Five Questions About Qualitative Method

What is a qualitative method and how does it help you conduct better interviews? We have compiled five common questions about qualitative method.

What is a qualitative method?

Qualitative method encompasses research that focuses on understanding and interpreting people's experiences, behaviors, and interactions. It involves collecting data through interviews, observations, and text analysis, to gain a deeper understanding of a certain phenomenon or behavior.

What does the method provide?

Qualitative methods give us an increased understanding of something we need to understand. It's about capturing subjective and nuanced insights about opinions, feelings, and motivations. This is particularly valuable for exploring complex questions where it's not just about counting or measuring, but rather understanding the meaning behind data. It provides the opportunity to discover trends and themes that may not be obvious at first glance.

When should you use qualitative method?

Qualitative research is most suitable when you need detailed understanding of a topic, such as people's perceptions, experiences, or behaviors. Here are some examples of when you can use qualitative research:

• Analyze and develop a product
• Explore user experiences for a study
• Understand strengths and weaknesses in a service
• Find insights into how consumers make purchasing decisions
• Identify advantages and challenges: Get a clearer picture of your strengths and areas that need improvement
• Understand how a marketing campaign affects your users

What is the difference with a quantitative method?

The biggest difference lies in data collection and analysis. Quantitative method focuses on numerical data and statistical analysis, while qualitative method focuses on non-numerical data such as texts and interviews. Quantitative methods are good for measuring and quantifying phenomena, while qualitative methods are better at understanding deeper meanings and contexts.

How should you think about reliability in a qualitative method?

Reliability in qualitative research is about ensuring that the research is credible, transferable, reliable, and verifiable. This is achieved through careful documentation of the research process, use of different data sources (triangulation), and by giving space for respondents' own voices. Reflection on the researcher's own role and bias is also important for maintaining objectivity.

How do you make interviews more efficient when using qualitative method?

Interviews are often very time-consuming. In addition to the interview process, we need to take notes, summarize the notes, and analyze the interview. Many of our users experience that the time they spend after the interview accounts for the majority of their work.

At Klang.ai, we have developed a solution to automatically transcribe, summarize, and analyze interviews, which saves large amounts of time, perfect for studies that use qualitative method.

Want to test using Klang for your research? Create an account completely free and see for yourself how it can help you in your work.