MICHAEL DEMPSEY - Cranfield University

of the analysis of the interview data with what senior officials were
engaged with in other circumstances.
Webb et al (1981) note the overdependence on a single, fallible
method of research such as interviews. No research method, they say,
is without bias. ‘Interviews and questionnaires must be supplemented
by methods testing the same social science variables but having
different methodological weaknesses’ Lincoln (1980) points to six
factors bearing on the accuracy of records and cites Clark (1967) as a
source for critical questions about the origins and usefulness of
documents – including history, completeness, the circumstances of its
production, the author, the intended audience, the purpose, sources of
information, bias and so on. Appendix 1 lists the documents included in
this research with answers to as many as possible of these questions
tabulated. The intention is to be as transparent as possible about the
circumstances of each document so that readers of this thesis can
judge for themselves the extent to which they can be relied on. The
submission is that, taken with the interview data, the documentary
evidence is a helpful form of triangulation.
Another potential source of bias in qualitative research relates to the
representative nature of the data presented. Bryman (1988:77) notes
that (inter alia) extended transcripts ‘would be very helpful in order to
allow the reader to formulate his or her own hunches about the people
who have been studied and how adequately the ethnographer has
interpreted people’s behaviour in the light of the explication of their
systems of meaning’. This danger has been addressed in the following
three ways:-
1. Wherever possible, extended quotations are presented in the
four case studies. The quantity of data presented in those
chapters is unusually voluminous. This is quite deliberate, with
the intention of allowing the reader to understand, as far as
possible, the context of the quotation and ‘where the interviewee
is coming from.’ This is regarded as an important design issue in
theoretical terms, despite its resulting in extended case studies.
To facilitate the narrative, ‘signposts’ have been inserted in the
form of headers, confirming the topics that the interviewees are
addressing.
2. NVivo is particularly helpful in enabling the researcher to check
on the context of a piece of data whilst working with it. If there is
any question that it might be out of context, a click with the
mouse enables surrounding text to be brought up into the report
being studied. If there is any concern that, for any reason,
coding has been inadequate and more or less data should be
available on a particular topic, or relevant to a particular
quotation, searches can be undertaken which, in effect, produce
freshly coded text. So the researcher can continually check that
the data selected is being used correctly
3. Back up reports have been taken throughout the coding process
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