social work research questions may emerge from your own experience

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9.6 Analyzing qualitative data

Learning objectives.

• Describe how to transcribe qualitative data
• Identify and describe the two types of coding in qualitative research
• Assess the rigor of qualitative analysis using the criteria of trustworthiness and authenticity

Analysis of qualitative data typically begins with a set of transcripts of the interviews or focus groups conducted. Obtaining these transcripts requires having either taken exceptionally good notes or, preferably, having recorded the interview or focus group and then transcribed it. Researchers create a complete written copy, or transcript , of the recording by playing it back and typing in each word that is spoken, noting who spoke which words. In general, it is best to aim for a verbatim transcript, one that reports word for word exactly what was said in the recording. If possible, it is also best to include nonverbals in a transcript. Gestures made by participants should be noted, as should the tone of voice and notes about when, where, and how spoken words may have been emphasized by participants. Because these are difficult to capture via audio, it is important to have a note-taker in focus groups or to write useful field notes during interviews.

The goal of qualitative data analysis is to reach some inferences, lessons, or conclusions by condensing large amounts of data into relatively smaller, more manageable bits of understandable information. Analysis of qualitative data often works inductively (Glaser & Strauss, 1967; Charmaz, 2006).  To move from the specific observations a researcher collects to identifying patterns across those observations, qualitative researchers will often begin by reading through transcripts and trying to identify codes. A code is a shorthand representation of some more complex set of issues or ideas.

Qualitative researcher and textbook author Kristin Esterberg (2002) describes coding as a multistage process.  To analyze qualitative data, one can begin by open coding transcripts. This means that you read through each transcript, line by line, and make a note of whatever categories or themes jump out to you. Open coding will probably require multiple rounds. That is, you will read through all of your transcripts multiple times. Once you have completed a few passes and started noticing commonalities, you might begin focused coding. In focused coding a final list of codes is identified from the results of the open coding. Once you come up with a final list of codes, make sure each one has a definition that clearly spells out what the code means. Finally, the dataset is recoded using the final list of codes, making sure to apply the definition of the code consistently throughout each transcript.

Using multiple researchers to code the same dataset can be quite helpful. You may miss something a participant said that another coder catches. Similarly, you may shift your understanding of what a code means and not realize it until another coder asks you about it. If multiple researchers are coding the dataset simultaneously, researchers must come to a consensus about the meaning of each code and ensure that codes are applied consistently by each researcher. We discussed this previously in Chapter 5 as inter-rater reliability. Even if only one person will code the dataset, it is important to work with other researchers. If other researchers have the time, you may be able to have them check your work for trustworthiness and authenticity, which are discussed in detail below.

Table 13.2, presents two codes that emerged from an inductive analysis of transcripts from interviews with child-free adults. It also includes a brief description of each code and a few (of many) interview excerpts from which each code was developed.

As you might imagine, wading through all these data is quite a process. Just as quantitative researchers rely on the assistance of special computer programs designed to help with sorting through and analyzing their data, so too do qualitative researchers. There are programs specifically designed to assist qualitative researchers with organizing, managing, sorting, and analyzing large amounts of qualitative data. The programs work by allowing researchers to import transcripts contained in an electronic file and then label or code passages, cut and paste passages, search for various words or phrases, and organize complex interrelationships among passages and codes. They even include advanced features that allow researchers to code multimedia files, visualize relationships between a network of codes, and count the number of times a code was applied.

Trustworthiness and authenticity

In qualitative research, the standards for analysis quality differ than quantitative research for an important reason. Analysis in quantitative research can be done objectively or impartially. The researcher chooses a statistical analysis based on the research questions and data, and reads the results. The extent to which the results are accurate and consistent is a problem with the data, not the researcher.

The same cannot be said for qualitative research. Qualitative researchers are deeply involved in the data analysis process. There is no external measurement tool, like a quantitative scale. Rather, the researcher herself is the measurement instrument. Researchers build connections between different ideas that participants discuss and draft an analysis that accurately reflects the depth and complexity of what participants have said. This is a challenging task for a researcher. It involves acknowledging her own biases, either from personal experience or previous knowledge about the topic, and allowing the meaning that participants shared to emerge as the data is analyzed. It’s not necessarily about being objective, as there is always some subjectivity in qualitative analysis, but more about the rigor with which the individual researcher engages in data analysis.

For this reason, researchers speak of rigor in more personal terms. Trustworthiness refers to the “truth value, applicability, consistency, and neutrality” of the results of a research study (Rodwell, 1998, p. 96).  Authenticity refers to the degree to which researchers capture the multiple perspectives and values of participants in their study and foster change across participants and systems during their analysis. Both trustworthiness and authenticity contain criteria that help a researcher gauge the rigor with which the results were obtained.

Most analogous to the quantitative concepts of validity and reliability are qualitative research’s trustworthiness criteria of credibility , dependability , and confirmability . Credibility refers to the degree to which the results are accurate and viewed as important and believable by participants. Qualitative researchers will often check with participants before finalizing and publishing their results to make sure participants agree with them. They may also seek out assistance from another qualitative researcher to review or audit their work. As you might expect, it’s difficult to view your own research without bias, so another set of eyes is often helpful. Unlike in quantitative research, the ultimate goal is not to find the Truth (with a capital T) using a predetermined measure, but to create a credible interpretation of the data. Credibility is seen as akin to validity, as it mainly speaks to the accuracy of the research product.

The criterion of dependability, on the other hand, is similar to reliability. As you may recall, reliability is the consistency of a measure (if you give the same measure each time, you should get similar results). However, qualitative research questions, hypotheses, and interview questions may change during the research process. How can one achieve reliability under such conditions? Because qualitative research understands the importance of context, it would be impossible to control all of the things that would make a qualitative measure the same when you give it to each person. The location, timing, or even the weather can and do influence participants to respond differently. Therefore, qualitative researchers assess dependability rather than reliability.  Dependability ensures that proper qualitative procedures were followed and that any changes that emerged during the research process are accounted for, justified, and described in the final report. Researchers should document changes to their methodology and the justification for them in a journal or log. In addition, researchers may again use another qualitative researcher to examine their logs and results to ensure dependability.

Finally, the criterion of confirmability refers to the degree to which the results reported are linked to the data obtained from participants. While it is possible that another researcher could view the same data and come up with a different analysis, confirmability ensures that a researcher’s results are actually grounded in what participants said. Another researcher should be able to read the results of your study and trace each point made back to something specific that one or more participants shared. This process is called an audit.

The criteria for trustworthiness were created as a reaction to critiques of qualitative research as unscientific (Guba, 1990). They demonstrate that qualitative research is equally as rigorous as quantitative research. Subsequent scholars conceptualized the dimension of authenticity without referencing the standards of quantitative research at all. Instead, they wanted to understand the rigor of qualitative research on its own terms.

While there are multiple criteria for authenticity, the one that is most important for undergraduate social work researchers to understand is fairness . Fairness refers to the degree to which “different constructions, perspectives, and positions are not only allowed to emerge, but are also seriously considered for merit and worth” (Rodwell, 1998, p. 107). Qualitative researchers, depending on their design, may involve participants in the data analysis process, try to equalize power dynamics among participants, and help negotiate consensus on the final interpretation of the data. As you can see from the talk of power dynamics and consensus-building, authenticity attends to the social justice elements of social work research.

Key Takeaways

• Open coding involves allowing codes to emerge from the dataset.
• Codes must be clearly defined before focused coding can begin, so the researcher applies them in the same way to each unit of data.
• The criteria that qualitative researchers use to assess rigor are trustworthiness and authenticity.
• Authenticity- the degree to which researchers capture the multiple perspectives and values of participants in their study and foster change across participants and systems during their analysis
• Code- a shorthand representation of some more complex set of issues or ideas
• Coding- identifying themes across qualitative data by reading transcripts
• Confirmability- the degree to which the results reported are linked to the data obtained from participants
• Credibility- the degree to which the results are accurate and viewed as important and believable by participants
• Dependability- ensures that proper qualitative procedures were followed and that any changes that emerged during the research process are accounted for, justified, and described in the final report
• Fairness- the degree to which “different constructions, perspectives, and positions are not only allowed to emerge, but are also seriously considered for merit and worth” (Rodwell, 1998, p. 107)
• Focused coding- collapsing or narrowing down codes, defining codes, and recoding each transcript using a final code list
• Open coding- reading through each transcript, line by line, and make a note of whatever categories or themes seem to jump out to you
• Transcript- a complete, written copy of the recorded interview or focus group containing each word that is spoken on the recording, noting who spoke which words
• Trustworthiness- the “truth value, applicability, consistency, and neutrality” of the results of a research study (Rodwell, 1998, p. 96)

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9 9. Writing your research question

Chapter outline.

• Empirical vs. ethical questions (4 minute read)
• Characteristics of a good research question (4 minute read)
• Quantitative research questions (7 minute read)
• Qualitative research questions (3 minute read)
• Evaluating and updating your research questions (4 minute read)

Content warning: examples in this chapter include references to sexual violence, sexism, substance use disorders, homelessness, domestic violence, the child welfare system, cissexism and heterosexism, and truancy and school discipline.

9.1 Empirical vs. ethical questions

Learning objectives.

Learners will be able to…

• Define empirical questions and provide an example
• Define ethical questions and provide an example

Writing a good research question is an art and a science. It is a science because you have to make sure it is clear, concise, and well-developed. It is an art because often your language needs “wordsmithing” to perfect and clarify the meaning. This is an exciting part of the research process; however, it can also be one of the most stressful.

Creating a good research question begins by identifying a topic you are interested in studying. At this point, you already have a working question. You’ve been applying it to the exercises in each chapter, and after reading more about your topic in the scholarly literature, you’ve probably gone back and revised your working question a few times. We’re going to continue that process in more detail in this chapter. Keep in mind that writing research questions is an iterative process, with revisions happening week after week until you are ready to start your project.

Empirical vs. ethical questions

When it comes to research questions, social science is best equipped to answer empirical   questions —those that can be answered by real experience in the real world—as opposed to  ethical   questions —questions about which people have moral opinions and that may not be answerable in reference to the real world. While social workers have explicit ethical obligations (e.g., service, social justice), research projects ask empirical questions to help actualize and support the work of upholding those ethical principles.

In order to help you better understand the difference between ethical and empirical questions, let’s consider a topic about which people have moral opinions. How about SpongeBob SquarePants? [1] In early 2005, members of the conservative Christian group Focus on the Family (2005) [2] denounced this seemingly innocuous cartoon character as “morally offensive” because they perceived his character to be one that promotes a “pro-gay agenda.” Focus on the Family supported their claim that SpongeBob is immoral by citing his appearance in a children’s video designed to promote tolerance of all family forms (BBC News, 2005). [3] They also cited SpongeBob’s regular hand-holding with his male sidekick Patrick as further evidence of his immorality.

So, can we now conclude that SpongeBob SquarePants is immoral? Not so fast. While your mother or a newspaper or television reporter may provide an answer, a social science researcher cannot. Questions of morality are ethical, not empirical. Of course, this doesn’t mean that social science researchers cannot study opinions about or social meanings surrounding SpongeBob SquarePants (Carter, 2010). [4] We study humans after all, and as you will discover in the following chapters of this textbook, we are trained to utilize a variety of scientific data-collection techniques to understand patterns of human beliefs and behaviors. Using these techniques, we could find out how many people in the United States find SpongeBob morally reprehensible, but we could never learn, empirically, whether SpongeBob is in fact morally reprehensible.

Let’s consider an example from a recent MSW research class I taught. A student group wanted to research the penalties for sexual assault. Their original research question was: “How can prison sentences for sexual assault be so much lower than the penalty for drug possession?” Outside of the research context, that is a darn good question! It speaks to how the War on Drugs and the patriarchy have distorted the criminal justice system towards policing of drug crimes over gender-based violence.

Unfortunately, it is an ethical question, not an empirical one. To answer that question, you would have to draw on philosophy and morality, answering what it is about human nature and society that allows such unjust outcomes. However, you could not answer that question by gathering data about people in the real world. If I asked people that question, they would likely give me their opinions about drugs, gender-based violence, and the criminal justice system. But I wouldn’t get the real answer about why our society tolerates such an imbalance in punishment.

As the students worked on the project through the semester, they continued to focus on the topic of sexual assault in the criminal justice system. Their research question became more empirical because they read more empirical articles about their topic. One option that they considered was to evaluate intervention programs for perpetrators of sexual assault to see if they reduced the likelihood of committing sexual assault again. Another option they considered was seeing if counties or states with higher than average jail sentences for sexual assault perpetrators had lower rates of re-offense for sexual assault. These projects addressed the ethical question of punishing perpetrators of sexual violence but did so in a way that gathered and analyzed empirical real-world data. Our job as social work researchers is to gather social facts about social work issues, not to judge or determine morality.

Key Takeaways

• Empirical questions are distinct from ethical questions.
• There are usually a number of ethical questions and a number of empirical questions that could be asked about any single topic.
• While social workers may research topics about which people have moral opinions, a researcher’s job is to gather and analyze empirical data.
• Take a look at your working question. Make sure you have an empirical question, not an ethical one. To perform this check, describe how you could find an answer to your question by conducting a study, like a survey or focus group, with real people.

9.2 Characteristics of a good research question

• Identify and explain the key features of a good research question
• Explain why it is important for social workers to be focused and clear with the language they use in their research questions

Now that you’ve made sure your working question is empirical, you need to revise that working question into a formal research question. So, what makes a good research question? First, it is generally written in the form of a question. To say that your research question is “the opioid epidemic” or “animal assisted therapy” or “oppression” would not be correct. You need to frame your topic as a question, not a statement. A good research question is also one that is well-focused. A well-focused question helps you tune out irrelevant information and not try to answer everything about the world all at once. You could be the most eloquent writer in your class, or even in the world, but if the research question about which you are writing is unclear, your work will ultimately lack direction.

In addition to being written in the form of a question and being well-focused, a good research question is one that cannot be answered with a simple yes or no. For example, if your interest is in gender norms, you could ask, “Does gender affect a person’s performance of household tasks?” but you will have nothing left to say once you discover your yes or no answer. Instead, why not ask, about the relationship between gender and household tasks. Alternatively, maybe we are interested in how or to what extent gender affects a person’s contributions to housework in a marriage? By tweaking your question in this small way, you suddenly have a much more fascinating question and more to say as you attempt to answer it.

A good research question should also have more than one plausible answer. In the example above, the student who studied the relationship between gender and household tasks had a specific interest in the impact of gender, but she also knew that preferences might be impacted by other factors. For example, she knew from her own experience that her more traditional and socially conservative friends were more likely to see household tasks as part of the female domain, and were less likely to expect their male partners to contribute to those tasks. Thinking through the possible relationships between gender, culture, and household tasks led that student to realize that there were many plausible answers to her questions about how  gender affects a person’s contribution to household tasks. Because gender doesn’t exist in a vacuum, she wisely felt that she needed to consider other characteristics that work together with gender to shape people’s behaviors, likes, and dislikes. By doing this, the student considered the third feature of a good research question–she thought about relationships between several concepts. While she began with an interest in a single concept—household tasks—by asking herself what other concepts (such as gender or political orientation) might be related to her original interest, she was able to form a question that considered the relationships  among  those concepts.

This student had one final component to consider. Social work research questions must contain a target population. Her study would be very different if she were to conduct it on older adults or immigrants who just arrived in a new country. The target population is the group of people whose needs your study addresses. Maybe the student noticed issues with household tasks as part of her social work practice with first-generation immigrants, and so she made it her target population. Maybe she wants to address the needs of another community. Whatever the case, the target population should be chosen while keeping in mind social work’s responsibility to work on behalf of marginalized and oppressed groups.

In sum, a good research question generally has the following features:

• It is written in the form of a question
• It is clearly written
• It cannot be answered with “yes” or “no”
• It has more than one plausible answer
• It considers relationships among multiple variables
• It is specific and clear about the concepts it addresses
• It includes a target population
• A poorly focused research question can lead to the demise of an otherwise well-executed study.
• Research questions should be clearly worded, consider relationships between multiple variables, have more than one plausible answer, and address the needs of a target population.

Okay, it’s time to write out your first draft of a research question.

• Once you’ve done so, take a look at the checklist in this chapter and see if your research question meets the criteria to be a good one.

Brainstorm whether your research question might be better suited to quantitative or qualitative methods.

• Describe why your question fits better with quantitative or qualitative methods.
• Provide an alternative research question that fits with the other type of research method.

9.3 Quantitative research questions

• Describe how research questions for exploratory, descriptive, and explanatory quantitative questions differ and how to phrase them
• Identify the differences between and provide examples of strong and weak explanatory research questions

Quantitative descriptive questions

The type of research you are conducting will impact the research question that you ask. Probably the easiest questions to think of are quantitative descriptive questions. For example, “What is the average student debt load of MSW students?” is a descriptive question—and an important one. We aren’t trying to build a causal relationship here. We’re simply trying to describe how much debt MSW students carry. Quantitative descriptive questions like this one are helpful in social work practice as part of community scans, in which human service agencies survey the various needs of the community they serve. If the scan reveals that the community requires more services related to housing, child care, or day treatment for people with disabilities, a nonprofit office can use the community scan to create new programs that meet a defined community need.

Quantitative descriptive questions will often ask for percentage, count the number of instances of a phenomenon, or determine an average. Descriptive questions may only include one variable, such as ours about student debt load, or they may include multiple variables. Because these are descriptive questions, our purpose is not to investigate causal relationships between variables. To do that, we need to use a quantitative explanatory question.

Quantitative explanatory questions

Most studies you read in the academic literature will be quantitative and explanatory. Why is that? If you recall from Chapter 2 , explanatory research tries to build nomothetic causal relationships. They are generalizable across space and time, so they are applicable to a wide audience. The editorial board of a journal wants to make sure their content will be useful to as many people as possible, so it’s not surprising that quantitative research dominates the academic literature.

Structurally, quantitative explanatory questions must contain an independent variable and dependent variable. Questions should ask about the relationship between these variables. The standard format I was taught in graduate school for an explanatory quantitative research question is: “What is the relationship between [independent variable] and [dependent variable] for [target population]?” You should play with the wording for your research question, revising that standard format to match what you really want to know about your topic.

Let’s take a look at a few more examples of possible research questions and consider the relative strengths and weaknesses of each. Table 9.1 does just that. While reading the table, keep in mind that I have only noted what I view to be the most relevant strengths and weaknesses of each question. Certainly each question may have additional strengths and weaknesses not noted in the table. Each of these questions is drawn from student projects in my research methods classes and reflects the work of many students on their research question over many weeks.

Making it more specific

A good research question should also be specific and clear about the concepts it addresses. A student investigating gender and household tasks knows what they mean by “household tasks.” You likely also have an impression of what “household tasks” means. But are your definition and the student’s definition the same? A participant in their study may think that managing finances and performing home maintenance are household tasks, but the researcher may be interested in other tasks like childcare or cleaning. The only way to ensure your study stays focused and clear is to be specific about what you mean by a concept. The student in our example could pick a specific household task that was interesting to them or that the literature indicated was important—for example, childcare. Or, the student could have a broader view of household tasks, one that encompasses childcare, food preparation, financial management, home repair, and care for relatives. Any option is probably okay, as long as the researcher is clear on what they mean by “household tasks.” Clarifying these distinctions is important as we look ahead to specifying how your variables will be measured in Chapter 11 .

Table 9.2 contains some “watch words” that indicate you may need to be more specific about the concepts in your research question.

It can be challenging to be this specific in social work research, particularly when you are just starting out your project and still reading the literature. If you’ve only read one or two articles on your topic, it can be hard to know what you are interested in studying. Broad questions like “What are the causes of chronic homelessness, and what can be done to prevent it?” are common at the beginning stages of a research project as working questions. However, moving from working questions to research questions in your research proposal requires that you examine the literature on the topic and refine your question over time to be more specific and clear. Perhaps you want to study the effect of a specific anti-homelessness program that you found in the literature. Maybe there is a particular model to fighting homelessness, like Housing First or transitional housing, that you want to investigate further. You may want to focus on a potential cause of homelessness such as LGBTQ+ discrimination that you find interesting or relevant to your practice. As you can see, the possibilities for making your question more specific are almost infinite.

Quantitative exploratory questions

In exploratory research, the researcher doesn’t quite know the lay of the land yet. If someone is proposing to conduct an exploratory quantitative project, the watch words highlighted in Table 9.2 are not problematic at all. In fact, questions such as “What factors influence the removal of children in child welfare cases?” are good because they will explore a variety of factors or causes. In this question, the independent variable is less clearly written, but the dependent variable, family preservation outcomes, is quite clearly written. The inverse can also be true. If we were to ask, “What outcomes are associated with family preservation services in child welfare?”, we would have a clear independent variable, family preservation services, but an unclear dependent variable, outcomes. Because we are only conducting exploratory research on a topic, we may not have an idea of what concepts may comprise our “outcomes” or “factors.” Only after interacting with our participants will we be able to understand which concepts are important.

Remember that exploratory research is appropriate only when the researcher does not know much about topic because there is very little scholarly research. In our examples above, there is extensive literature on the outcomes in family reunification programs and risk factors for child removal in child welfare. Make sure you’ve done a thorough literature review to ensure there is little relevant research to guide you towards a more explanatory question.

• Descriptive quantitative research questions are helpful for community scans but cannot investigate causal relationships between variables.
• Explanatory quantitative research questions must include an independent and dependent variable.
• Exploratory quantitative research questions should only be considered when there is very little previous research on your topic.
• Identify the type of research you are engaged in (descriptive, explanatory, or exploratory).
• Create a quantitative research question for your project that matches with the type of research you are engaged in.

Preferably, you should be creating an explanatory research question for quantitative research.

9.4 Qualitative research questions

• List the key terms associated with qualitative research questions
• Distinguish between qualitative and quantitative research questions

Qualitative research questions differ from quantitative research questions. Because qualitative research questions seek to explore or describe phenomena, not provide a neat nomothetic explanation, they are often more general and openly worded. They may include only one concept, though many include more than one. Instead of asking how one variable causes changes in another, we are instead trying to understand the experiences ,  understandings , and  meanings that people have about the concepts in our research question. These keywords often make an appearance in qualitative research questions.

Let’s work through an example from our last section. In Table 9.1, a student asked, “What is the relationship between sexual orientation or gender identity and homelessness for late adolescents in foster care?” In this question, it is pretty clear that the student believes that adolescents in foster care who identify as LGBTQ+ may be at greater risk for homelessness. This is a nomothetic causal relationship—LGBTQ+ status causes changes in homelessness.

However, what if the student were less interested in  predicting  homelessness based on LGBTQ+ status and more interested in  understanding  the stories of foster care youth who identify as LGBTQ+ and may be at risk for homelessness? In that case, the researcher would be building an idiographic causal explanation . The youths whom the researcher interviews may share stories of how their foster families, caseworkers, and others treated them. They may share stories about how they thought of their own sexuality or gender identity and how it changed over time. They may have different ideas about what it means to transition out of foster care.

Because qualitative questions usually center on idiographic causal relationships, they look different than quantitative questions. Table 9.3 below takes the final research questions from Table 9.1 and adapts them for qualitative research. The guidelines for research questions previously described in this chapter still apply, but there are some new elements to qualitative research questions that are not present in quantitative questions.

• Qualitative research questions often ask about lived experience, personal experience, understanding, meaning, and stories.
• Qualitative research questions may be more general and less specific.
• Qualitative research questions may also contain only one variable, rather than asking about relationships between multiple variables.

Qualitative research questions have one final feature that distinguishes them from quantitative research questions: they can change over the course of a study. Qualitative research is a reflexive process, one in which the researcher adapts their approach based on what participants say and do. The researcher must constantly evaluate whether their question is important and relevant to the participants. As the researcher gains information from participants, it is normal for the focus of the inquiry to shift.

For example, a qualitative researcher may want to study how a new truancy rule impacts youth at risk of expulsion. However, after interviewing some of the youth in their community, a researcher might find that the rule is actually irrelevant to their behavior and thoughts. Instead, their participants will direct the discussion to their frustration with the school administrators or the lack of job opportunities in the area. This is a natural part of qualitative research, and it is normal for research questions and hypothesis to evolve based on information gleaned from participants.

However, this reflexivity and openness unacceptable in quantitative research for good reasons. Researchers using quantitative methods are testing a hypothesis, and if they could revise that hypothesis to match what they found, they could never be wrong! Indeed, an important component of open science and reproducability is the preregistration of a researcher’s hypotheses and data analysis plan in a central repository that can be verified and replicated by reviewers and other researchers. This interactive graphic from 538 shows how an unscrupulous research could come up with a hypothesis and theoretical explanation  after collecting data by hunting for a combination of factors that results in a statistically significant relationship. This is an excellent example of how the positivist assumptions behind quantitative research and intepretivist assumptions behind qualitative research result in different approaches to social science.

• Qualitative research questions often contain words or phrases like “lived experience,” “personal experience,” “understanding,” “meaning,” and “stories.”
• Qualitative research questions can change and evolve over the course of the study.
• Using the guidance in this chapter, write a qualitative research question. You may want to use some of the keywords mentioned above.

9.5 Evaluating and updating your research questions

• Evaluate the feasibility and importance of your research questions
• Begin to match your research questions to specific designs that determine what the participants in your study will do

Feasibility and importance

As you are getting ready to finalize your research question and move into designing your research study, it is important to check whether your research question is feasible for you to answer and what importance your results will have in the community, among your participants, and in the scientific literature

Key questions to consider when evaluating your question’s feasibility include:

• Do you have access to the data you need?
• Will you be able to get consent from stakeholders, gatekeepers, and others?
• Does your project pose risk to individuals through direct harm, dual relationships, or breaches in confidentiality? (see Chapter 6 for more ethical considerations)
• Are you competent enough to complete the study?
• Do you have the resources and time needed to carry out the project?

Key questions to consider when evaluating the importance of your question include:

• Can we answer your research question simply by looking at the literature on your topic?
• How does your question add something new to the scholarly literature? (raises a new issue, addresses a controversy, studies a new population, etc.)
• How will your target population benefit, once you answer your research question?
• How will the community, social work practice, and the broader social world benefit, once you answer your research question?
• Using the questions above, check whether you think your project is feasible for you to complete, given the constrains that student projects face.
• Realistically, explore the potential impact of your project on the community and in the scientific literature. Make sure your question cannot be answered by simply reading more about your topic.

Matching your research question and study design

This chapter described how to create a good quantitative and qualitative research question. In Parts 3 and 4 of this textbook, we will detail some of the basic designs like surveys and interviews that social scientists use to answer their research questions. But which design should you choose?

As with most things, it all depends on your research question. If your research question involves, for example, testing a new intervention, you will likely want to use an experimental design. On the other hand, if you want to know the lived experience of people in a public housing building, you probably want to use an interview or focus group design.

We will learn more about each one of these designs in the remainder of this textbook. We will also learn about using data that already exists, studying an individual client inside clinical practice, and evaluating programs, which are other examples of designs. Below is a list of designs we will cover in this textbook:

• Surveys: online, phone, mail, in-person
• Experiments: classic, pre-experiments, quasi-experiments
• Interviews: in-person or via phone or videoconference
• Focus groups: in-person or via videoconference
• Content analysis of existing data
• Secondary data analysis of another researcher’s data
• Program evaluation

The design of your research study determines what you and your participants will do. In an experiment, for example, the researcher will introduce a stimulus or treatment to participants and measure their responses. In contrast, a content analysis may not have participants at all, and the researcher may simply read the marketing materials for a corporation or look at a politician’s speeches to conduct the data analysis for the study.

I imagine that a content analysis probably seems easier to accomplish than an experiment. However, as a researcher, you have to choose a research design that makes sense for your question and that is feasible to complete with the resources you have. All research projects require some resources to accomplish. Make sure your design is one you can carry out with the resources (time, money, staff, etc.) that you have.

There are so many different designs that exist in the social science literature that it would be impossible to include them all in this textbook. The purpose of the subsequent chapters is to help you understand the basic designs upon which these more advanced designs are built. As you learn more about research design, you will likely find yourself revising your research question to make sure it fits with the design. At the same time, your research question as it exists now should influence the design you end up choosing. There is no set order in which these should happen. Instead, your research project should be guided by whether you can feasibly carry it out and contribute new and important knowledge to the world.

• Research questions must be feasible and important.
• Research questions must match study design.
• Based on what you know about designs like surveys, experiments, and interviews, describe how you might use one of them to answer your research question.
• You may want to refer back to Chapter 2 which discusses how to get raw data about your topic and the common designs used in student research projects.
• Not familiar with SpongeBob SquarePants? You can learn more about him on Nickelodeon’s site dedicated to all things SpongeBob:  http://www.nick.com/spongebob-squarepants/ ↵
• Focus on the Family. (2005, January 26). Focus on SpongeBob.  Christianity Today . Retrieved from  http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2005/januaryweb-only/34.0c.html ↵
• BBC News. (2005, January 20). US right attacks SpongeBob video. Retrieved from:  http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4190699.stm ↵
• In fact, an MA thesis examines representations of gender and relationships in the cartoon: Carter, A. C. (2010).  Constructing gender and   relationships in “SpongeBob SquarePants”: Who lives in a pineapple under the sea . MA thesis, Department of Communication, University of South Alabama, Mobile, AL. ↵

research questions that can be answered by systematically observing the real world

unsuitable research questions which are not answerable by systematic observation of the real world but instead rely on moral or philosophical opinions

the group of people whose needs your study addresses

attempts to explain or describe your phenomenon exhaustively, based on the subjective understandings of your participants

"Assuming that the null hypothesis is true and the study is repeated an infinite number times by drawing random samples from the same populations(s), less than 5% of these results will be more extreme than the current result" (Cassidy et al., 2019, p. 233).

whether you can practically and ethically complete the research project you propose

the impact your study will have on participants, communities, scientific knowledge, and social justice

Graduate research methods in social work Copyright © 2021 by Matthew DeCarlo, Cory Cummings, Kate Agnelli is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Practice-Based Research in Social Work: A Guide for Reluctant Researchers

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Cheryl Simmill-Binning, Practice-Based Research in Social Work: A Guide for Reluctant Researchers, The British Journal of Social Work , Volume 43, Issue 1, February 2013, Pages 197–199, https://doi.org/10.1093/bjsw/bcs203

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Research, it is said, is rarely high on the agenda of social workers. However, during my time working alongside practitioners, I have learnt that invariably they ask the right questions and hold many of the skills to seek successful solutions. With the guidance of this new volume, most practitioners could undertake research, especially if they sought to develop practice-based research (PBR). PRB places practitioners at the heart of the research examining questions that ‘emerge from practice in ways that inform practice’ (p. 5). This has to be a good thing in an era when social workers are urged to be a thinking practitioner as proposed by the Social Work Task Force (2009) and the Munro Review (2012). We should be supporting, enabling and encouraging social workers to see research as ‘the norm’, not as the ‘add-on’ it has become.

By engaging with Dodd and Epstein, the social worker's research fears should melt away. The authors lay bare the research ‘paradigm wars’; they discuss the concept of ‘gold standard’ research and the associated randomised control trials, which, for a newcomer to the field, can appear overwhelming in their demands. In its place, the authors present a manageable research process that values practitioner knowledge and introduces a systematic approach to achievable research.

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Social Work Research Guide: The Research Process

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Step by Step through the Research Process

• What is the history of the issue? How have events affected it? • What are the arguments that recur? • Which areas of study (e.g., psychology, popular culture studies, religion, science, etc.) have addressed the topic? • Who are the major players? People? Countries? Corporations? • Which terms, combined with the major search terms you've already used, lead you to more detail?

Places to look for background research:  Newspapers, Encyclopedias, and the Web

• How can I distill the issues and their questions into one- or two-word concepts? Are there significant recurring terms or phrases? • What basic subjects do the authors confront? Pharmaceuticals? Government? Law? Health? • For the length of my paper, how many subjects is it reasonable to address?

So, we must break down our research question into concepts and representative terminology in order to find the best information. As you do this for your own research purposes, keep in mind that academic research databases do not behave like Google, Yahoo, or any other open-web search engine. We must learn a different way to search, specifically using Boolean operators.  You will most likely use the three most common Boolean operators: AND, OR, and NOT.  Here is more information on search strategies including  Boolean Operators and Truncation . 

• Have I found enough information to inform or support the explanations/assertions/claims that I have made? • Has the abundance of information provided me with a new direction for my research question(s)? • Have I found that my initial claims are unfounded and need to change direction and approach?

• Is there a straightforward answer to my question(s)? • If not, how can I “read between the lines” and piece together information from various sources to construct an answer? • Can I develop a strategy of support from the materials I have decided to use? • Can I paraphrase general ideas and statements (more than I use direct quotes), which shows I understand each author’s conversation with me? • Can I outline my approach in an organized and logical way?

When you do work through drafting, revising, and editing, don’t forget that you must cite your sources, both in-text and on a references or works cited page.  RefWorks can help you immensely. If you follow the suggestion to keep a running bibliography as you collected sources, this part is super easy. 

Here's another extremely compelling reason to use RefWorks and other documentation guides your instructor or a librarian may recommend: you don’t want to find yourself in a position, intentionally or unintentionally, in which you have to defend yourself against claims of plagiarism. 

Fanning, D.L. (2012). Research and stuff: Tools and strategies for the beginning academic researcher. In C.T. Jordan (Ed.), Open 2010: A composition textbook for WRTG 2010 at the University of Utah . Salt Lake City, UT: University Writing Program, University of Utah. 

• Start with a  specific  topic & broaden or narrow as necessary
• Use different words/synonyms  to describe your topic (different finding tools may use different words/phrases to describe your topic)
• Keep a list of keywords and phrases used in each database. When possible, print a copy of your  search history  from each database
• Check the database  thesaurus  or subject terms to find the terms peculiar to that database
• Search by  keyword
• Use quotation marks " " for a specific phrase: "literature review"
• Truncate  your search term (famil* finds family, families, familial)
• Use Boolean operators ( AND ,  OR ) to combine concepts
• Limit  sources by format and material type
• Use  subjects assigned  to one source to find other sources
• Use the  references  at the end of an article to find other articles
• Use the term “Literature Reviews” combined with your topic
• Export the bliographic information for your resources to  RefWorks
• Keep a list of the databases you search.  Use the Research Log below.
• Research Log Use this log to keep track of the keywords, databases and results of your research.
• Research Log Use this log to keep track of your database searches.
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Module 4 Chapter 1: Working With Qualitative Data

Prior modules introduced qualitative approaches and methods for study design and data collection. You learned that exploratory and descriptive research questions are often addressed using qualitative methodologies—naturalistic observation, interview, focus group, social network, GIS, or open-ended survey data, to name a few. Qualitative studies do not necessarily test hypotheses about the data (although they can test hypotheses generated by prior theory (Glaser & Struss, 1967). Qualitative studies often use data to develop an understanding of social work problems, social phenomena, or diverse populations. The focus of this chapter is on what investigators do with the collected qualitative data to begin answering their research questions.

In this chapter you will learn about:

• moving from qualitative data collection to data preparation;
• coding qualitative data.

Qualitative Data Preparation

Investigators engaged in qualitative research are careful to collect data in a manner that preserves, to the closest possible degree, the specific wording and context or what their study participants share. Technology tools can assist in capturing participants’ statements verbatim . For example, digital audio or video recording is possible with small, portable recorders, cell phones, or dictation devices. Digital recording is preferable to recordings based on “tapes” because they are more durable and less vulnerable to accidental destruction. Furthermore, digital software exists to help transcribe these recordings into written text (more about this later). The entire process of data collection and preparation (recording and transcription ) needs to be approved by the institutional review board (IRB) for human subject participation and consented to by the study participants.

However, seasoned investigators do not rely on technology alone. There exist many painful stories concerning data lost through technology failures: not picking up the narrative in the first place because microphones or cameras were not sufficiently sensitive or were improperly placed, batteries running out, or damaged recording devices; and, including accidentally erased recordings or other epic failures. Audio and video recordings are usually supplemented with field notes —these are written (or typed) either by the person conducting the observation, interview, or focus group, or by a collaborating observer/recorder. It is difficult to effectively play both roles, interviewer and recorder, and maintain strong interview rapport with participants; engaging a collaborator as recorder/note-taker is well-advised.

There exists another, important reason for these field notes: they contribute rich descriptive detail about the context of statements made, supplementing the recorded and transcribed participant statements, infusing the record with greater meaning. For example, field notes can clarify who was the speaker when recorded voices sound similar. And, the notes can describe changes in body language, long pauses, facial expressions, making or losing eye contact, or other events that can help investigators interpret meaning from the context  of what is said.

To demonstrate, consider an early study of children’s emerging sibling relationships (Nadelman & Begun, 1982). The investigators engaged firstborn preschool aged children (2 ½ to 5 years old) from families expecting their second baby in projective  doll play, a structured format for observational data. Each of the children, in their own homes, were introduced to the standardized, portable doll house and doll family (parents, child, and baby matching their own race and family composition). What the child said was audio-recorded throughout the doll play session. The investigator also kept field notes describing each child’s behavior with the dolls with comments made every 30 seconds. These field notes were particularly helpful in understanding child utterances, since the children’s language skills were emerging. The notes also explained long silences that occurred when children, upon discovering the toy toilet, ran off to the potty themselves—potty training was an active part of the children’s reality at this age, and a reminder to go was often triggered by play with the toy toilet. Field notes also helped when the doll play sessions were repeated after the birth of the younger sibling. The children often ran to the baby when playing with the doll baby, and the investigators had notes characterizing a child’s touching, eye contact, and other interactions with the real baby brother or sister. Combining these different types of qualitative data allowed investigators to develop a rich description of emerging sibling relationships that extended far beyond the preexisting ‘sibling rivalry’ paradigm.

Qualitative Data Transcription . Investigators may choose to work with observational data in real time— coding observed behaviors as they occur. For the sake of reliable and verifiable data, however, they often choose to work from recordings. One challenge with recordings is the necessity to replay them, over and over, to analyze the data. Instead, investigators often choose to work from transcripts of the recorded interview, focus group, or observation sessions; reading the transcript is often faster than repeatedly rewinding and replaying content for coding purposes. As previously noted, however, some of the rich context may be lost in translation from audio or video recording to written transcription.

Data transcription is time consuming. Transcribing a one-hour interview could require four or more hours of transcription time—assuming the recording is clear and easy to interpret and there is only one person speaking. It could require upwards of ten hours in real time to transcribe a one-hour group interview (a family with multiple members or a focus group, for example). Digital transcription software can help (e.g., Dragon Speak®) but often introduces inaccuracies, necessitating a great deal of time re-checking the transcription to be certain of its accuracy. These software packages MAY have contractual agreements that violate research standards for confidentiality and data security—reading the fine print before clicking on “ACCEPT” is critical, especially for “free” transcription software packages. Investigators need to consider the relative cost of their own time, the time and experience of study team members, or professional transcription (e.g., ranges $1 to $5 per minute across several websites visited in August, 2018). Furthermore, transcription services need to be approved by the institutional review board (IRB) when a study involving human participants is proposed, and participant consent is required, as well.

• How accurately did you record the children’s vocalizations?

Replay the video again, this time both watching and listening. Compare your audio transcription to what you see and hear–the seeing being a context for what you hear.

• How accurately did your audio transcription reflect what happened—the children’s vocalizations and the context?
• How much meaning do you think you lost without tone of voice and body language/gestures?
• What do you think would improve the quality of the data you transcribed, moving from the video to the written word?

Qualitative Data Coding

“aims to make sense of and give meaning to the data collected. In general, the process of qualitative data analysis involves the identification and organization of themes or patterns from the words, text, and narratives obtained in the data collection” (Corcoran & Secret, 2013, p. 166).

• These programs do not DO the analysis, they support the investigator doing analyses—remember, the investigator is the “tool” for determining themes and codes.
• Some programs only assist with text data, others assist with analysis of images and other forms of data, as well (e.g., Dedoose®).
• Cloud-based programs and some free packages may have practices that violate data confidentiality or security requirements established by an institutional review board (IRB).

Coding and Coding Confirmation

As previously noted, an investigator may approach qualitative data with a pre-established list of categories that are applied to the data—deductive or  a priori coding. The investigator applies the predetermined coding categories with the data in terms of whether each them appears or, possibly, how frequently the theme appears (depending on the research question). For example, investigators were interested in exploring the nature and extent of personal information shared by adolescents in the MySpace social networking site (Hinduja & Patchin, 2008). The study addressed a widespread concern that individuals were providing information that left them vulnerable to sexual predators. The team began with an a priori coding scheme for the type of information youth publicly post: they conducted a content analysis with a randomly sampled set of 9,282 MySpace profile pages. The coding included first name, full name, birth date, telephone number, address or city/state of residence, school attended, email address, instant messaging screen name, pictures, pictures in swimsuit or underwear, and evidence of alcohol/other substance use. In terms of identification, over 38% of pages sampled provided the adolescent’s first name, almost 9% provided a full name, over 81% provided a city of residence, and almost 28% referenced their school. Furthermore, almost 57% of sampled profiles included a photograph, and over 15% had a friend’s photograph in a swimsuit or underwear, while slightly over 5% had a photograph of themselves in swimsuit/underwear; over 18% presented evidence of alcohol use, 7.5% tobacco use, and 1.7% marijuana use. About 40% of youth set access to “private,” meaning that the other 60% of profiles were potentially viewable by anyone. While single pieces of information alone might not lead to identifying an individual, in combination (especially with pictures included) information shared makes identification and/or personal contact possible. Since this research was completed, public education about safer Internet use may have had an impact on individuals’ posting patterns, and organizations have introduced security measures that may reduce vulnerability. However, concern remains that individuals, including adolescents, are vulnerable to predators or exploitation based on what is shared across public domains of the Internet.

Open Coding.  In contrast, when investigators approach qualitative data without predetermined or preconceived ideas about categories and themes present in participants’ responses, they engage in open coding (an inductive process). This is the foundation of the qualitative approach called grounded theory. Open coding was defined by Rubin and Babbie (2013) as:

A qualitative data processing method in which, instead of starting out with a list of code categories derived from theory, one develops code categories through close examination of qualitative data” (p. 337).

Accompanying the investigators’ description of the resulting coding categories is a set of memos, notes, or journaling entries that depict what the investigator was thinking in making these coding decisions. This information helps guide others in how the results emerged to provide transparency and replicability. While qualitative research is science and results in empirical evidence, performing it well can be compared to the art of dance (Engel & Schutt, 2018). This is because it requires the investigator to maintain a state of openness in interpreting the variety of ideas shared by participants while concurrently maintaining objectivity in applying the methods and a subjective awareness and reflection about the dynamic processes by which themes and categories emerge.

For example, investigators reported on a study that utilized grounded theory methods to explore the ways that transgender persons are depicted in the media (McInroy & Craig, 2015). They conducted in-depth, semi-structured interviews of several hours length with 19 young adults who self-identify as LGBTQ persons. The interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed; coding of each interview was conducted by three separate coders. The investigators found, first of all, that participants described their experiences with offline media (e.g., television and movies) differently from their experiences with online media (e.g., websites and social media). Transphobic representations (negative reactions or opinions concerning transgender persons) emerged from the thematic coding as an issue with offline media more significantly than issues of homophobia (negative reactions of opinions concerning gay, lesbian, or bisexual persons). The participants also expressed that offline media exhibits very little in the way of positive representations of transgender people; this was experienced as a contrast with more positive representations of LGBTQ persons. The participants also experienced transphobia to a greater extent in the online environment, possibly because of the anonymity allowed in this environment. On the other hand, the online environment offered greater numbers and range of supportive, helpful options for transgender youth. The study authors shared a large number of verbatim quotes from their study participants to demonstrate the coding categories that emerged from the data.

Cross-Checking Coding Decisions

• data collection
• managing and organizing the data
• reading and making memo notes about emergent ideas (initial analysis)
• describing and classifying codes into themes (data reduction)
• developing interpretations (including how themes relate to one another, how they are distinct)
• assessing interpretations (how themes/interpretations hold up in other examples, how well other investigators and study participants agree with interpretations)
• representing and visualizing the data
• presenting an account of the findings.

Take a moment to complete the following activity.

Chapter Summary

In this chapter, you were introduced to general concepts and issues involved in managing and analyzing qualitative data. There exist excellent textbooks and online demonstrations for learning to master these skills. This content also applies to mixed methods research since many aspects of mixed methods data are qualitative.

Social Work 3401 Coursebook Copyright © by Dr. Audrey Begun is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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The link between social work research and practice

When thinking about social work, some may consider the field to solely focus on clinical interventions with individuals or groups.

There may be a mistaken impression that research is not a part of the social work profession. This is completely false. Rather, the two have been and will continue to need to be intertwined.

This guide covers why social workers should care about research, how both social work practice and social work research influence and guide each other, how to build research skills both as a student and as a professional working in the field, and the benefits of being a social worker with strong research skills. 

A selection of social work research jobs are also discussed.  

• Social workers and research
• Evidence-based practice
• Practice and research
• Research and practice
• Build research skills
• Social worker as researcher
• Benefits of research skills
• Research jobs

Why should social workers care about research?

Sometimes it may seem as though social work practice and social work research are two separate tracks running parallel to each other – they both seek to improve the lives of clients, families and communities, but they don’t interact. This is not the way it is supposed to work.

Research and practice should be intertwined, with each affecting the other and improving processes on both ends, so that it leads to better outcomes for the population we’re serving.

Section 5 of the NASW Social Work Code of Ethics is focused on social workers’ ethical responsibilities to the social work profession. There are two areas in which research is mentioned in upholding our ethical obligations: for the integrity of the profession (section 5.01) and for evaluation and research (section 5.02). 

Some of the specific guidance provided around research and social work include:

• 5.01(b): …Social workers should protect, enhance, and improve the integrity of the profession through appropriate study and research, active discussion, and responsible criticism of the profession.
• 5.01(d): Social workers should contribute to the knowledge base of social work and share with colleagues their knowledge related to practice, research, and ethics…
• 5.02(a) Social workers should monitor and evaluate policies, the implementation of programs, and practice interventions.
• 5.02(b) Social workers should promote and facilitate evaluation and research to contribute to the development of knowledge.
• 5.02(c) Social workers should critically examine and keep current with emerging knowledge relevant to social work and fully use evaluation and research evidence in their professional practice.
• 5.02(q) Social workers should educate themselves, their students, and their colleagues about responsible research practices.

Evidence-based practice and evidence-based treatment

In order to strengthen the profession and determine that the interventions we are providing are, in fact, effective, we must conduct research. When research and practice are intertwined, this leads practitioners to develop evidence-based practice (EBP) and evidence-based treatment (EBT).

Evidence-based practice is, according to The National Association of Social Workers (NASW) , a process involving creating an answerable question based on a client or organizational need, locating the best available evidence to answer the question, evaluating the quality of the evidence as well as its applicability, applying the evidence, and evaluating the effectiveness and efficiency of the solution. 

Evidence-based treatment is any practice that has been established as effective through scientific research according to a set of explicit criteria (Drake et al., 2001). These are interventions that, when applied consistently, routinely produce improved client outcomes. 

For example, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) was one of a variety of interventions for those with anxiety disorders. Researchers wondered if CBT was better than other intervention options in producing positive, consistent results for clients.

So research was conducted comparing multiple types of interventions, and the evidence (research results) demonstrated that CBT was the best intervention.

The anecdotal evidence from practice combined with research evidence determined that CBT should become the standard treatment for those diagnosed with anxiety. Now more social workers are getting trained in CBT methods in order to offer this as a treatment option to their clients.

How does social work practice affect research?

Social work practice provides the context and content for research. For example, agency staff was concerned about the lack of nutritional food in their service area, and heard from clients that it was too hard to get to a grocery store with a variety of foods, because they didn’t have transportation, or public transit took too long. 

So the agency applied for and received a grant to start a farmer’s market in their community, an urban area that was considered a food desert. This program accepted their state’s version of food stamps as a payment option for the items sold at the farmer’s market.

The agency used their passenger van to provide free transportation to and from the farmer’s market for those living more than four blocks from the market location.

The local university also had a booth each week at the market with nursing and medical students checking blood pressure and providing referrals to community agencies that could assist with medical needs. The agency was excited to improve the health of its clients by offering this program.

But how does the granting foundation know if this was a good use of their money? This is where research and evaluation comes in. Research could gather data to answer a number of questions. Here is but a small sample:

• How many community members visited each week and purchased fruits and vegetables? 
• How many took advantage of the transportation provided, and how many walked to the market? 
• How many took advantage of the blood pressure checks? Were improvements seen in those numbers for those having repeat blood pressure readings throughout the market season? 
• How much did the self-reported fruit and vegetable intake increase for customers? 
• What barriers did community members report in visiting and buying food from the market (prices too high? Inconvenient hours?)
• Do community members want the program to continue next year?
• Was the program cost-effective, or did it waste money by paying for a driver and for gasoline to offer free transportation that wasn’t utilized? What are areas where money could be saved without compromising the quality of the program?
• What else needs to be included in this program to help improve the health of community members?

How does research affect social work practice?

Research can guide practice to implement proven strategies. It can also ask the ‘what if’ or ‘how about’ questions that can open doors for new, innovative interventions to be developed (and then research the effectiveness of those interventions).

Engel and Schutt (2017) describe four categories of research used in social work:

• Descriptive research is research in which social phenomena are defined and described. A descriptive research question would be ‘How many homeless women with substance use disorder live in the metro area?’
• Exploratory research seeks to find out how people get along in the setting under question, what meanings they give to their actions, and what issues concern them. An example research question would be ‘What are the barriers to homeless women with substance use disorder receiving treatment services?’
• Explanatory research seeks to identify causes and effects of social phenomena. It can be used to rule out other explanations for findings and show how two events are related to each other.  An explanatory research question would be ‘Why do women with substance use disorder become homeless?’
• Evaluation research describes or identifies the impact of social programs and policies. This type of research question could be ‘How effective was XYZ treatment-first program that combined housing and required drug/alcohol abstinence in keeping women with substance use disorder in stable housing 2 years after the program ended?’

Each of the above types of research can answer important questions about the population, setting or intervention being provided. This can help practitioners determine which option is most effective or cost-efficient or that clients are most likely to adhere to. In turn, this data allows social workers to make informed choices on what to keep in their practice, and what needs changing. 

How to build research skills while in school

There are a number of ways to build research skills while a student.  BSW and MSW programs require a research course, but there are other ways to develop these skills beyond a single class:

• Volunteer to help a professor working in an area of interest. Professors are often excited to share their knowledge and receive extra assistance from students with similar interests.
• Participate in student research projects where you’re the subject. These are most often found in psychology departments. You can learn a lot about the informed consent process and how data is collected by volunteering as a research participant.  Many of these studies also pay a small amount, so it’s an easy way to earn a bit of extra money while you’re on campus. 
• Create an independent study research project as an elective and work with a professor who is an expert in an area you’re interested in.  You’d design a research study, collect the data, analyze it, and write a report or possibly even an article you can submit to an academic journal.
• Some practicum programs will have you complete a small evaluation project or assist with a larger research project as part of your field education hours. 
• In MSW programs, some professors hire students to conduct interviews or enter data on their funded research projects. This could be a good part time job while in school.
• Research assistant positions are more common in MSW programs, and these pay for some or all your tuition in exchange for working a set number of hours per week on a funded research project.

How to build research skills while working as a social worker

Social service agencies are often understaffed, with more projects to complete than there are people to complete them.

Taking the initiative to volunteer to survey clients about what they want and need, conduct an evaluation on a program, or seeing if there is data that has been previously collected but not analyzed and review that data and write up a report can help you stand out from your peers, be appreciated by management and other staff, and may even lead to a raise, a promotion, or even new job opportunities because of the skills you’ve developed.

Benefits of being a social worker with strong research skills

Social workers with strong research skills can have the opportunity to work on various projects, and at higher levels of responsibility. 

Many can be promoted into administration level positions after demonstrating they understand how to conduct, interpret and report research findings and apply those findings to improving the agency and their programs.

There’s also a level of confidence knowing you’re implementing proven strategies with your clients. 

Social work research jobs

There are a number of ways in which you can blend interests in social work and research. A quick search on Glassdoor.com and Indeed.com retrieved the following positions related to social work research:

• Research Coordinator on a clinical trial offering psychosocial supportive interventions and non-addictive pain treatments to minimize opioid use for pain.
• Senior Research Associate leading and overseeing research on a suite of projects offered in housing, mental health and corrections.
• Research Fellow in a school of social work
• Project Policy Analyst for large health organization
• Health Educator/Research Specialist to implement and evaluate cancer prevention and screening programs for a health department
• Research Interventionist providing Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for insomnia patients participating in a clinical trial
• Research Associate for Child Care and Early Education
• Social Services Data Researcher for an organization serving adults with disabilities.
• Director of Community Health Equity Research Programs evaluating health disparities.

No matter your population or area of interest, you’d likely be able to find a position that integrated research and social work. 

Social work practice and research are and should remain intertwined. This is the only way we can know what questions to ask about the programs and services we are providing, and ensure our interventions are effective. 

There are many opportunities to develop research skills while in school and while working in the field, and these skills can lead to some interesting positions that can make a real difference to clients, families and communities. 

Drake, R. E., Goldman, H., Leff, H. S., Lehman, A. F., Dixon, L., Mueser, K. T., et al. (2001). Implementing evidence-based practices in routine mental health service settings. Psychiatric Services, 52(2), 179-182. 

Engel, R.J., & Schutt, R.K. (2017). The Practice of Research in Social Work. Sage.

National Association of Social Workers. (n.d). Evidence Based Practice. Retrieved from: https://www.socialworkers.org/News/Research-Data/Social-Work-Policy-Research/Evidence-Based-Practice

• University of Texas Libraries
• UT Libraries

Social Work Research

• Getting Started
• Encyclopedias & Handbooks
• Evidence Based Practice
• Peer Review & Evaluation
• Reading Scholarly Articles
• Books & Dissertations
• Data and Statistics
• Film & Video
• Policy & Government Documents
• Trabajo Social
• Citing & Citation Management
• Research Funding
• Open Access
• Choosing & Assessing Journals
• Increasing Access to Your Work
• Tracking Your Impact
• Systematic Reviews
• Tests & Measures

Getting Started with Social Work Research

• Video Tutorials
• Understanding the Libraries "Basic" Search
• The Research Process
• What is a literature review?
• What is a Research Question?
• Turn a topic into a Search Strategy
• Keyword Brainstorming
• Search Tips

The search box on the library homepage provides a basic search across library holdings.  See the guide below for an explanation of how to effectively use the basic search:

• Library Search Help

As you work toward completing your research projects, remember that the research process is NOT linear. It's usually more of a circular process and there may be many times where you jump back and forth between the stages of your research. While not everyone's research process will look exactly the same, the following model can give you a better idea of how the research process often works.

Think of scholarly papers like a conversation. A paper takes a look at what people are saying on a particular topic and then adds something new to the conversation based on their own research. A literature review is how scholars get caught up on the conversation so they will know what to say or ask next.

A literature review can be just a simple summary of the sources, but it usually has an organizational pattern and combines both summary and synthesis.

A summary is a recap of the important information of the source, but a synthesis is a re-organization, or a reshuffling, of that information. It might give a new interpretation of old material or combine new with old interpretations. Or it might trace the intellectual progression of the field, including major debates.

• APA Literature Review Template Note: not yet updated for APA 7th edition

A research question is what forms and guides your literature review. It is the question that you want the literature to answer for you. A research question should be specific, focused, and concise.

To develop a research question, start with a general topic of interest to you. You'll want to do some preliminary and background research on this topic to think through what specific questions you might have.

Sample Topic: impact of social media on adolescent physical activity

Sample Research Question: Can social media serve as an effective tool for increasing physical activity among adolescents?

Need more guidance on developing your topic into a research question? Check out  this video  from the library at Northern Kentucky University.

In order to search most effectively for articles that pertain to your research topic, take a little time at the beginning of your project to plan out your search strategy.

1. Break up your topic/research question into it's primary concepts

• i.e. What impact does tobacco use have on the lung health of teenagers?
• Population - teenagers
• Problem - tobacco use
• Outcome - lung health

2. Brainstorm synonyms for your terms (see more in next tab)

• i.e. teenagers, teens, adolescents, youth, young adults, juvenile

3. Add quotation marks around exact phrases and be sure to include both singular and plural

• i.e. "young adults", "young adult"

4. Search one concept at a time using ORs to include all of your synonyms and then combine your searches with AND

• Search 1: teenagers OR teens OR adolescents OR youth OR "young adults" OR "young adult" OR juveniles
• Search 2:  tobacco OR smoking OR vaping OR cigarettes OR nicotine
• Search 3:  lung health OR "respiratory health" OR "respiratory distress" OR dyspnea OR asthma OR "pulmonary disorder" OR "pulmonary disorders" OR "pulmonary disease" OR "pulmonary diseases"

1. Save time, prepare to research!

• Break your research question into key concepts (you'll connect these in your paper to make an original argument)
• For each of these concepts, brainstorm multiple  keywords

• Try this   keyword tool  to brainstorm online and send the results to yourself.

2. Combine keywords using  AND  and  OR :

• Too many  results? Try using quotation marks around an exact phrase. Ex: "students with disabilities"
• Still too many  results? Narrow using  AND . Ex:  "students with disabilities" AND "assistive technology"
• Too few  results? Broaden using  OR . Ex: "students with disabilities" AND (campus OR college OR university OR higher education)
• Put  parentheses  around synonyms.
• The  asterisk  finds multiple endings from a root word. Ex: wom* will bring back women, woman's, wombat, etc.

3. Brush up on the  search tools  available:

• Here are  search tips for Google .
• Databases often include their own search tips. Tip: Look for a help link or a gear symbol.

Interfaces and search options vary across databases, but best practices for searching are relatively consistent across interfaces. No matter which database you choose, remember these important tips...

1) Don't search wth your topic as a single phrase!  Determine the key concepts of your topic. Then place each concept in its own search bar.  For example...

2) Use ORs to string together synonyms or related terms for core concepts...

3) Use truncation, when appropriate. Adding an * to the end of a word will catch all forms of that word. For example, teach* will return teach, teachers, teaching , etc.

4) Use proximity searches to force a relationship between two terms. This isn't always needed, but is sometimes super helpful. Completion is a common word that may come up in many context. The search below means that the word complete or completion must appear within two words of college in the article title and abstracts.

5) Look for the "peer reviewed" limit in each database. You can set this limit on the main search screen (before you search) or narrow your results after you've started your search.

6) Set date limits  as appropriate for your topic..

Writing a Research Paper

• Steps for Writing a Research Paper Step by Step instructions on how to write a research paper by the University Writing Center

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• Last Updated: May 15, 2024 3:57 PM
• URL: https://guides.lib.utexas.edu/socialwork