In this section the data collection method and procedure was used to capture and understand a
“subjective reality” of the participants’ knowledge base that informs their mentorship roles. I explain my inspiration for choosing this data collection instrument as well as the benefits and limitations of the method. The primary source of data was the individual semi-structured interviews with the participants. As a qualitative researcher, I was able to use interviews to gather information, thus taking advantage of the strengths of this particular data collection instrument. Cohen et al. (2007) maintain that there is no particular direction for data collection, but the issue of suitability of purpose is most important.
35 3.4.1 INTERVIEWS
The intention of a research interview is to “probe a respondent’s view,” their perceptions, or life history”, i.e. it is more than a conversation with a purpose. A voice is given to the respondent (Wellington, 2000, p.72). There are several types of interviews, such as group interviews, ethnographic interviews, in-depth interviews, semi-structured interviews etc. The semi-structured interview was used for this study. Pillay (2012) claims a semi-structured interview involves pre-determined questions, which allows participants to include or voice their feelings as the interview advances. Semi-structured interviews also allow the same view to be covered with each respondent. Bertram (2010) explains an interview to be a discourse between the interviewer and interviewee. Rule and John (2011) maintain that interviews regularly suggest a one-on-one conversation between the researcher and participant; it is a type of guided conversation. Semi- structured interviews were suitable for this study because they are a detailed type of conversation that allowed me, as the researcher, to probe for information from the participants by enquiring for more clarification on responses, finding opinions and insights, and establishing motives and feelings. Such information enabled me to gather rich descriptive data, which in turn allowed me to understand how the participants create knowledge and social reality (Struwig & Stead, 2001; Opie, 2004; Shank, 2007; Bell, 1999).
An interview schedule was prepared carefully in advance to elicit perceptions and responses relevant to answer the research questions. The nature of the interview was fairly structured;
flexibility in terms of the sequence of responses and additional information was catered for. I preferred semi-structured interviews, as they reduced pointless narration by allowing
questions to be formulated around topics of specific interest, but they still allowed for
adjustment and depth of the interview, as stated by Fouche (2005). To facilitate a natural flow of the interview, one interview schedule was created and learnt in advance. I agree with Bell (1999, p.13), that an advantage of an interview is “its adaptability and a skilful interviewer can follow up ideas, probe responses and investigate motives and feelings, which other methods may not be able to do.”
Retaining original data was important, because it enabled the researcher to relay information back to the participants so that they could check against bias (Opie, 2004), facilitate the
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process of checking for information gaps that might have required follow up interviews and also for the purpose of data analysis.
I conducted the semi-structured interviews in non-teaching time, each lasting from 20 minutes to 60 minutes each. This pointed to the fact that some participants had a variety of experiences or information to provide, while others, at times, were speaking on the periphery of the topic and used it as a time to air other grievances. Participants were provided with an opportunity to set dates and times of the interview to suit them. The venue chosen was appropriate for interview purposes, allowing the participant to feel comfortable and at ease.
In case where home interviews were not preferred, interviews were conducted in a quiet place. On the morning of the interview, I provided participants with a copy of the interview schedule. Permission had been obtained to use a digital voice recorder, but I addressed confidentiality by transferring voice-recorded interviews to a password-protected computer immediately after the interviews were completed and soon thereafter deleted it from the voice recorder. Pillay, (2012) proposes that, thorough recording and processing of interview records could increase and reassure participant validation. Voice recording the interviews ensures that the researcher focuses exclusively on what the participants are saying and is not distracted by taking profuse notes during the interview, states Fouche (2005). Field notes were required during the interviews to capture gestures and attitude, as some aspects of the interaction could not be captured by a voice recorder.
3.4.2 DATA ANALYSIS
Data analysis is a methodological process that “organizes the data into manageable units, combines and synthesizes ideas, develops constructs, themes, and illuminates the important discoveries of your research” (Anderson & Arsenault, 1999, p.131). There is consensus that qualitative research results in large amounts of subjective, rich and detailed data. The challenge experienced in this study, then, was to reduce the data and interpret it in a meaningful manner. In this regard, Bassey (1999, p.84) states that, “fundamentally data analysis is an intellectual struggle with an enormous amount of raw data in order to produce a meaningful and trustworthy conclusion which is supported by a concise account of how it was reached.”
I utilised the three stages in data analysis, as suggested by Miles and Huberman (cited in Wellington, 2000, p.134): data reduction, data organisation, and data interpretation. Data
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reduction took place by collating, summarizing, coding, and sorting data into themes or categories. I had to interpret and make meaning of the data. Cohen et al. (2007) regards this as a thematic content analysis, which “involves generating themes or concepts through the process of coding, resulting in theoretical conclusions.”
The data transcripts were characterised using a coding system, the interview questions and answers were classified according to the four research questions. Coding is understood as the clarification of responses that was created from the questions asked so that they could be analysed. The responses were clustered according to questions and different codes were assigned, founded on cohesion. I formulated themes to scale down the coded data. The themes were created by taking the four key research questions into account and these were driven by content analysis, as specified by Cohen et al. (2011).
In this study, the inductive data analysis method was used to allow the data to speak and provide answers to the research questions. In keeping with the qualitative data analysis view, I assessed the various data collected and discovered a correlation between them.