“Validity in Qualitative Research Revisited”: 14 Years Later, A Continuing Dialogue
Location
DeSantis Room 1047
Format Type
Plenary
Format Type
Paper
Start Date
17-1-2020 9:15 AM
End Date
17-1-2020 9:35 AM
Abstract
As always, concerns with the issues of validity in qualitative research have lingered. An impactful and well-received article that addresses these concerns is “Validity in Qualitative Research Revisited” (Cho & Trent, 2006). It has been cited over 1200 times in Google Scholars. It starts with a traditional approach to the validity of qualitative research which involves determining the degree to which researchers’ claims about knowledge correspond to the reality (or research participants’ construction of reality) being studied. After reviewing the then literature on qualitative research, the authors categorize and label two emerging approaches, ‘transactional’ validity and ‘transformational’ validity, and they suggest that neither approach was sufficient in meeting the then current needs of the field. As a result, a recursive, process-oriented view of validity as an alternative framework was proposed. 14 years have passed since then, and the field of qualitative research has continued to grow, shift, move forward (and, perhaps, backward a bit in some sense), dramatically evolve, and become (more) complicated, contested, and challenged. This paper is an attempt by one of the authors to re-revisit this article in order to critically reflect on the continuing concerns with the issues of validity through recent literatures and developments, in the hopes of re-validating the importance of theorizing and practicing a ‘holistic validity’ across the board.
Keywords
transactional, transformational, holistic validity
“Validity in Qualitative Research Revisited”: 14 Years Later, A Continuing Dialogue
DeSantis Room 1047
As always, concerns with the issues of validity in qualitative research have lingered. An impactful and well-received article that addresses these concerns is “Validity in Qualitative Research Revisited” (Cho & Trent, 2006). It has been cited over 1200 times in Google Scholars. It starts with a traditional approach to the validity of qualitative research which involves determining the degree to which researchers’ claims about knowledge correspond to the reality (or research participants’ construction of reality) being studied. After reviewing the then literature on qualitative research, the authors categorize and label two emerging approaches, ‘transactional’ validity and ‘transformational’ validity, and they suggest that neither approach was sufficient in meeting the then current needs of the field. As a result, a recursive, process-oriented view of validity as an alternative framework was proposed. 14 years have passed since then, and the field of qualitative research has continued to grow, shift, move forward (and, perhaps, backward a bit in some sense), dramatically evolve, and become (more) complicated, contested, and challenged. This paper is an attempt by one of the authors to re-revisit this article in order to critically reflect on the continuing concerns with the issues of validity through recent literatures and developments, in the hopes of re-validating the importance of theorizing and practicing a ‘holistic validity’ across the board.