Postgraduate Course: Qualitative Research Skills for Service Management and Design (fusion on-site) (EFIE11300)
Course Outline
| School | Edinburgh Futures Institute |
College | College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) |
Availability | Available to all students |
| SCQF Credits | 10 |
ECTS Credits | 5 |
| Summary | This elective course offers practical and hands-on training in qualitative research methods, complementing EFI's central offerings primarily focused on quantitative methods and numeric data. While using examples from service management and design settings, the course equips students across disciplines with the necessary skills to collect, manage and analyse qualitative data. After attending this course, students will be able to independently develop a major piece of qualitative research, which benefits their study (e.g., Future Project) and future professional career. |
| Course description |
This course offers students an introduction to qualitative research methods. It engages with the full process of designing, implementing, analysing, writing up, and disseminating a research project following a qualitative approach. Guest speaker sessions will also enable students to reflect on the differences and synergies between qualitative and other methods, and to understand how qualitative methods have been applied in industry and practice, primarily in service management and design fields.
There will be a two-day intensive teaching session covering several topics below. Students will get a chance for group discussion, and using qualitative method to work on their own area of interest. Before and after that, students will have the independent learning of pre-recorded videos, podcasts, and suggested readings. Examples of the content to be covered in the course include:
- Research design and reviewing the literature
- Doing qualitative case studies
- Qualitative research interviews
- Observation and ethnographic research
- Second-hand data: archives and documents
- Speaker - using qualitative research to inform management decisions
- Speaker - using qualitative research to inform service design
- Speaker - using surveys for qualitative research
- Data analysis, writing up and reporting
Edinburgh Futures Institute (EFI) - On-Site Fusion Course Delivery Information:
The Edinburgh Futures Institute will teach this course in a way that enables online and on-campus students to study together. This approach (our 'fusion' teaching model) offers students flexible and inclusive ways to study, and the ability to choose whether to be on-campus or online at the level of the individual course. It also opens up ways for diverse groups of students to study together regardless of geographical location. To enable this, the course will use technologies to record and live-stream student and staff participation during their teaching and learning activities.
Students should be aware that:
- Classrooms used in this course will have additional technology in place: students might not be able to sit in areas away from microphones or outside the field of view of all cameras.
- Unless the lecturer or tutor indicates otherwise you should assume the session is being recorded.
As part of your course, you will need access to a personal computing device. Unless otherwise stated activities will be web browser based and as a minimum we recommend a device with a physical keyboard and screen that can access the internet.
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Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
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Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | None |
Information for Visiting Students
| Pre-requisites | None |
Course Delivery Information
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| Academic year 2024/25, Available to all students (SV1)
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Quota: 20 |
| Course Start |
Semester 2 |
Timetable |
Timetable |
| Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
100
(
Lecture Hours 4,
Supervised Practical/Workshop/Studio Hours 6,
Online Activities 2,
Formative Assessment Hours 4,
Summative Assessment Hours 12,
Other Study Hours 3,
Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 2,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
67 )
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| Additional Information (Learning and Teaching) |
Other Study: External Speakers - 3
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| Assessment (Further Info) |
Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
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| Additional Information (Assessment) |
Summative Assessment:
The course will be assessed by means of the following components:
1) 2000 Word Individual Methodological Reflection (100%)
In this reflection, students are required to develop a research proposal interrogating how a research question relevant to a topic of their own interest can be answered through qualitative research methods.
Students could select the topic in relation to their Future Projects, or one of their prior EFI assignments, or their work-related projects.
Specifically, they will conduct a short literature review to refine a specific research question; elaborate on the research methods that will be applied; and assess the strengths and limitations of the chosen methods in answering the research question.
This assignment will enable students to apply their understanding and skills in qualitative research methods to a research project. It should be conducted individually, for both synchronous and asynchronous students.
A one-page outline of the assignment should be submitted for feedback from tutors. |
| Feedback |
Written feedback of formative assignment will be given to students.
There will be one online drop-in tutorial after intensive teaching linking reading, learning and assignment.
Feedback on summative assignment will enable students to develop skills in doing qualitative research for future study and professional career.
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| No Exam Information |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Understand the role and process of literature review in qualitative research.
- Recognise the relationship between qualitative and quantitative methods and identify their respective strengths.
- Plan and apply various qualitative methods of data collection.
- Demonstrate a critical understanding of the primary approaches to analysing diverse forms of qualitative data.
- Reflect critically on their own approach to applying qualitative methods in future academic study and/or professional research.
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Reading List
Indicative Reading List:
Essential Reading:
Miles, M., Huberman, A. & Saldana, J. (2020). Qualitative data analysis: An expanded sourcebook. Sage. (4th ed.)
Recommended Reading:
This is Service Design Doing (Stickdorn et al.) - Chapter 5 (Research Data, Collection & Analysis)
Saldana, J. (2021) The Coding Manual for Qualitative Researchers. Fourth edition. Washington, D.C.: SAGE Publications Ltd.
Denzin, N. & Lincoln, Y (2012). Collecting and interpreting qualitative materials. Sage.
Further Reading:
Richards, L. (2020). Handling qualitative data: A practical guide. Handling Qualitative Data, 1-336.
Ritchie, Jane et al. (2014) Qualitative Research Practice: A Guide for Social Science Students and Researchers. |
Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
Students will develop a range of cognitive and communicative skills including:
- Ability to critically understand and interpret qualitative research.
- A critical understanding of various data sources and methodological tools used in qualitative research.
- Ability to apply specialized methods to develop a research project.
- Communicating qualitative research projects to cross-disciplinary audiences.
- IT skills in using qualitative data analysis software and its application. |
| Keywords | Qualitative Research,Case Study,Interview,Ethnographic Research,Documentary Data,Thematic Analysis |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Tie Cui
Tel:
Email: tie.cui@ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | |
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