Linking Data (Qualitative Research Methods)

While there are many textbooks and manuals on the methodology of both quantitative and qualitative research designs, most focus chiefly on data collection rather than data analysis. Further, the literature on the interrelation of data gained from using quantitative and qualitative methods is neither extensive nor explicit about analytic procedures. Linking Data makes the case for the interrelation of data in light of recent advances in theory and in method, and describes ways in which quantitative and qualitative data can be interrelated so as to gain maximum purchase on substantive problems and research issues in social science. The book is liberally illustrated with empirical data from the authors′ work in sociological studies, political sociology, and the sociology of work and organizations. The authors are critical of the naive assumption that simply using several different methods necessarily ensures the validity of research findings. The need for a systematic approach to the assumptions made in formulating a research program and for rigor in establishing the linkage between methodology and the logic of the research design is emphasized in their discussion of multimethod research. The book is aimed at students in the social sciences, professional social researchers, and academic social scientists, particularly those involved in the growing field of training in social science research methods. It will be of interest to similar groups in associated fields such as evaluation research, behavioral sciences, and management and organizational studies. "Linking Data is a very dense text with a great deal packed into its 96 pages . . . This makes it a challenging paper for use as teaching material, to say nothing of its value in forcing practicing researchers to confront theoretical issues." --Journal of the Market Research Society

Nigel Fielding, BA (Sussex) MA (Kent) PhD (LSE), is Emeritus Professor of Sociology at the University of Surrey, a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences, and a member of the Community of Experts of the European Science Foundation, and served on the Mixed Methods Research Association’s presidential task force on the future of mixed methods.

His interests in research methodology include mixed methods, socio-spatial methods, qualitative software, interview methods, field observation, and digitally-mediated fieldwork. Nigel has authored/edited 27 books, many in research methodology, including The SAGE Handbook of Online Research Methods, Sage, 2018 (second edition), with Grant Blank and Ray Lee.

Jane Fielding gained her DPhil in Biochemistry in 1976 to be followed by postdoctoral fellowships at Queen Elizabeth College and Imperial College, University of London. She joined Surrey University in 1981 as a researcher on several part-time contracts in the departments of Sociology, Psychology and Human Biology. In 1984 she was appointed as the Departmental Research Fellow and has been involved with the teaching of computing and quantitative methods since that time. In 1994 she took up her current lectureship in quantitative methods and was promoted to Senior Lecturer in 2001.