Dear all,

I am looking at quality in medical care. The idea is to ask doctors' views regarding this. The instrument used will be a focus group with the idea to generate ideas. I will also introduce a new concept.

I have done a test session and have the following question:

How do you know who is who when recording?

I mean on tape there are these different voices, but how is the person transcribing the info going to know which participant this is? Any practical thoughts or ideas about this?

By the way, Shani, in case you are reading this. You were right regarding your suggestions in the past related to qualitative research!

rick: in the begining of the focus group you ask every member to say their name (or a nickname they want to use) and some sentences (e.g.what their had for breakfest;)) in the recorder. Then the transcriber will know who is who. Also during the focus group refer sometimes to participants in their name, e.g. Dr. John what are your opinions about this?

ah, rick, thanks but i don't even remember what you might be referring to. would you mind giving me a quick pointer? i suppose i could use that advice now

Hi Shani,

sorry for the late reply.

Previously I mentioned to you that I wanted to ask clinicians what they think of a guideline which was used abroad. As the clinicians are not familiar with it is difficult to talk about it.
You suggested to bring forward parts of the guideline in a focus group, based on that to develop a tool (questionnaire) and then to use this in a bigger sample.

After enormous amount of "circular discussion" the focus group is what I am going to use. As mentioned I just was not certain regarding who is who on tape. The suggestions made on the forum for each partipant to use their name at the beginning is helpful. What would be your views?
By the way, how are you? Is your research going well?

Are you also planning on having someone with you to co-moderate and take notes? That way they can get the essence of the answers going on at the discussion while you focus on moderating the focus group itself.

have worked as a transcriber for a major HIV/AIDS project, and basically the idea is that the transcriber picks up the different voices. it is handy to give them names, easy ones like; respondent 1, respondent 2 etc, such that the person transcribing doesnt have to be having all these funny lengthy names to go by. good luck

Hi doc2008 nd tsipat,

thanks for your replies, this is useful.

Doc2008 yes I will have someone to co-moderate who will take notes, so that would indeed be helpful regarding "who is who". So you kept notes with names regarding who said what? Did you also time things? What was your experience regarding the amount of topics you get in a session?I understand from the literature that 5 topics can be adressed in 1.5 hours?

Tsipat, when you were transcribing was it easy to pick up the voices? And how long did it take you to transcribe one hour of discussion on tape? These practical issues woudl be useful for me as not used this method before.

Regards

Rick

rick, oh, that well i'm glad it helped!

thanks for asking - i'm a bit of a pendulum right now, going from perfectly happy and making good progress to desolate and procrastinating, never know what it is going to be today. ah, if it were always bad at least i could complain

An hour length's discussion will take a couple of hours. Word for word, i would say between 3 - 5hours if not more, though this hinges on a couple of things; e.g speed of the person transribing and the quality of the recorded tapes. you need to make sure that everyone is sitting within recording sphere and they speak loundly and clearly because if they don't the more probs when trying to transcribe. When i was transcribing i found poorly recorded tapes the worst to deal with cause i was spending a lot of time trying to get what the respondents were saying and it also short changes the quality of your data. hope this helps.By the way are you going to transcribe the tapes by yourself? take heart if you are because its a lot of work.

Sorry rick, forgot to answer your first question; voices were easy to pick up as long as they spoke loudly and clearly; hence the need to make sure they do likewise and that the recorder is well placed to pick up all voices. if someone happens to whisper don't shy away from telling them to speak up coz if u dont later on you will pay the price!!

Hi tsipat,

thanks for your reply. This is helpful. So one hour is about 3-5 hours of transcribing. Luckily the secretary will do this. Even so your tips are very useful.
Have you finished your transcribing?

Hi Shani,

thanks again, you really helped me.

Maybe you should see the variation in how you feel as something positive, due to the differences in mood you will enjoy "the ups" more, as there will be a stronger contrast!
Remember the whole thing (PdD) is about persevering.
Were are you in your part of the PhD process? How is the writing going?

yes finished that bit of work a while ago though i will soon have my tapes to transcribe for my thesis. then i will have to translate and trascribe! you actually have a secretary to transcribe for you?? blessed thou art!! wow! !

Hi tsipat,

is not my secretary, is from the institution.

I understand that you have to translate what you transcribe. So you are doing your research in two languages? Is this not difficult, I mean how will you quote things in the publication? In both languages?

I am in a similar position: focus groups will be in German ,yet thesis and hopefully publication will be in English. I like English a lot better, easier to write in. What languages are you confronted with?

me too I will be dealing with language/translation problems, with the added difficulty that Swiss German is only a spoken, not a written language. So the interviews will be in Swiss German. There is no way to write in Swiss German so I will have to translate the interviews into German while transcribing. But my thesis will be in english. Gets me confused... I don't know how I will solve that yet.