Russel-Research-Method-in-Anthropology

526 Chapter 18
Do you always go to class?
Yes
No
Were you sick
this morning?
Were you sick
this morning?
Yes
No
Yes
No
Do you have an
exam later today?
Yes
No
Is your 8:00 class
really tough?
Yes
No
Out late
last night?
Yes
No
Skip class
Go to
class
Skip class
Skip class
Go to
class
Skip class
Go to
class
Figure 18.3. An ethnographic decision model after interviewing three informants
(Alex, Sheila, and Brad).
(90% prediction) with just a handful of ordered rules. So, when you stop getting
new reasons or constraints from EDM interviews, try building a model
that accounts for at least 80% of the decisions with the fewest number of rules.
Then—and here’s the important part—test your model against an entirely new
group of informants.
The interview for the second group of informants is rather different. Now
you do ask them all the questions in your model (that is, you probe for all the
reasons and constraints for the decision that your first group taught you), and
then you guess what their decision was. In our example, you’d interview 20
or 30 new informants, all of whom have 8 a.m. classes, and you’d ask each
one: Do you always go to class? Were you sick this morning? Were you out