?

• Could be easier to do a questionnaire - but then answers wouldn't be very in-depth, which feels necessary for this project
• Most of my questions are probably gonna be pretty open - which is more appropriate for interview methods
• On the other hand questionnaires do have more anonymity
• Also interviews can actually be better for sensitive topics bc it means there's a level of trust involved - people more likely to trust someone they see face to face
• Anyway I think we've established questionnaires probably aren't appropriate
• One advantage of individual interviews over focus groups could be that I could do them online - people might be more willing to sign up if they don't have to leave the house lol
• Oh yeah one-on-one interviews are better for anonymity too

Key sources for the week:

• Doing Focus Groups by Rosaline Barbour
• Research Ethics in the Real World: Euro-Western and Indigenous Perspectives by Helen Kara
• Your Research Project: Designing and Planning Your Work by Nicholas Walliman
• Qualitative Research Methods for Media Studies by Bonnie S Brennen
• The Research Interview by Bill Gillham

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