1) Choose focus group qualitative research methodand:
a) Identify a research problem and or question (s) that would be most appropriate to this type of method; that is what you will study;((something related to physical activities or diet))
b) Develop a research design appropriate to focus group method (that is how you will study the problem or question). Make sure to identify all the steps to be include in conducting the study. The research design needs to include a set of questions that you will observe, or ask, the population that you will recruit, or the “what” that you will observe, or all the strategies involved in an ethnographic study.
c) Discuss data analysis and interpretation of results
d) Illustrate strengths and weaknesses of the qualitative method you chose.
e) Elaborate on the appropriateness of the method to your question or focus of research interest.
In terms of writing format, you will need to:
a) State Study Aims/Questions (a)
b) Significance of the Study (here you will explore the significance of a)
c) Methods (b and ca above)
d) This last section will include d and e above
2 This question is based on an article published in the Journal of Health and Social Behavior, September 2014, Vol. 55 (3) 342-359. The article is titled, “I want you to save my kid! Illness Management Strategies, Access, and Inequality at an Elite University Research Hospital.” The author is Amanda M. Gengler. I have copied the article and have attached it for you in an electronic message to make it easier for you to concentrate on answering the question, rather than finding the article.

You will need to read the entire article in order to respond to the question. Then make sure that you address each of the questions or points below.

1) What about the manner in which Gengler posits her study questions should immediately indicate to you that the proper method to address these questions is qualitative? Based on your knowledge of qualitative methods and the differences between qualitative and quantitative methods discussed in class, justify her choice of qualitative over quantitative. Make sure that you state the difference between the two methods and why Gengler chose qualitative to address her study questions. Provide examples from the text, especially from sentences where Gengler relies on specific words that justify her choice of methods. You so nor need to copy the entire sentences but explain context and indicate the words that support her choice of methods.

2) Briefly discuss her fieldwork to include where she conducted the studied, her population as well as her research strategies. Why did she choose this fieldwork?
3) Illustrate her strategic case selection. How did she use this qualitative research strategy?

4) Discuss her research strategies. Illustrate how the interviews and observations that she conducted come together in informing her research. How does she integrate data that resulted from both strategies?

5) Why does she refer to her approach as a “family centered ethnographic approach?”

6) Gengler used a grounded theory approach in making sense of her data and to inform her analysis. How did she use grounded theory? Discuss her data analysis in reference to how well it fits the grounded theory approach.

7) Illustrate how Gengler uses in vivo quotes from participants to guide and strengthen her analysis.

8) What are some of the emergent codes that she identifies?

9) In her discussion section, how well does she integrate her findings to her methods? Does she triangulate? If yes, illustrate how this is done? If yes, do you think that triangulating added to the reliability of the study and how? If no, do you think that the paper is still strong without it? Why or why not? What do you find is the major strength of the study? Discuss.
3. In a very different article, Normalizing Adolescent Experiences Living with Type I Diabetes (The Diabetes Educator, June 2015, Vol 41, 3, 351 -360), the authors Babler and Strickland, conduct a study with adolescent diabetics to explore their experiences living with diabetes. I have also attached this article in the same e-mail to you.
Based on your reading of this article, please respond to the questions below.
1) Why do Babler and Strickland select a qualitative approach and rely on grounded theory to explore their questions of interest?

2) The study employs purposeful and theoretical samples. How and why are these two samples used in the study? Do you find them appropriate to the study?

3) Discuss the study’s data collection process and data analysis. How do the authors assess the rigor of the study and how is grounded theory used when discussing rigor of the study?

4) What are the axial codes used in describing the “normalizing” process?

5) How were codes used to determine emerging themes and reduce the data to the axial codes that are posited?

6) How did the authors use the data, the axial codes and phases that emerged from the data analysis in their conclusions, future directions and recommendations?

7) Did the authors use triangulation in their methods? If yes, how was it used and was it appropriate: if no, do you think that its absence weakens or strengthens the study?

Instructions
You need to address all points and questions raised under each question. This is a take home exam which requires that you consider each response carefully and write thoroughly in response to all the sub questions and points posited under each question.

I suggest that you need to write at least one paragraph for each sub question or point. And you may need two or three paragraphs for certain points or sub questions..