Qualitative Research Methods for the Social Sciences (4th Edition) [Paperback]

Bruce Lawrence Berg (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 6, 2000 | ISBN-10: 0205318479 | ISBN-13: 978-0205318476 | Edition: 4th

This book offers the most comprehensive and straightforward coverage of doing qualitative research on the market, now with a new chapter on Action Research. The author's central purpose remains a desire to instruct inexperienced researchers in ways of effectively collecting, organizing, and making sense of qualitative data, while stressing the importance of ethics in research and in taking the time to properly design and think through any research endeavor. After reading this book, fledgling researchers should be able to design, collect, and analyze data and then present their results to the scientific community.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Thank you to the following reviewers:

 

Chris Podeschi                    Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania

Janelle Wilson                      University of Minnesota Duluth

Kimberly Mahaffy                Millersville University

Meredith Kneavel Boyd       Chestnut Hill College

Paula Fernandez                 William Paterson University

Susan Wortmann                Nebraska Wesleyan University

 

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“This is so well written and clear for students who struggle with this type of material.”

-Meredith Kneavel Boyd, Chestnut Hill College

 

“The primary strength of Berg's book is the breadth of data gathering approaches covered. It is also written in a manner that is accessible to undergraduate students.”

-Chris Podeschi, Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania

 

Berg’s text is organized nicely, written well, and includes helpful ideas for student projects.”

-Janelle Wilson, University of Minnesota, Duluth

--This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

From the Back Cover

Unique in both its scope and its focus, Qualitative Research Methods is a comprehensive introduction to designing, collecting, analyzing, and reporting research data. Designed for readers without prior experience in data collection, this book also stresses the importance of ethics in research and taking the time to properly design and think through any research endeavor.

Topics new to the fifth edition include appropriate uses for the Internet, and using computers as a tool for interviewing and for conducting ethnographic research. Additionally, a new “Moderator's Guide” provides the focus group facilitators with a step-by-step guide to conducting interviews.

Other Titles of Interest:

Nardi, Doing Survey Research: A Guide to Quantitative Research Methods, 1/e (0-205-34348-1) (2003)

Neuman, Basics of Social Research: Quantitative and Qualitative Methods, 1/e (0-205-35578-1) (2004)

Thomas, Spotlight on Social Research, 1/e (0-205-36806-9) (2003)

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: Allyn & Bacon; 4th edition (June 6, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0205318479
• ISBN-13: 978-0205318476
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.8 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #694,094 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Exceptional Book. The best book on the subject., November 26, 1997

By 

[e-mail] (Erie, Pennsylvania, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Qualitative Research Methods for the Social Sciences (Paperback)

This book is, by far, the most comprehensive book on qualitative research methods ever written. Berg covers all of the major areas of qualitative research methods with the expertise of a seasoned veteran researcher--of which he is. This book is written in an accessible and easy-to-understand style. Each chapter revolves around one central element of the qualitative research methods picture. Having been a reader of earlier editions of this book (in fact, all editions), I can testify that each edition of this book gets better than the previous edition. This book is required reading for anyone seriously interested in the research process--qualitative or quantitative. This book may well be THE bible of qualitative research methods.

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great resource for anyone interested in qualitative research, August 7, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Qualitative Research Methods for the Social Sciences (4th Edition) (Paperback)

In the most recent edition of Bruce L. Berg's Qualitative Research Methods for the Social Sciences, the author makes a number of important addition to his work. This edition has a much greater emphasis on methodology-how to collect, organize, and present qualitative data-while maintaining a strong theoretical backing. A new chapter on ethical issues in field research is perhaps the most important addition to this work. The book still appeals primarily to students and researchers in social sciences, but the author attempts to broaden his scope into other fields not typically associated with the social sciences, such as nursing and business.

In his introduction, Berg laments the absence of comprehensive books on qualitative research methods, a technique that has lost out to a more quantitative, data-driven approach to field research. Berg also criticizes the number of texts written about ethnographic methodology that focus on only one aspect of field research. Elsewhere, Berg suggests that too often books on field methods presuppose a strong background in data collection techniques that most students simply do not have. Berg attempts to rectify these problems, by providing the novice researcher with a book that offers a comprehensive view of field methods that anyone can use. He is, for the most part, successful.

While the author discusses a number of different views concerning qualitative research design, he ultimately suggests that individuals begin collecting data as soon as their ideas are formed. Berg says that there is some value in combining the "research-before-theory" and "theory-before-research" approaches. This method has the researcher conducting investigations and gathering information as needed. The author looks at this as a "spiraling" pattern, where the researcher is able to learn theory while conducting investigations and to direct his or her research based on preexisting theories. While this method has its pitfalls, it seems like a more realistic approach than the traditional "linear" method, where an individual moves from idea generation to literature review to data collection without looking back.

Much like the "spiraling" approach that the author presents, the book itself moves effortlessly between discussions of theories in qualitative research and practical advice, which is given in the "Trying it out" section at the end of each chapter. The book looks closely at seven different strategies for data collection, including "focus group interviewing," "ethnographic field strategies," and the collecting of oral traditions and "historiographies." New to this addition is the chapter on "action research," which seems in many ways reminiscent of the concept of "participant observation" found in other areas of the social sciences, particularly anthropology. This new emphasis on action research also reflects a trend in the social sciences towards the incorporation of charitable work into a field research project. Action research, according to Berg, takes into account the history, culture, and "emotional lives" of a group of people as a means of tracing the sources of that community's problems. The author points out that all field research, on one level or another, evokes social change, but action research brings about change more directly.

Closely related to this notion of action research is the book's new chapter on the ethical dimensions of field research. Unlike other books on field methods that include ethical issues at the end on the text as an afterthought, Berg's book places his chapter on ethics towards the beginning of the book, before he goes into any detail about specific projects. While the rest of the text is full of practical advice, it is obvious that Berg is not out to establish any moral absolutes regarding field research. Instead, the author presents the reader with a number of real-life scenarios where ethical concerns have come into play. Berg also presents a number of factors for the reader to consider, such as consent, privacy, and the role of institutional review boards. He also provides an historical overview of ethics in field research that gives the reader an idea of how this issue has evolved.

Berg's book is perhaps the best resource for field researchers that money can buy, but there are still some issues that the book fails to address. Since the book focuses primarily on Western research in sociology, there is not much consideration for cross-cultural problems that may arise. Elsewhere the book fails to acknowledge the rising concern over intellectual property, which is relevant to social science research. For this reason, the researcher may want to supplement his or her reading with other texts that address global issues and intellectual property rights, but, overall, this book is by far the most thorough and practical resource available for those interested in field research.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars For undergraduate class, July 8, 2002

By 

Suckwoo Lee (Seoul, Seoul South Korea) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Qualitative Research Methods for the Social Sciences (4th Edition) (Paperback)

This book is a textbook on qualitative research methods at undergraduate level. To be a good and useful enough textbook on research methods, it must have two features:
1. the extensive coverage of existing methods to be used in the field.
2. elucidating those methods not only in abstract and theoretical words but also with live examples from real field works to grasp real sense of each method.
Fortunately, this textbook has both aspects. It embraces from classical methods like interview, fieldwork to young methods like sociometry, historiography. Moreover, it deals with, in depth, post processing of data. For quantitative methods, such processing has been automated with such packages like SPSS or SAS. But for qualitative methods, standardizing data is tricky and complex for the nature of data. But data should be treated anyway. This book briefly introduces reader to that process. Furthermore, unlike other textbooks simply enumerating various methods, this book attempts to explain them from consistent viewpoint, dramaturgy. As you know, dramaturgy interprets the activity of research itself such social process as the object of research. Such an approach orients readers towards what the research would be like in the field. In this view, research is portrayed so in dynamic and vivid way as to get a image of research with more ease.
But as the author incessantly points out, research methods could be learned not by reading but by doing. You should practice it to know it. Explanation in textbook is no more than a map to the destination, not the destination itself.