Progress Update 4

I am still writing up my Research Design document.  I am a slow writer, as you can see.  It's been over a month, and I have come up with about 15 pages in all so far. 

It is now mostly done.  I just need to touch up and hopefully it will be completed in a few days' time.

It has been good to get words out on paper, in my opinion, even though I had wanted this done way earlier.  I think it is alright, because the writing process made me think a lot more and consider many things I had not thought of previously.

Interestingly, it has made me even more eager to get started.  I had doubts about Grounded Theory (still do), but I think I am more sure than before this is something In want to do, and that the Glaserian version is what I will be going with.

The one big thing that has really jumped out at me has been the idea of CONCEPTUALIZATION.

Glaser's method is steeped in the abiltiy of the researcher to conceptualize, that is to elevate data to the conceptual level.  I think this, more than anything, clinches the Glaserian model for me.

I understand it is a difficult skill, and Glaser (among others) have warned about the difficulties that novice researchers (like me) may face undertaking a conceptualization effort like this.  But I also have had more than one person advise me that is it is not challenging enough, it is probably not worth doing it.  Strauss' method is descriptive, which meshed with my original thoughts about this project, but now I think the real value is to be able to draw some conceptual results from this study.  So in a sense, some of the original ideas that I had going into this project has been somewhat altered.

So I think this is going to be a key thing for my PhD study.  The opportunity to learn to conceptualize, through this project.

It also means I will need to work on my THEORETICAL SENSITIVITY training.  I have pulled together some references and resources on these and I will be going through them soon.

I am excited, and I can't wait to start.

At the same time, there is also a number of things to take care of, which I had blogged about in the previous UPDATE, so I will attend to those items before I enter the field.

I will try to integrate the Research Design into a Proposal and I hope to get that out of the way as soon as possible.

My wife and daughter are taking a one-week trip to Singapore in June (Gawai).  I will miss them, but it will also free me up to work without distraction.