Importance Of Qualitative Research In Social Work

Introduction Research is very important to the field of social work. Without research, many social workers would not have a job. Without research, some of the situations that social workers are involved in would not even be considered illegal. Over the years two main types of research have formed, quantitative and qualitative research.
Qualitative Research Qualitative research emphasizes the qualities of entities. It stresses the social constructed nature of reality. It helps develop an intimate relationship between the research and what is being studied. The situational constraints of qualitative research help shape inquiry.
Design
The three types of qualitative designs are naturalistic, emergent, and purposeful. Naturalistic is when a researcher studies a real-world situation as it happens naturally. It is also nonmanipulative and noncontrolling. Emergent is the acceptance of adapting inquiry as understanding deepens and/or as situations change. The researcher often tries to avoid rigid designs that could eliminate responding to opportunities to pursue new paths of discovery as they emerge. Purposeful involves case studies such as people, organizations, communities, cultures, events, critical

It allows the research to be completed by using different designs. These designs allow a social worker to be flexible with research since one certain design may not work for every case. Qualitative research allows social workers to make presentations to hostile audiences who are insensitive. Quantitative research is important to social workers because it allows them the information in numbers and graphs. It is often presented to an expert audience where they would like to know the statistics and data involved with a case. Quantitative and Qualitative research allows social workers to be able to report their findings through detailed descriptions, statistics, and