Programme for the 7th ESRC Research Methods Festival 2016
Enhancing Data Collection to Improve Survey Data Quality
Convenors:
Dr Gabriele Durrant (University of Southampton)
Professor Patrick Sturgis (University of Southampton )
This session presents recent advances in data collection methods. Response rates have been falling in many large-scale surveys and statistical agencies are keen to implement methods that ensure the data quality of the resulting data whilst dealing with increased costs. An unanswered question remains if increased data collection efforts are indeed worth the effort. This session investigates data quality indicators, such as those measuring the risk of nonresponse bias, during data collection. The use of linked paradata and other datasources is explored. The influence of the interviewer on measurement error during data collection is investigated using a novel multilevel.
Biomarkers
Convenors:
Professor Natalie Shlomo (Social Statistics, School of Social Sciences, University of Manchester)
Professor Tarani Chandola (Cathie Marsh Institute for Social Research, University of Manchester)
The session includes presentations on substantive and methodological topics in bio-social research. Michaela Benzeval considers ways in which biomarker and genetics data might be included in social science research across different disciplines. Peter Lynn describes survey processes that lead to non-response in biomarker data and how compensatory weights were developed for Understanding Society. Gindo Tampubolon presents an analysis of biomarkers in ELSA with a focus on informative attrition and bias arising from collected retrospective data. Alex Cernat presents a typology of missing data in bio-social research, current practices and compensating for the missingness.
The New Data Environment: Opportunities and Challenges
Convenors:
Professor Mark Elliot (University of Manchester)
Professor David Martin (University of Southampton)
The data environment has changed beyond all recognition; in this session we will consider the impact of this change on research culture and methods and engage in a little horizon scanning. We will consider the challenges that the new data environment presents (to privacy, to research quality, and to researcher training) as well as the opportunities that it provides (different types of research, new means of data access, radical interdisciplinarity – is social science coming of age?). The session spans the problem space and will close with a debate on whether the new data spell the end for census and surveys.
Learning Social Science Research Methods: Let's Talk Pedagogy
Convenor:
Professor Melanie Nind (NCRM, University of Southampton)
Competence in research methods needs to be acquired, maintained and further developed. The emphasis is moving toward creating researchers with transferable, advanced skills gained via ongoing training. Within NCRM, capacity-building effort has focused on short courses and online resources, with a relatively recent focus on the teaching and learning models being employed. Papers in this session explore the distinctive pedagogic challenges in the field of social research methods and the challenges of talking about and understanding that pedagogy. The aim is to look at these issues from different perspectives in seeking to develop the pedagogic culture in this arena.
Comparative Urbanism
Convenor:
Professor Michael Keith (University of Oxford)
The city provides a particular lens through which we make the social and economic world visible. But how might we develop scholarship that recognises the differences between cities, acknowledges that they are characterised by particular histories and unique geographies and at the same time understands the potential to learn from different experiences? To do so we might need to think again about the potential and pitfall of a comparative urbanism. So in this session we consider the methods through which such a comparative urbanism might develop analytically in the social sciences and practically in the world beyond the academy.
Site Selection Issues for Small Area Field Research (PANEL)
Convenor:
Professor Howard Davis (Bangor University School of Social Sciences and WISERD)
Selecting a site or sites for fieldwork is a common problem for researchers using mixed, qualitative and case study methods. The selection process can be theorised and justified in a variety of ways: as a search for exemplary or deviant cases, the application of pragmatic criteria such as cost and accessibility, or simply as exploration in uncharted territory. Issues include scale, space, place, boundaries, temporalities, mobilities, representativeness and the concept of locality itself. Drawing on the experiences of localities research by members of WISERD, the session is designed to promote critical reflection on this significant aspect of the research process.
Nexus Methods
Convenor:
Professor Andy Stirling (University of Sussex)
Confused notions of 'the Nexus' are a burgeoning instrumentalising fashion. Yet imperatives are growing, to address complex global interactions between natures, technologies and societies – and consequent harms, opportunities and injustices. Resulting challenges span expedient distinctions between ‘systems’, ‘sectors’ and ‘settings’. They transcend reified notions of ‘place’, contrived divisions between ‘levels’ and ‘scales’, ‘science’ and ‘society’ and cherished boundaries between ‘quantitative’, ‘qualitative’ and ‘hybrid’. With biases, drivers and power relations in research also part of the focus – ‘method’ and ‘action’ are inseparable. Aims are not just to inform policy, but invigorate democratic struggle. This session will explore practical implications for methodology.
Time Use Diary Data: Methodological Innovations
Convenors:
Professor J Gershuny (University of Oxford)
Professor Oriel Sullivan (University of Oxford)
Time use diary data are increasingly used to understand the rhythms and patterns of everyday activities, and to provide rich pictures of the experienced quality of daily life. Archives of time use data now extend over 50 years across 25 countries, and there have been large recent increases in the number of publications based on this data across disciples such as Sociology, Economics and Psychology. In this session participants will gain an understanding of what time use data is, its substantive scope, recent methodological innovations in its application, and how they might consider utilising such data in their own research.
NCRM ANNUAL LECTURE: Big Data: Bridging the Qualitative/Quantitative Divide? - Jane Elliott (Chair: Patrick Sturgis)
Convenor:
Professor Rosalind Edwards (University of Southampton)
The term 'Big data' is now firmly entrenched. This lecture will explore the different meanings and uses of the term. It will then consider the extent to which the digital revolution and the development of techniques to analyse large bodies of unstructured data are disrupting previous understandings of the differences between qualitative and quantitative approaches to research in the social sciences.
Modelling and Visualising Inequality: Exploring Spatial, Regional and International Differences - Methodological Challenges and Innovations
Convenors:
Professor Susan McVie (AQMeN, University of Edinburgh)
Dr Ellie Bates (AQMeN, University of Edinburgh)
It is well known that social processes and their outcomes are not identical across places but differ from country to country and from local area to local area. This leads to inequality between areas, as people's experiences and life chances differ according to where they live. In this session researchers from AQMeN showcase a mix of different methodological approaches which attempt to model and visualise this challenging problem: multilevel models including spatial multilevel models, latent class analysis and lexis surface latticeplots, with particular examples from: demographics, migration, crime, education, and segregation.
Researching Ageing: Methodological Opportunities in Gerontology
Convenor:
Dr Rebekah Luff (National Centre for Research Methods, University of Southampton)
Research with older adults can pose a number of practical and ethical challenges. This session considers the methodological opportunities coexisting within three different areas of gerontology: research with older people from ethnic minority communities, including the use of social network maps; “shortitudinal” research tracking over time the care and experiences of those living and dying with dementia in care homes; examining patterns in missing data at end-of-life which could bias health and social care estimates in panel datasets. Points of clarification will be addressed after each presentation with substantive questions and discussion at the end of the session.
The Ethics of Sensors
Convenor:
Professor Nigel Gilbert (University of Surrey)
Digital devices are becoming more sophisticated. A mobile phone can measure position and movement, as well as what the phone is being used for. Many people wear sensors for heart rate, sleeping patterns, and physical activity. And fixed sensors in houses can be plugged in to measure sound and energy use. Using such sensors effectively could reduce the need for questionnaires and interviews, providing potentially more accurate reporting. However, the availability of such sensors and the data they can produce raises important ethical questions. This session will review the use of sensors in social research and the related ethical issues.
Strategies for Working with Combined Qualitative Longitudinal Data Sets
Convenors:
Professor Ros Edwards (University of Southampton)
Professor Lynn Jamieson (University of Edinburgh)
How feasible is it to conduct secondary data analysis across existing data from several qualitative longitudinal studies? This session will focus on various strategies for exploiting the full potential of archived qualitative longitudinal data to explore and compare processes of change and continuity. Presenters will discuss their practices in working across cases and longitudinally within a data set, and scaling up across cases and longitudinally using multiple data sets. They will draw on their diverse experiences of using the Timescapes Archive to discuss their secondary analytic strategies for working with combined qualitative longitudinal data.
Getting Started in NVivo (A Qualitative Software Workshop)
Convenors:
Dr Rosalind Willis (University of Southampton)
Dr Rebecca Taylor (University of Southampton)
This hands-on computer workshop provides a basic introduction to the NVivo qualitative data analysis software, and gives a flavour of what NVivo can offer the more advanced user. In the workshop you will set up a new project from scratch, try out some coding, and run some queries. Example data will be provided for you to practice with. More experienced users can explore NVivo’s extensive features and ask questions of the facilitators. We expect you to have some knowledge of qualitative methods, however no previous knowledge of the software is assumed.
Understanding Society - Innovations in Panel Data Collection and Analysis
Convenors:
Professor Michaela Benzeval (ISER, University of Essex)
Professor Peter Lynn (ISER, University of Essex)
A core principle of Understanding Society - The UK Household Longitudinal Study - is to ensure it is based on the best longitudinal survey methods. To facilitate this, an Innovation Panel was established that allows internal and external researchers to conduct experiments with survey methodologies. In this workshop we will present the latest findings from such research focusing on three areas: * introducing mixed mode data collection in a panel survey * improving measurement in a panel context * targeting the design of panel surveys. The workshop will also discuss the key methodological challenges for the future of the Study, and plans to address them.
What is... Diary Method, Action Research, Discrete Choice Experiments
Convenor:
Professor Graham Crow (University of Edinburgh)
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 diary method; action research; and discrete choice experiments. Each presentation will last about 20 minutes and will be followed by about 10 minutes of questions from the audience, who are assumed to be interested but to have no prior knowledge of the method under discussion. Presentations will be recorded and made available on the NCRM website.
Developing Effective Research Proposals
Convenor:
Professor Mark Elliot (Univeristy of Manchester)
Anyone who has been a member of a funding council will tell you that many of the proposals they see are not well-written. Research questions are often poorly explicated, methods insufficiently related and the literature reviewed too wide-ranging and only loosely tied to research aims. This session illustrates how these problems can be overcome, leaving you in a better position to convince the funding body to do the only thing that matters: Give YOU money! Whether you are an anthropologist or a neuroscientist, if you want to get your proposal funded, this session is for you.
Dinner
Dinner is for those who have booked
Bath Tour
The Bath Tour is for those who have booked