Posts tagged as:

anthropology

The essence of qualitative research: “verstehen”

by Sam Ladner on October 15, 2009 · 13 comments

“But how many people did you talk to?” If you’ve ever done qualitative research, you’ve heard that question at least once. And the first time? You were flummoxed. In 3 short minutes, you can be assured that will never happen again.
Folks, qualitative research does not worry about numbers of people; it worries about deep understanding. [...]

13 comments

Tagged as: anthropology, linkedin, organizations, qualitative, qualitative research, quantitative, quantitative research, sample size, sociology, thick description, verstehen

Organizational culture 101: a practical how-to for designers

by Sam Ladner on September 8, 2009 · 0 comments

in anthropology, culture, facebook, interaction design, product design, qualitative research, sociology, technology design

My article on understanding organizational culture is now up on the interaction design site, Johnny Holland. The post provides an overview of key factors in organizational culture and how these factors affect an organization’s culture. It’s specifically intended to help designers understand their clients’ business culture and to avoid the all-too-common trap of “missing the [...]

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Tagged as: anthropology, culture, design, innovation, interaction design, linkedin, organizations, user experience, value orientation model

Categories: anthropology · culture · facebook · interaction design · product design · qualitative research · sociology · technology design

Open-access anthropology (and sociology): opening social research

by Sam Ladner on April 30, 2009 · 0 comments

in anthropology, sociology

May 1st is Open-Access Anthropology day. My contribution to this day:
It� is well past time to knock down the closed walls of the Ivory Tower.

Years ago, I worked on a project called The Public Knowledge Project. The principal investigator, Dr. John Willinsky, was actually a professor of literacy (and a distinguished one at that). John [...]

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Tagged as: anthropology, linkedin, open access, open source, scholarly publishing, scholarship, sociology

Categories: anthropology · sociology

#TOEthno: is Twitter a "place"?

by Sam Ladner on January 4, 2009 · 0 comments

in design, ethnography, product design, qualitative research, social media, technology design, user experience

I’m currently forming research questions for an ethnography of Toronto-based technology and design workers. I am working through this question: is Twitter a “place”?
In her 2000 book Virtual Ethnography, Christine Hine argues that there are two analytic strategies to see “cyberspace.” First, one can view it as a “place,” where social norms emerge. Or second, [...]

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Tagged as: anthropology, design, design reseach, ethnography, product design, twitter, user experience

Categories: design · ethnography · product design · qualitative research · social media · technology design · user experience

Qualitative versus quantitative research, Part II

by Sam Ladner on October 8, 2008 · 0 comments

in Research Methods, qualitative research, quantitative research

Thousands of people arrive at this blog wanting to know what is the difference between qualitative and quantitative research. Qualitative versus quantitative research is by far the most popular post on this blog. In that first post, I explained why sample size doesn’t matter in qualitative research. In this post, I explain why qualitative research [...]

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Tagged as: anthropology, design, linkedin, qualitative research, quantitative research, research design, sample size

Categories: Research Methods · qualitative research · quantitative research

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