Systematic Data Collection

The message of this concise volume is that data collection in the field whether by interviewing or other methods can be carried out in a structured systematic and scientific way. This volume compels field researchers to take very seriously not only what they hear but what they ask. Ethnographers have often discovered too late that the value of their interview information is discounted as a consequence of poor sampling (of both questions and informants) and poor elicitation techniques a very pragmatic fashion Weller and Romney outline a wealth of structured data collection methods for field workers; these methods are both oral for use with non-literate populations and written for use in the most sophisticated survey research.Firstly the authors focus on the importance of establishing the right questions to ask through the use of free listing techniques; then they describe in practical terms the administration of an impressive array of alternative kinds of informant task: pile sorts triads rank order methods rating scales and others. They conclude with a discussion of reliability and validity of various methods which can be used by qualitative and quantitative researchers alike to generate more systematic culturally meaningful data for analysis.