The combination of our "ubiquitous connectivity" (Hardey, 2011) and a
move toward more open research techniques including blogging throughout
different stages of research (Wakeford and Cohen, 2008) made me think
hard about my own research process as I read this week. Generally, we
seem to be moving toward an era of transparency; users want open
resources that are editable by the community, and as a public we seem to
want to know what is behind the curtain in many different facets of
life. As we move toward more open and transparent techniques in
research, it seems we walk a fine line between opening up for new
insights and critique, and risking the protection of our research and
research subjects (and all of the data we gather from our experiences with and observations of them).
On
the one hand, if we become co-participants (Hardey, 2011) in our
research, we gain new insights and perspective on our observations and
analysis, which can lead to a richer and more productive research
process and product. Certainly in design-based implementation research
(Penuel, et al., 2011) the focus is on working in teams with the
stakeholders to iterate theory and implement designs. And I can say from
experience that giving the research participants a powerful voice in
the research process can be extremely informative, productive, and even
inspiring. I am working with a teacher who, in the beginning, was highly
skeptical of our approach to curricular design (based on situative
theories of learning and cognition). She pushed back at every step and
made me rethink how I present new theories, and how to approach the
design process. As she implemented her designs, she began to understand
why we used particular methods, and expressed her surprise at how much
productive engagement they elicited. The finding here was not that the
method worked, but that she was able to articulate what did not work
for her in her design process, and her suggestions for the next
iteration have been invaluable. We are continuing to collaborate, and
are making plans for her to be an integral part of the next iteration of
this work. Our openness has helped to foster this productive
relationship, and the research (and the researcher) are better for it.
On
the other hand, as I was reading I kept thinking about another teacher I
am working with who was also resistant, but in a less productive way.
This teacher stated plainly that these methods were antithetical to what
he had been taught, and was less willing to try a new method. The
reviews for that course reflected this resistance; the students felt
that the course did not flow well, that their teacher was not present,
and that they had to "learn everything on my own." I like the idea of
being transparent in my research process, and the notion of using a
semi-formal space like a blog to write up initial thoughts and get
feedback and engage in discussion with a community is very appealing.
However, even writing this I am hesitant because if either of these
teachers see this post, they will see how I have characterized them in
opposition to one another, and they will be able to identify themselves.
I have pulled out information and am forming a broader narrative about
teacher learning, using the teachers' experiences as examples of
different types of learners, but I risk making them uncomfortable and
construing characterizations as negative when they are meant only to be
representative of the different experiences we have seen in the many
teachers with whom we have worked.
(And I know they
might look. One teacher did an extensive (an kind of intrusive) Google
search of me when we started working together. This teacher dug far past
my teaching career into my college activities and performance hobbies.
All of this information is public knowledge, and in pieces it doesn't
seem odd, but given the context of our work together it just seemed to
overstep something.)
This leads to a host of privacy
and ethical issues that both Hardey (2011) and Wakeford and Cohen (2008)
discussed, but in my opinion did not address deeply enough. I don't
want researchers to be frightened of the technology, as I have mentioned
in other posts, but at the same time we need to understand the gravity
of the potential consequences of being so open. When my advisor first
wanted to write a blog post about our research to post to the community
for feedback, I felt uncomfortable and exposed. I didn't want to show
them our unfinished work. But the feedback and questions that emerged
were so helpful, and I realized how important opening up can be. So as I
read Wakeford and Cohen in particular, I found myself wanting to try
fleshing out my observations in a public forum. I have been keeping a
research diary, in which I write entries after a discussion or email or
meeting, but I haven't taken the time to flesh those out. As I enter
into the writing phase and am designing the next iteration, the idea
that I could present initial thoughts to a community and to my research
participants is appealing. But in addition to worrying about how my
research participants would feel about my characterizations and
analysis, I am concerned that these public and unrefined
characterizations and analyses could actually put my participants at
risk. What if their principals saw this? How would they react to these
teachers' behavior?
So I guess I'm saying I'm kind of
stuck. I want to be more open. I want the feedback from the community,
including the participants. But are the risks too big? Should we only be
"sort-of open," only sharing more mature-but-not-quite-finished
analyses? I don't know.
You've posed some really important questions here. One thing that strikes me is the potential connection to validation strategies in qualitative inquiry. One of the practices that we, as qualitative researchers, pursue consistently is 'feeding' our understandings back to participants (or co-researchers, depending upon your methodological approach). In this way, whether the characterization of the participants is public (e.g., described on a blog) or shared privately via email, the participants are part of the interpretative process. Of course, there are methodological strands that do this in differing ways and some would argue don't need to pursue such 'checks.' Nonetheless, I would suggest that transparency of findings has always been a foundational idea within qualitative inquiry. Yet, emergent technologies are opening new possibilities and ethical dilemmas in relation to what this might look like. Publications (paper-based) in years based raised similar concerns. What if research participants read our descriptions of them? Well, sometimes they did and there were consequences. This was particularly true when researchers has bypassed the step of sharing their interpretations (in various stages) with participants. Ah, I could go on...
ReplyDeleteThis is something I think about often, as methodologically I draw (primarily) upon a tradition that has never pushed for participants involvement in the interpretive process. Why? Well, the discourse itself is positioned as the "participant", rather than the individual. Transparency, then, is generated in other ways, many scholars claim. Nonetheless, this is something I mull over often. Thanks for sparking this conversation.