Establishing Reliability for Coding Implementation Concerns of School-Based Teams from Audiotapes

Abstract

A useful methodology for coding themes directly from audiotape is described, and issues and methods by which reliability can be established are presented. Attention is given to both the importance of audiotape use in qualitative research and the ways in which audiotape use can be expanded. Comparison is made between reliability estimates from coding themes directly from audiotape and coding themes from transcripts. A study is presented in which the reliability of direct coding from audiotapes, to develop conceptual categories and code concerns of professionals being trained on school-based support teams, was evaluated The results of this study suggest that the direct coding of audiotapes provides the qualitative researcher with another reliable option in the collection and analysis of data. Research implications are discussed

Interrogating inclusion with youths who use augmentative and alternative communication

“…Interviews were video‐recorded to ensure that rich non‐verbal interactions could be reviewed in all their complexity (Gravois et al . ). All interview video recordings, observational field notes, captions and photo data were entered into ATLAS.ti Scientific Software Development GmbH, v.7 software (Cologne, Germany), which allows for direct coding and memoing of video data.…”

The Cost of Youth Voices: Comparing the Feasibility of Youth GO Against Focus Groups

“…Paired with our implementation fidelity results, these findings suggest the practical utility of Youth GO in community-based settings where funding and/or resources are limited and focus groups may not be feasible. These findings are important, given researchers' acknowledgement of resource challenges as a significant barrier to utilizing participatory methods (Chen et al, 2010;Flicker, 2008;Ozer & Douglas, 2013;Zeller-Berkman et al, 2013) and/or qualitative approaches (Gravois et al, 1992;Neal et al, 2015;Tessier, 2012). Our results suggest that by addressing these significant resource barriers, Youth GO may meet an important need within the field of participatory evaluation and research.…”

“…Focus groups are traditionally used in community settings to gather rich, contextually-grounded qualitative data (Brotherson, 1994). However, focus groups pose several resource limitations and therefore may not be feasible in all settings (Bertrand et al, 1992;Gravois et al, 1992;Neal et al, 2015). Given that our results suggest that Youth GO may be more feasible than focus groups, equivalent perceptions of satisfaction and acceptability further underscores the approach as a viable tool for community settings with limited resources.…”

“…Researchers and communitybased partners must manage conflicting tensions from participatory values, resource constraints, research quality, and internal capacity-all of which place different and unique demands on the research project (Zeller-Berkman et al, 2013). Furthermore, resource requirements are exacerbated in qualitative research, given the processes and materials needed to gather, record, and analyze these data (Gravois et al, 1992;Neal et al, 2015;Tessier, 2012). Resource requirements create a barrier to using qualitative methods in participatory research with youth, which is unfortunate given their potential to engage a wide array of youth.…”

Getting More Out of Your Interview Data: Toward a Framework for Debriefing the Transcriber of Interviews

“…However, one type of debriefing interview that has been totally neglected in the qualitative research literature is that of the transcriber. Because, as Agar (1996) stated, "Transcription is a chore" (p. 153), and, moreover, can be extremely time consuming (Gravois, Rosenfield, & Greenberg, 1992)-which can affect both the turnaround time for disseminating findings emanating from the interview data (Bertrand, Brown, & Ward, 1992) and even whether the taped interview data actually will be analyzed (Gravois et al, 1992)-an increasing number of qualitative researchers are relying on transcription services, paying professionals or even non-professionals (e.g., relatives, friends, other researchers, fellow students) to transcribe their interview data. And because a transcript represents an interpretation that is constructed by the transcriber (Lapadat & Lindsay, 1999;Mishler, 1991), it is essential that qualitative researchers are reflexive about how transcribers represent the participant interview data, as well as their positionality as transcribers in their respective research studies.…”