Claims to Innovation in qualitative research methods: A narrative literature review

1. Claims to Innovation in qualitative research methods:A narrative literature review Rose Wiles NCRM Hub University of Southampton

2. Context • Increasing interest in methodological innovation in social sciences (and arts and humanities) • Innovation (impact) important for individuals’ careers • Expectations of funders and publishers led to increase in claims to innovation • Innovation central to ensuring competitive and high impact research - the future of disciplines • Importance of identifying methods to address new social and economic challenges and patterns of social interaction • Is innovation part of ‘progress narrative’ of QR (Alasuutari, 2007) or encouraging ‘fads’ (Travers, 2009)

3. What is methodological innovation? • Varying definitions but key elements: • Should be rooted in genuine attempt to improve some aspect of the research process (not just gimmickry or innovation for innovation sake) • Can comprise developments to established methods as well as new methods • Should be some level of dissemination, acceptance and take-up in the research community • (Travers, 2009; Coffey and Taylor, 2008)

4. Researching Methodological Innovation • Questions for research on methodological innovation • What is innovation? What’s the difference between a development and an innovation? • Why innovate? What motivates innovation? • How does the social science community respond to innovations: how are they diffused, how do they become mainstream? • What difference do particular innovations make? What are the benefits?

5. Study 1: Exploring claims of innovation • What claims for innovation in qualitative research have been made 2000-2009? • Where is innovation being claimed: • in what types of method, • in which disciplines and geographical locations. • On what basis is the claim to innovation made? • What are the motivations given for developing these ‘innovations’? • To what extent are they taken up?

6. Method • Systematic review of innovation claims in social science journals 2000-2009; narrative review of claims conducted • 14 journals selected • Journal contents searched using innovat*, new, novel and emerg* in the title or abstract • Focus on authors’ self-definition of innovation • 57 papers identified • Papers reviewed and categorised • Narrative analysis of claims • Citation search to explore take-up

7. Author profiles Disciplines Locations

8. Methodological Areas

9. Distribution across timeframe

10. Findings: motivations for innovating • Morally or ethically-driven motivation (n=22) • Responses to practical challenges (n=18) • Theoretically-driven motivation (n=17)

11. Findings: innovation stage – are these new innovations? • Exploring the stage of development of the innovation being claimed; what was being claimed about the ‘newness’ of the innovation? • Three categories identified from claims • Inception (n=32) • Adaptation (n=6) • Adoption (n=19)

12. Narratives of claims 3 broad narratives about the nature of the innovation claims • ‘Pushing boundaries’ claim • ‘Solution’ claim • ‘Pioneering’ claim

13. Narratives of claims • ‘Our claims for the validity of our methodology rely on combining standard theoretical foundations with an explicit voice from practice … it is this combination which grounds our claim to novelty’ [Dodson et al, 2007] • ‘our purpose in this article is to identify and suggest resolution for two core problematics of grounded theory’ [Wasserman et al, 2009] • ‘it is generally recognised that cyberspace offers a new and exciting frontier for social research. It is yet to be seen how blogging can be utlised as a research technique. The aim of this article is to make an important first step in building this knowledge base’ [Hookway, 2008]

14. Findings: benefits • Importance of innovations being evaluated but no evidence from papers … • In most cases, direct claims for benefits made which accorded with the motivation for the innovation • few failures identified • Some reported additional benefits

15. Take-Up • Citation search undertaken using Google Scholar. • Most papers had 0-3 citations • 9 papers had 12+ citations (highest = 40 for paper on ethnotheatre). • Higher citation rate for: • Papers in the adoption category • Papers on online and software methods/tools • A paper on validity • 3 papers on ethnography – auto-ethnography and ethnotheatre)

16. Conclusion • Supports the finding that researchers are increasingly claiming innovation (over-claiming?) • limited evidence of wholly new methods; majority appear to be adaptations or transfer from other disciplines (developments?) • Study highlights e-research, participatory and creative methods as sites of innovation; innovations at interface with arts-based approaches dominate • Evaluation of these innovations appears to be limited; what are the benefits of these methods? • Take-up appears limited; little indication these innovation becoming mainstream • Unanswered questions? How are innovations developed, how are they disseminated, how do they become mainstream, how do the social science community respond to them ……

17. Reference Wiles, R., Crow, G. & Pain, H. (2011) Innovation in qualitative research methods: a narrative review Qualitative Research 11,5: 587-604