OBSERVATION
 A technique of gathering data whereby you
personally watch, interact, or communicate
with the subjects of your research.
 It lets you record what people exactly do
and say in their everyday life on Earth.
 Through this data gathering technique,
proofs to support your claims or
conclusions about your topic are obtained
in a natural setting.
 Observation is the central method in
qualitative types of research, most
especially, ethnography, in which you
observe the lifestyle of a cultural group.
(Letherby 2013; Snort 2013)
Types of Observation
1. Participant Observation
 The observer, who is the researcher, takes
part in the activities of the individual or
group being observed.
 Your actual involvement enables you to
obtain firsthand knowledge about the
subjects’ behavior and the way they interact
with one another.
 uses the diary method or logbook to record
findings.
 Descriptive observation – describes
the people, places, events,
conversation, and other things involved
in the activity or object focused on by
the research.
 Narrative Account – gives your
interpretations or reflections about
everything you observed.
2. Non-participation or Structured
Observation
 Completely detaches you from the target of
your observation.
 You just watch and listen to them do their
own thing, without you participating in any
of their activities.
 Recording of observations happens through
the use of a checklist which is also called
the observation schedule.
Methods of Observation
1. Direct Observation
 makes you see or listen to everything that
happens in the area of observation.
2. Indirect Observation
 also called behavior archaeology
 you observe traces of past events to get
information or a measure of behavior, trait,
or quality of your subject.
Methods of Indirect Observation
1. Continuous Monitoring or CM
 You observe to evaluate the way people
deal with one another.
2. Spot Sampling
 A focus on researching the extent of
children’s nervous habits as they would go
through their regular personality
development.
 You record your observations through spot
sampling in an oral manner, not in a written
way.
 Named also as scan sampling or time
sampling
 Spot sampling comes in two types: time
allocation (TA) and experience sampling.
 Time Allocation sampling – what goes
into the record are the best activities of
people you observed in undetermined
places and time.
 Experience sampling – lets you record
people’s responses anytime of the day or
week to question their present activities,
companions, feelings, and so on.
 Data gathering in this case is facilitated by
modern electronic and technological
gadgets like cell phone, emails, and other
online communication methods or
techniques. (Peggs 2013; Ritchie 2014)
Advantages
1. It uses simple data collection technique and
data recording method.
2. It is inclined to realizing its objectives
because it just depends on watching and
listening to the subjects without experiencing
worries as to whether or not the people will say
yes or no to your observation activities.
3. It ofers fresh and frsthand knowledge that
will help you come out with an easy
understanding and deep refection of the data.
4. It is quite valuable in research studies about
organizations that consider you, the
researcher, a part of such entity.
Disadvantages
1. It requires a long time for planning.
2. Engrossed in participating in the subjects’
activities, you may eclipse or neglect the
primary role of the research.
3. It is prone to your hearing derogatory
statements from some people in the group that
will lead to your biased stand toward other
group members.
INTERVIEW
 is a data gathering technique that makes
you verbally ask the subjects or
respondents questions to give answers to
what your research study is trying to look
for.
 aims at knowing what the respondents think
and feel about the topic of your research.
 data gathering technique occurs between
you, the researcher, and your respondents
in a face-to-face situation.
Types of Interview
1. Structured Interview
 This is an interview that requires the use of
an interview schedule or a list of questions
answerable with one and only item from a
set of alternative responses.
 the respondents are barred from giving
answers that refect their own thinking or
emotions about the topic.
2. Unstructured Interview
 the respondents answer the questions
based on what they personally think and
feel about it.
 There are no suggested answers.
3. Semi-Structured Interview
 The characteristics of the first two types
are found in the third type of interview
called semi-structured interview.
 a flexible and an organized type of
interview.
Approaches
1. Individual Interview
 Only one respondent is interviewed
here. The reason behind this one- on-
one interview is the lack of trust the
interviewees have among themselves.
 a time-consuming type of interview
2. Group Interview
 also called this as focus group interview
 you ask the question not to one person, but
to a group of people at the same time.
 The group members take turns in
answering the question.
3. Mediated Interview
 No face-to-face interview is true for this
interview approach because this takes
place through electronic communication
devices such as telephones, mobile
phones, email, among others.
Synchronous Mediated Interview – if you talk
with the subjects through the telephone, mobile
phone, or online chat and also find time to see
each other.
Asynchronous Mediated Interview – two
persons are interviewed at a different time
through the Internet, email, Facebook, Twitter,
and other social network media.
Steps in Conducting an Interview Advantages

Step 1: Getting to Know Each Other
Step 2: Having an Idea of the Research
Step 3: Starting the Interview
Step 4: Conducting the Interview Proper
Step 5: Putting an End to the Interview
Step 6: Pondering Over Interview Afterthoughts
Questionnaire
 is a paper containing a list of questions
including the specific place and space in
the paper where you write the answers to
the questions.
Purposes of a Questionnaire
1. To discover people’s thoughts and feelings
about the topic of the research
2. To assist you in conducting an effective
face-to-face interview with your respondents
3. To help you plan how to obtain and record
the answers to your questions
4. To make the analysis, recording, and coding
of data easier and faster
Types of Questionnaire
1. Postal questionnaire
 type of questionnaire goes to the
respondent through postal service or
electronic mail.
1. It is cheap as it does not require you to
travel to hand the questionnaires to a big
number of respondents in faraway places.
2. It entails an easy distribution to respondents.
3. It offe more opportunity for the respondents
to ponder on their responses.
4. It enables easy comparison of answers
because of a certain degree of uniformity
among the questions.
5. It has the capacity to elicit spontaneous or
genuine answers from the respondents.
Disadvantages
1. There is a possibility that some questions
you distributed do not go back to you, and this
prevents you from getting the desired rate of
response.
2. Confusing and uninteresting questions to
respondents fail to elicit the desired responses.
3. Owing to individual differences between the
selected subjects and those in the population,
in general, the questionnaire is hard up in
obtaining unbiased results to represent the
characteristics of the target population.
4. It prevents you from being with the
respondents physically to help them unlock
some difculties in their understanding of the
questions.

 It is through the mail or postal system that

the accomplished questionnaires will be
sent back to the researchers.

2. Self-administered questionnaire

 This kind of questionnaire makes you

act as the interviewer and the
interviewee at the same time.

 First, you ask the questions either in

person or through phone; then, you will
be writing the interviewee’s answers on
a piece of paper.