4.2. THE ADOPTED RESEARCH DESIGN
4.3.2 Employed research approach
This study employed a qualitative research approach, which focuses on the quality and depth of information. It derives at a narrative that is descriptive in nature, and helps the researcher to understand the core concept of the issue being studied, since it provides more content that is useful for practical application (Flick, 2014). This study utilised the qualitative research approach, as it allowed more options and suggestions from the participants, and provides in-depth and rich information regarding the complex topic.
72
According to Neuman (2011), the qualitative research approach “deals with an experienced subject and the meaning associated with the phenomenon”. Qualitative research enables the researcher to gain insight into people’s thoughts, attitudes, behaviour, value systems and motivations. As the aim and objectives of the study were to garner an understanding of the remedies used regarding sexual offences in the Mankweng area, it had to ask the why, what, when, how, who to understand human behaviour and factors that influence them. Thus, it aimed to overcome the lack of information about the phenomenon investigated. Shank (2002) defined qualitative research as “a form of systematic empirical inquiry into meaning” in a systematic or planned manner to guide the process of research information.
4.3.2.1 Advantages of employing a qualitative research approach
Qualitative research has been described as contributing rich information. Conger (1998), Lowe and Gardener (2001), Fletcher (2002), and Potter (2013) outlined the following advantages of using a qualitative research approach:
It involves an interpretative and naturalistic approach to the world. This means that qualitative research analyses things in their natural settings, attempts to make sense of what it establishes and interprets phenomena in terms of the meaning people bring to them.
It uses text, sounds, images and videos, which are mostly translated in language and provides far more sensitive and meaningful reflections of human experience.
The primary motive of using qualitative research is to contribute to human knowledge and understanding about a particular phenomenon, which grants the researcher the ability to investigate responses or observations to obtain more detailed descriptions and explanations about experiences, behaviour, and beliefs.
Qualitative research permits the researcher the opportunity to follow-up with subsequent probes, which helps to identify threats or challenges regarding a particular subject, through open-ended responses. Validity is achieved, since responses are provided in the participants’ own words, and understanding is increased.
It takes into account the complexity of a topic by incorporating the real-world context, which can take different perspectives on board.
73
Qualitative research can focus on how people or groups of people can have different ways of looking at reality, usually a social or psychological reality.
The qualitative research approach is not limited to the objectives and goal of the the study. Instead, it allows questions to deliver new additional information on the subject related to the study, allowing the study to be inductively oriented.
4.3.2.2 Disadvantages of using the qualitative research approach
Ronald and Darlen (2007) state that qualitative research has weaknesses as much it has strengths that grant the researcher the opportunity to overcome these weaknesses. Qualitative research is time consuming, as it has to be conducted by the researcher, instead of being able to be executed via electronic media. The necessary in-depth analysis opens a gateway to better understanding of a given research topic, but this involves not only collecting the information, but also transcribing, coding and interpreting the data.
Hacook, Windridge & Ockleford (2007) add that qualitative research became more complex when it had to be translated between two or more languages; for example, where the questions was designed in English and participants were living in a rural area, where individuals did not understand English but only their native language
‘Sepedi’, and this adds an extra two steps for the researcher having to translate the research questions first into the local language, which will be understood by those participant to add understanding, and thereafter, translate the vernacular responses back into English to draw conclusions for the research study.
This process is time-consuming and could introduce errors through the translation process. Qualitative research studies often have a narrow scope, and small sample sizes, making them impossible to be generalised to other settings. Many qualitative studies also lack information about how participants were chosen for observation and interviews, and how the researcher arrived at the study’s conclusions (Maluleke, 2016). Qualitative questioning is open-ended, and an inductive thematic approach, while quantitative testing usually involves some form of direct comparison and quantitatively-oriented content analysis that allows more systematic comparison.
Comparison of thematic expressions across groups is an underdeveloped field, where extra care must be taken to maximise the ability to meaningful compare (Guest, MacQueen, & Namey, 2012).
74
Given (2008) reveals that the purpose of research was to derive at answers to questions about experiences or phenomena via in-depth questioning or observations in an attempt to discover new and different values to the changing nature of lived social realities. As each methodology has its own aims, advantages and disadvantages, they do not share the same epistemology. Al-saadi (2014) criticises the qualitative approach for its shortfalls, but believes that the qualitative research approach allows researchers the opportunity to garner information that cannot be adequately expressed numerically.
The researcher believed that for the goal of garnering a better understanding of the challenges faced by the TCC in the Mankweng area, the qualitative research methodology was the better approach to be employed, since the different perspectives of the real-world context were taken into account and interpreted on lived experiences and descriptions of different understandings. This should lead to the development of new concepts or evaluations of an organisational progress (Maarouf, 2019).