Programme for the 6th ESRC Research Methods Festival 2014
Wednesday 9th July AM (09.15 - 12.45 including a coffee break from 10.45 - 11.15)
Using Linked Administrative Data for Research
Convenor:
Professor Peter Smith (University of Southampton)
Part 1. How to use the Administrative Data Service (9.15-10.45, presentations 1-3): This session will outline what the administrative data service has to offer, how to get started with an application, and the types of linked data that are available in each of the four UK countries. Part 2. Methodological challenges in using linked administrative data (11.15-12.45, presentations 4-6): The session will highlight some of the methodological challenges involved in linking administrative data.
Analysing Canonical Narratives of Good and Bad in Everyday Life/Analysing Everyday Digital Narratives
Convenors:
Professor Ann Phoenix (Institute of Education, London)
Ms Heather Elliott (Institute of Education, London)
Presentation One: Catherine and Joe will present from their respective PhD projects, offering participants the opportunity to discuss extracts of data. They will consider and invite feedback on how individuals challenge and/or reproduce contextually located cultural expectations of “good” behaviour in relation to environment and parenting in their narratives of everyday life. Presentation Two: This practical session focuses on how to work narratively with digital data. Taking account of how platform and content work together, we consider methods for analysing blogs about mothering to understand everyday family practices and how online identities are performed and revised.
Longitudinal Data Analysis: Methods and Applications
Convenor:
Professor Fiona Steele (London School of Economics and Political Science)
This session includes presentations on methodological and applied research carried out by members of the NCRM LEMMA 3 node. New methodological developments have been implemented in the Stat-JR software package, developed under LEMMA. Topics include a review of methods for handling missing data, a comparison of different approaches to causal modelling, and models for the analysis of longitudinal and multilevel data structure. Areas of application include education, demography and economics.
Researching the City
Convenor:
Professor Mark Birkin (University of Leeds)
The session will explore the implications of the latest developments in technology, analysis and data acquisition for our understanding of the form and function of urban areas. -Communicating the City will consider tools for visualising the spatial structure and dynamic patterns of cities. -Diagnosing the City will discuss the capture of data and toolkits for analytics and mining intelligence from big spatial data. -Simulating the City will look at model-based representations of the urban environment, with a focus on planning. -Monitoring the City will assess movement patterns with reference to both new technologies and classical concerns about land-use.
Methodologically Informed Teaching, Learning and Use of Computer Assisted Qualitative Data Analysis (CAQDAS) Packages
Convenor:
Dr Christina Silver (University of Surrey)
Computer Assisted Qualitative Data AnalysiS (CAQDAS) packages have been available for several decades, yet instruction is not embedded across university curricula. This session considers reasons for and implications of this, suggesting models for curriculum development. Presentations from expert users and teachers of qualitative methodology and software, including NVivo, ATLAS.ti and MAXQDA present results of research into technology adoption, discuss challenges and experiences of teaching methodology and software together and illustrate models of good practice.
Microeconometric Methods to Identify Causal Effects - Theory and Applications
Convenor:
Professor Sascha Becker (CAGE and Dept of Economics @ University of Warwick)
This sessions presents popular methods to identify causal effects, used in the applied social sciences, such as instrumental variables (IV), regression-discontinuity design (RDD), Difference-in-differences (DiD), and Matching/Synth Control Method (SCM) and applications thereof.
How to Read and Write Critically
Convenors:
Professor Mike Wallace (Cardiff University)
Professor Alison Wray (Cardiff University)
This workshop provides support with learning to become a critical reader of academic literature in social science fields and a self-critical writer of literature reviews, including those forming part of a thesis. The presenters are co-authors of the textbook ‘Critical Reading and Writing for Postgraduates’ (published by Sage, 2nd edition 2011). The workshop will be based on material in it. Participants will be invited to bring an academic article or chapter reporting research that they wish to engage with critically, and to try conducting an in-depth critical analysis of this document using frameworks drawn from the book.
Challenges/Opportunities of Using Social Media for Social Science Research
Convenor:
Ms Kandy Woodfield (NatCen Social Research)
Social media is used increasingly in social science research as a source of data, a way to connect with participants and with other researchers. These research approaches raise interesting and challenging questions for conventional approaches to research. In this session leading members of last year's NCRM funded Network of Methodological Innovation - Blurring the Boundaries - New Social Social Media, New Social Science? will be talking about case studies from their own experience. The #NSMNSS network is a thriving global community of researchers using social media. This session will give you a chance to hear more about their work.
Research Ethics in Context: Qualitative Methods and Ethical Challenges
Convenor:
Dr Rose Wiles (University of Southampton)
Different methods and methodologies raise different ethical challenges albeit ones that are inevitably influenced by the context of research. Through a series of presentations, this session will explore some of the ethical challenges that arise in using specific qualitative approaches. The session will include presentations from researchers using participant observation, auto/biography, mixed methods and online methods. Drawing on a range of research projects, presentations will explore some of the ethical challenges encountered and how the emergent issues have been negotiated within the context of specific research projects.
Wednesday 9th July Lunch (12.45 - 13.30)
Wednesday 9th July PM (14.15 - 15.30)
KEY LECTURE Sharlene Hesse-Biber: The 'Thing-ness' Problem of Mixed Methods Research (Chair: Rosalind Edwards)
Convenor:
Professor Sharlene Hesse-Biber (Boston College)
Contemporary mixed methods research veers away from a 'loosely bounded' to a 'bounded' concept. I deploy the concept of reification, defined as taking an object/abstraction and treating it as if it were such that it takes on the quality of 'thing-ness', having a concrete independent existence. I argue that the contemporary reification of mixed methods as a 'thing' is fuelled by three interrelated factors: (1) The growing formalisation of mixed methods as design; (2) The movement towards mixed methods guidelines for 'best' practice; and (3) The deployment of 'pragmatism' as the 'philosophical partner' for mixed methods inquiry. Sharlene Hesse-Biber is a professor in the Sociology Department of Boston College and Director of the Women’s & Gender Studies Program. She has published widely on the impact of sociocultural factors on women’s body image as well as on methodological and methods issues, including the role of technology and emergent and mixed methods in social research. Her monograph, Am I Thin Enough Yet? (Oxford, 1996), was selected as one of Choice magazine’s best academic books for 1996. She is author of The Cult of Thinness (Oxford, 2007) and Mixed Methods Research: Merging Theory With Practice (Guilford Publications, 2010). She is the coauthor of Working Women in America (Oxford, 2005) and author of The Practice of Qualitative Research (Sage Publications, third edition expected in 2015). She is the coeditor of Approaches to Qualitative Research (Oxford, 2004), Feminist Perspectives on Social Research (Oxford, 2004), Emergent Methods in Social Research (Sage, 2006), and The Handbook of Emergent Methods (Guilford, 2008). She is also the editor of The Handbook of Feminist Research (Sage, 2007, 2012), an AESA Critics’ Choice Award winner and selected as one of Choice magazine’s outstand¬ing academic titles for 2007.
Teaching Quantitative Methods: What Can Qualitative Researchers and Teachers Learn?
Convenor:
Dr Marty Chamberlain (University of Loughborough)
Just what can qualitative researchers and teachers learn from those who choose to work with numbers? The purpose of this session is to explore this topic with a panel of practitioners who work in both empirical fields. Each panel member will present a paper which addresses this question before the floor is opened for questions and debate.
Disseminating Your Research: Journals, Books and the Media
Convenors:
Miss Katie Metzler (SAGE)
Mr Patrick Brindle (SAGE)
Katie Metzler, Senior Commissioning Editor at SAGE, will convene an introductory session on academic publishing and will help you to think about the best way to disseminate your research. The talk aims to give you an insight into what publishers are looking for in an author, and what you should be looking for in a publisher. Jai Seaman will give you top tips for publishing in journals and will talk through the process of preparing a book proposal for an academic publisher. Stephen Khan from The Conversation will give advice on engaging with the media and writing for the public.
Using Specialist Bibliographies, Abstracting and Indexing Databases
Convenor:
Mr Rob Newman (ProQuest)
Using examples from ProQuest’s abstracting and indexing databases in the social sciences such as Sociological Abstracts and IBSS, this session will provide guidance on how such bibliographic tools can be useful and help save time in your research, whether you are doing simple keyword searches or want to construct more complex search strategies. The session will show how specialist A&I databases differ from and add value compared to discovery services and Google Scholar; when you would use them in your research; how they work and how to get the best out of them.
Wednesday 9th July PM (16.00 - 17.30)
Knowledge Mobilisation and the Social Sciences: Engagement, Coproduction, and Exchange
Convenors:
Professor Irene Hardill (University of Northumbria)
Ms Ceridwen Roberts (University of Oxford)
The workshop, chaired by Ceridwen Roberts, Oxford University has three interlinked themes which will be highlighted in papers: Theme 1 - Mobilising social sciences, knowledge and value. Theme 2 - Engagement, co-production and exchange, and Theme 3 - Knowledge mobilisation strategies and techniques. The workshop will end with an interactive debate on an agenda for action, social science for the 21st century, opening with Barbara Doig, formerly of the Scottish Government. The participants draw on papers published in Contemporary Social Science (8,3,2013). The related discussion will feed into a Knowledge Mobilisation Handbook.
How to Use Imitation Games
Convenor:
Dr Rob Evans (Cardiff School of Social Sciences)
This session will introduce the theory and practice of Imitation Game research. We will: - describe the origins of the method and outline its distinctive features, including the close integration of qualitative and quantitative data; - demonstrate how to conduct Imitation Game research by running a live Imitation Game; - present results from our current research project that aims to develop the Imitation Game as a new method for comparative and longitudinal research. This will be a highly participatory and interactive session. If you have a laptop, tablet or smartphone that runs chrome or firefox, please bring it along!
Research Impact: How to Get Media Coverage of Your Research
Convenor:
Professor Lorraine Dearden (Institute for Fiscal Studies)
This session will draw on the expertise of journalists, external relation managers, academics with strong media presence and public policy experts on how to get press coverage of your research and how to ensure maximum impact. What is the ideal way to write a press release? What is the best way of getting the media to cover your research? How can you use other mediums such as blogging and twitter to get media coverage?
Beating Those Mid-PhD Blues
Convenor:
Dr Ross English (Kings College London)
This session will look at the loss of motivation that can occur at any point in a postgraduate researcher's career but often happens mid-way through the period of study. We will look at common reasons for loss of motivation, distractions that get in the way of work and strategies for getting a researcher's focus back on track. The session will take the form of presentation, personal reflection and small group discussion.
Finnish Research Methods Festival Guest Session: Analysing Diary Data / Ethical Agency / Online Ethnography
Convenor:
Dr Asko Tolvanen (Methodology Center of Human Sciences, University of Jyväskylä)
First presentation approaches the topic from a practical as well as statistical point of view analyzing quantitative diary data with multilevel modeling. Second presentation discusses two important questions related to ethical agency in science: What kind of role researcher’s character and judgment have in ethical decision making, and what kind of institutional settings support ethical agency. Applying the insights, methods, and perspectives of ethnography to the virtual world issues is a delightful challenge for researchers interested in online communities of our information age. This third presentation depicts how traditional ethnographic research methodology is applied to online settings.
What is the UK Data Service?
Convenor:
Professor David Martin (University of Southampton)
In October 2012, ESRC combined its previous Economic and Social Data Service, Census Programme and Secure Data Service into a new UK Data Service - thereby providing an integrated service offering the research community a single point of access to an enormous range of secondary data. This session will provide an overview of the UK Data Service and to use it, highlighting three major areas of the data collection: UK Survey Data, International data and 2011 UK Census data. Expert staff from different areas of the service will be available to answer attendees' questions.
New Methods for Old Data: Diverse Approaches to Reusing Qualitative Data
Convenor:
Dr Libby Bishop (UK Data Service)
Secondary analysis has been less common and more contested for qualitative data than for quantitative data. However, use of the approach has grown rapidly to become more widely accepted. This growth is explained by the open data movement, funder policies and researchers seeing benefits of sharing all manner of resources. This session showcases novel methodological approaches to reusing qualitative data: Brannen, Elliott and Phoenix employ narrative analysis to intergenerational, qualitative data on fathering by both secondary and original investigators; Andrews integrates narrative method with reuse; and Lawrence applies an historical framing to the question of social identity.
Ethnographic Portraits: Writing to Communicate
Convenors:
Dr David Mills (University of Oxford)
Dr Jane Dyson (University of Oxford)
Artistic portraits illuminate and evoke. They hint at what lies beyond the frame. Ethnographic portraits do the same, revealing the complex interweaving of individual lives with the 'grand narratives' of politics and history. In this informal hands-on workshop we explore the practice of writing, and of teaching, ethnographic portraits as a research method. After presentations by the convenors introducing ethnographic portraiture, two doctoral students - Peidong Yang and Hem Borker - reflect on their own use of portraits. Together, we discuss their analytical potentials and limitations, their communicative possibilities, and their use in qualitative methods training.
'What is...Rhythmanalysis', 'What is...Qualitative Interviewing' and 'What is...Problem-Centred Interviewing'
Convenor:
Dr Andy Cullis (University of Southampton)
What Is... sessions are designed to provide an introduction to a range of research methods and related methodological issues. The methods will be presented in an accessible fashion and their uses will be described. In this session the presentations will be on ' Rhythmanalysis ', 'Qualitative interviewing ' and 'Problem-centred interviewing '. Each presentation will last about 30 minutes which consists of 20 for the presenter and 10 for questions/discussion from the audience, who are assumed to be interested but to have no prior knowledge of the method under discussion. Sessions will be recorded and made available on the NCRM
Wednesday 9th July Wine Reception (18.00 - 19.00)
Wine Reception with Jon Rasbash prize and Student Poster prizes (sponsored by Sage)
Supper (19.00 - 20.30) for those staying in St Catherine’s accommodation
Wednesday 9th July Evening (20.30 - 22.00)
Stimulating the Reseach Imagination: Red Magic
Convenor:
Mr Ian Saville (Socialism)
Whereas David Copperfield is content with little tricks like making the Statue of Liberty disappear, Ian Saville aims at the much more ambitious goal of making International Capitalism and exploitation disappear. True, he hasn't quite succeeded, but he keeps on trying. This is a funny, magical, thought-provoking and topical celebration of Socialism.