QUALITATIVE AND QUANTITATIVE RESEARCH METHODS

Strengths and Weaknesses of Qualitative and Quantitative Research Methods

[Name of Student]

Strengths and Weaknesses of Qualitative and Quantitative Research Methods

Introduction

The purpose of this paper is to enlighten two different research techniques by exploring their strengths and weaknesses. With the passage of time, researchers have come across different methods and tactics that could assist the process of extracting valid research findings. There are varieties of research techniques representing qualitative and quantitative research methods. Nonetheless, it can be asserted that data collection is one of the critical and most important phases of conducting a research study. Therefore, appropriate selection of data collection method is mandatory as the selected method can influence the findings to be extracted from the data.

Each data collection approach representing qualitative and quantitative methodology accompanies certain strengths and weaknesses. These are the factors that affect the decision of research to select an adequate approach for the purpose of data collection. The two approaches selected to be discussed in this paper are interviews and survey methods. One of them represents qualitative and the other represents quantitative research methodology. Each approach contains certain strengths that facilitate the decision of the research along with weaknesses that hinder the process. Each of them will be explored in detail in order to elaborate the prescribed research methods.

Advantages of Interviews

There are several advantages of interview as an effective method of data collection representing qualitative research methodology. According to different sources, the qualitative researches using interview as an approach of data collection are eligible to present detailed and sophisticated information. The research studies using interview as a method of data collection successfully extract data from the study participants in terms of their personal feelings, perceptions and opinions.

In addition, another advantage of using interview research method is that this research method equips researcher to ask detailed questions from the participants which cannot be asked using other research methods. Moreover, it can be asserted that the response rate of participants is substantially high when a researcher adapts interview as a method to accumulate data from the respondents. Moreover, according to different sources, it can be enlightened that while using interview as a research method, the researcher can record participants' own words (Beatty, 1995, 147-60).

In addition, it can also be asserted that while using interview as a research method every ambiguity of the respondents is clarified which improves the effectiveness of data to be extracted from participants that will enhance validity of results. The most substantial advantage of interview as a research method is that while using this research method to accumulated data from the sample, the language of the questions to be asked from the respondents can be altered as per the language understandable for the participants.

This becomes a significant advantage for the researcher when the participants in the research sample have English as foreign language. In addition, it can be asserted that using interview as a research method minimizes the influence of diverse factors and other individuals in sample on the interviewee from whom the ...