Focus Groups

This method is applicable to my study because it allows the group of students the freedom to share their experiences, understanding and beliefs of the topic being presented. Focus groups are an asset to my research design because these groups work best for topics people could talk about with one another in their daily lives but do not. Focus groups are not always appropriate for highly sensitive and personal topics to be shared with strangers. However, for the purposes of my research the racially sensitive issues will be open to discussion because the focus group will only have African American students (Merriam,

This article represents a focus group type of qualitative research. According to Qualitative Research Consultants Association (2015), in focus group qualitative research, a group of individuals who share a need, life circumstance, or habit relevant to the research issue(s) at hand are led in a discussion by a modulator. The focus group discussions often include between two to ten respondents, and are often held face to face. They can also be conducted remotely through videoconferencing, teleconferencing, or

In order to gather a lot of data, a focus group is recommended. According to Howitt D. (2013), an optimal focus group consists of six to ten participants (Howitt, 2013; Morgan, 1997). The fact that an experienced interviewer conducted the interview led to good control and desired data(Morgan, 1996). Furthermore, a thematic analysis provided a systematic overview of the results.

Although the underlying purpose of both focus group and sharing circle discussions are very similar, the procedures/protocols and cultural principles vary. Focus groups are often regarded as top–down design approach since participants carefully sampled and numbers restricted to a recommended number however, sharing circles are more bottom-up design approach with the group size based on local, social, cultural, and physical conditions (Redman-MacLaren, Mills, and Tommbe 2014). Also, sharing circles have a sacred meaning in many Indigenous cultures and involves the growth and transformation bases for the participants the act of sharing the heart, mind, body, and spirit of the individual and providing the facilitator with the permission to report on the discussions (Lavallée 2009). The methods will be discussed in respect to ceremony, relationship building, and respect which are key factors

After the focus group, the moderator will tell the individuals what the purpose of the focus group was for. After we have collected, analysed, and drawn conclusions, we will send those to the chapters and/or meet with them to discuss not only our findings on why members stay, even during conflict they do not agree with, but also what solutions their members have to address and solve the intragroup conflict that is hindering their

I engage with the evidence of a focus group I conducted to discover how an audience

Focus groups are a popular method used to capture views and opinions for qualitative research.

Moreover, Alan Bryman (2001) in Haralambos, & Holborn, ( 2008), defines a focus group as: a form of group interview in which: there are several participants (in addition to the facilitator); there is an emphasis in the questioning on a tightly defined topic, and the accent is on interaction within the group and the joint construction of meaning.

To my understanding the idea behind the focus group method is that group processes can help people to explore and clarify their views in ways that would be less easily accessible in a one to one interview. Group discussion is particularly appropriate when the interviewer has a series of open ended questions and wishes to encourage research participants to explore the issues of importance to them, in their own words, generating their own questions and pursuing their own priorities. When group dynamics work well the participants work next to the researcher, taking the research in new and often unexpected directions.

Thanks for sharing your post regarding the difference between focus groups and depth interviews. Do you think people feel more pressure when they are interview one-on one, I believe moderators tend to be more flexible since there’s only one person being interrogated. On the other hand, people who participated on focus groups tend to be motivate for the rewards offered than the actual topic of interest.

A focus group is a small and structured meeting of approximately 8 – 10 people. Discussion revolves around a set of pre-determined topics to give you a set of rich qualitative information. Although focus groups take a while to set up and require a budget to run, once done, they can prove an efficient way of getting detailed information on a subject. Expect a focus group to give you a range of views from your target audience, and to find out why people hold these views. A focus group can take place either before or after your event, depending on what you want to find out. For example, if you want to know what motivates your audience to attend an event you might choose to run a focus

Focus groups are a method of group interviewing in which the interaction between the moderator and the group, as well as the interaction between group members, serves to elicit information and insights in response to carefully designed questions. The dynamic nature of the questions asked by the moderator and the group process, produces a level of insight that is rarely derived from 'unidirectional ' information collection devises such as observation, surveys and less interactional interview techniques. Methods of recording and analyzing information gathered during focus groups, and strategies for collecting unbiased information have helped focus group research to gain

Focus groups are a form of group interview that make use of the communication between research participants in order to produce data. Group interviews are mostly used as a quick and easy way to collect data from several people at the same time and focus groups explicitly use group interaction as part of the method. This means that the researcher doesn’t just ask each person to respond to a question in turn, but people are encouraged to talk to one another: asking questions, exchanging stories and commenting on each other's experiences and points of view. The method is mainly useful for exploring people's knowledge and experiences and can be used to study not only what people think but how they think and why they think that way.

Focus groups are a prominent method of enquiry, regularly used within the field of social science and in particular, qualitative research. The focus group practice involves a number of participants having an open discussion on a specific topic, set by a researcher. The researcher acts as a moderator to aid discussion by using probes to collect desirable data. This process is recorded and transcripts are used to interpret and analyse given information.

The objective of qualitative research is to collect the individuals’ views and support the quantitative research design. The focus group is considered as a technique, which implements the depth group interview to collect the data and evaluate the identified variables are relevant for the study (Rabiee, 2007). Richardson & Rabiee (2001) argue that participants should be selected according to the following criteria: First, they have the relevant life experiences and have something to state on the topic. Second, it would be better that they are not fearful of expressing the opinions among the participants. Third, they could feel comfortable communicating with each other.