Qualitative Research: Annotated Bibliography

McMillan explains that the value of qualitative research is derived from the postulation “that multiple realities are represented in participant perspectives, and that context is critical in exploring and understanding the phenomenon being investigated” (McMillan, 2015, p. 304). Additional to this position, the interdependence of factors and influences lend to the holistic perspective of research; thereby emphasizing the interconnectedness of all the parts of a study rather than variables to reach conclusions, or develop frameworks. Integral to qualitative research are the insights, interactions and induction by which researchers analyze and interpret data. McMillan characterizes this is a “bottom-up” approach to research design, and allows

The use of multiple sources for data collection supports the position that “the researcher should use multiple methods of data collection” (McMillan, 2015, p. 334) to establish credibility. According to the text, triangulation is the “collection and use of data collected from different individuals at different times or in different places, or several sources of data” (McMillan, 2015, p. 357). Finding the points where data from various sources coincide provides a general sense of the reliability of a conclusion or pattern based on represented correlations. As McMillan explains, when a researcher uses at least two sources where the data points to the same conclusion the findings have been triangulated (p. 357). The advantage of triangulating findings is that the data supports itself. In terms of qualitative research, triangulated data allows for a more insightful inductive analysis of what the data represents; as well, triangulation allows for the process orientation of research to validate the why and how of participants’ behaviors. Moreover, McMillan expresses that “triangulation is perhaps the most widely used technique to establish credible findings” (McMillan, 2015, p.