Qualitative Research Paper Sample

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Methods
Sample
The sampling method that I have used to obtain a sufficient pool of participants is purposeful sampling. Purposive sampling techniques are especially useful in exploratory, qualitative research. This purposive sample, which is a non-probability sample, consists of SUNY Oneonta resident students with a meal plan to the campus dining halls, and also selected staff members of the three campus dining halls: Wilsbach, Mills, and Hulbert. In total, I interviewed 13 resident students who routinely eat at the dining halls and 5 staff members that work within one of the three dining halls.

Research Design I engaged in an ethnography of the three SUNY Oneonta campus dining halls (Wilsbach, Mills, and Hulbert) to obtain observations …show more content…

The same goes for the study’s staff participants, but their interviews differed in substance, and only consisted of five questions. I designed each set of interview questions with the goal to explore the student and staff construction of a personal space within the dining halls. I have also designed these questions as based upon the theories of symbolic interactionism, anthropological genealogy, embodied space, and embodied language. The interview questions focus on perception of symbols and interactions within the communal space, and how these perceptions are then in turn the basis for the construction of a personal space. The participant responses were transcribed by hand at the time of the interview. A journal of notes was kept for my ethnographic observations, which took place over a two week period. Interviews were conducted speradicly over this same two week …show more content…

One way in which students develop this means of personal space is through the location within the dining halls that they choose to sit at. The arrangement of seating varies throughout each dining hall, with each embodying its own unique style. What Wilsbach, Mills, and Hulbert all have in common is that the kitchen and dining or eating areas are very distinct. The one exception of this rule would be “my kitchen” in Mills. “My kitchen” is a room located off of the Mills central dining area, and is a place where students can cook and prepare their own food if they so choose. I sat and did observations within “my kitchen” in order to better understand how students utilized that room. Some students would simply come into the room, prepare themselves a plate of food, and then leave to continue sitting in the central dining area. Other students would come into the room, prepare their food, and then pick out a seat at one of the tables if one was available. In some cases, a student or a group of students would bring in the standard, staff prepared food into “my kitchen” to sit and eat without preparing any food at all. This interested me, so I made sure to speak with some of the students who did this to try and see why they preferred eating in this room instead of the main dining area. I had specific interview questions for these students such as, “Do you always choose to sit

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