Explain why issues of reliability and validity are critical in the choice of research designs and methods, giving examples to support your reasoning.
This essay will discuss the Validity and Reliability issues faced when undertaking research using certain research designs and also the same issues facing Research Methods used to gather information.
In order to evaluate the issues of anything relating to Validity and Reliability they must both first be defined. Bryman and Bell (2007, pp. 40-41) say that Validity is concerned with the integrity of conclusions that are generated from a piece of research, whereas Reliability is concerned with the question of whether the results of a study are repeatable. Research is undertaken to provide a new …show more content…
Pettigrew conducted his research over a 20 year period at ICI using a very specific set of criteria to evaluate the company. 20 years is a long time and if another study were to be conducted, looking at the exact same issues, then there will have been 40 years difference in-between the start and end of the studies. There will have obviously been a massive amount of change within any company in this period – if it still remains around that long. Therefore this provides a reliability issue with case studies because they are very hard to replicate and get the same results within the same …show more content…
Quantitative and Qualitative. An example of a qualitative research method is observation. As with research designs, research methods, which are used to gather data to drive the research forward, are riddled with validity and reliability issues. An observation is a very personal and qualitative method of collecting data. Participant observation has a high ecological validity because it involves studying social actors and social phenomena in their natural settings Mark Saunders et al (2012, pp. 352). It creates a whole host of issues of validity and reliability because the researcher will need to become accustomed to the businesses culture and history surrounding it in order to validly assess them. Also how the observer acts and how the participants react make it very difficult for the study to be totally reliable because they will have completely different reactions to a different researcher coming into their environment and observing them again. Delbridge and Kirkpatrick (1994) suggested that not every researcher is suited to observational research. It depends very much on rapport building and a lot of flexibility is needed. Therefore it is apparent that, although it obtains vital and specific qualitative data, it has its flaws with reliability and validity issues like other
This essay will discuss the Validity and Reliability issues faced when undertaking research using certain research designs and also the same issues facing Research Methods used to gather information.
In order to evaluate the issues of anything relating to Validity and Reliability they must both first be defined. Bryman and Bell (2007, pp. 40-41) say that Validity is concerned with the integrity of conclusions that are generated from a piece of research, whereas Reliability is concerned with the question of whether the results of a study are repeatable. Research is undertaken to provide a new …show more content…
Pettigrew conducted his research over a 20 year period at ICI using a very specific set of criteria to evaluate the company. 20 years is a long time and if another study were to be conducted, looking at the exact same issues, then there will have been 40 years difference in-between the start and end of the studies. There will have obviously been a massive amount of change within any company in this period – if it still remains around that long. Therefore this provides a reliability issue with case studies because they are very hard to replicate and get the same results within the same …show more content…
Quantitative and Qualitative. An example of a qualitative research method is observation. As with research designs, research methods, which are used to gather data to drive the research forward, are riddled with validity and reliability issues. An observation is a very personal and qualitative method of collecting data. Participant observation has a high ecological validity because it involves studying social actors and social phenomena in their natural settings Mark Saunders et al (2012, pp. 352). It creates a whole host of issues of validity and reliability because the researcher will need to become accustomed to the businesses culture and history surrounding it in order to validly assess them. Also how the observer acts and how the participants react make it very difficult for the study to be totally reliable because they will have completely different reactions to a different researcher coming into their environment and observing them again. Delbridge and Kirkpatrick (1994) suggested that not every researcher is suited to observational research. It depends very much on rapport building and a lot of flexibility is needed. Therefore it is apparent that, although it obtains vital and specific qualitative data, it has its flaws with reliability and validity issues like other