CSCI 4163/6610 WINTER 2015

Housekeeping

Group membership update

PSA: Toast Masters

Time Wednesdays - 6:30 pm (tomorrow!)

Location Council Chambers, Student Union

Building Cost

Free (for 4 meetings) Additional Information

http://daltm.toastmastersclubs.org/

Q1: Interviews are:

a) Verbally asking participants questions

b) Hearing their point of view in their own words

c) Both A & B

d) Neither A nor B

Q2: Which type of interview allows you to probe participants’ responses?A) Structured

B) Unstructured

C) Semi-Structured

D) Unstructured and Semi-Structured

Q3: Which type of interview allows you to quantitatively compare responses?A) Structured

B) Unstructured

C) Semi-Structured

D) Structured and Semi-Structured

Q4: Active listening is…

A) Making a conscious effort to hear the words a person is saying

B) Making an effort to understand the complete message being sent

C) Paying attention to the other person very carefully

D) All of the above

Observation Exercise Research topic: Rituals of on-line

information seeking behaviour

Questions: What types of information sources are regularly checked? Is it a push or pull paradigm? What is the frequency? What prompts a session to begin? How long does a session usually last? What brings a session to an end (time? Information found? All sources seen?)? Is there multi-tasking?

Observation

Watching people, programs, events, communities, etc.

Used to: Provide information about real-life

situations and circumstances Assess what is happening

Valuable because you cannot rely on participants’ willingness and ability to furnish information

When is observation useful? When you want direct information When you are trying to understand

an ongoing behaviour or process When there is physical evidence,

products, or outcomes that can be readily seen

When other data collection methods seem inappropriate

Observations

Advantages Disadvantages

Most direct measure of behavior

Provides direct information

Easy to complete (?) Saves time (?) Can be used in

natural or experimental settings

May require training Observer’s presence

may create artificial situation

Potential for bias Potential to overlook

meaningful aspects Potential for

misinterpretation Difficult to analyze

(If unobtrusive…)

Can see things in their natural context Can see things that may escape

conscious awareness, things that are not seen by others

Can discover things that may have been taken for granted

Can learn about things that people might not be willing to talk about

Low potential for generating observer effects

Major limitations

Potential for bias Observer bias Cultural bias (during observation and

interpretation) Reliability

Ease of categorization Often used in combination with other

methods to provide a more thorough account

Types of observation

Observing what does not happen may be as important as observing what does happen

Planning

Determine who/what to observe Determine what aspects will be

observed (characteristics, attributes, behaviours, etc.)

Determine when/where observations will be made

Develop the observation record sheet Pilot test the observation record sheet Train the observers, practice Collect information, analyze and

interpret

Observations need to be credible Observation guide Recording sheet Checklist Field notes Pictures Video Some combination of the above

Ecological validity

Is what you are observing representative of usual behaviours? Unobtrusive? Task? Setting? Tools?

If unobtrusive…

Can be hard to understand why….

Contextual inquiry (Thursday’s topic) Interviewees are interviewed in their

context, when doing their tasks, with as little interference from the interviewer as possible.

Allows probing of “why?” Can be real-time or record

interesting actions for later discussion

Other ways of providing context If natural observation not possible,

can ask them to demonstrate specific tasks of interest

Can provide task scenarios and ask them to perform

“Think aloud” aloud protocols

Other ways of getting observational data

Logging Screen recording (check out

Camtasia) Trace data

Homework Assigned reading w/ questions for Thurs Get your ethics tutorials done and submit

certificate before Friday’s lab Friday’s groups: make plans to show protocol

to Hasmeet or I BEFORE Friday! Make sure you come prepared for Friday (print

what needs printing, each group member should know their role)

How many sessions? How many participants will you need? Check in with Hasmeet so he can handle logistics on Friday

Today’s reading

What was the motivation? What were the research questions? What was their approach? Critique their study (what was good?

What was bad?) Recruitment, running the study, analysis

Do you think that their findings are valid? What would you do differently if you

wanted to replicate/extend this research?