Abstract
Concerns about the quality of qualitative research are – at least in some constituencies – enduring. Those perennial bugbears, validity, transferability and generalizability, raise questions regarding the value of findings derived from small-scale, local, often interview-based studies to the messy reality of practice beyond their immediate bounds. Increasingly, integration of one form or another is advocated as a means of enhancing the quality, scope, relevance and – a related consideration – legitimacy of knowledge upon which practice might be based. Thus, we are now familiar with techniques such as meta-analysis and critical appraisal, and increasingly, various approaches to knowledge integration have been developed as means of bridging the research–practice gap. In the hard sciences, knowledge integration has traditionally entailed the specification and measurement of intrinsic criteria which allow for knowledge accumulation; in the softer ‘social’ sciences, often, though by no means necessarily based on qualitative studies, it routinely involves utilising extrinsic criteria to identify similarity and difference as the basic for approximate comparison. There has been little in the way of rapprochement between these alternative viewpoints, and it is this polarity that novel approaches to synthesis seek to challenge. But how robust are these new developments, and how justifiable the claims and ambitions they foster? In different ways, both texts reviewed this issue grapple with these issues, which are more weighty than they might at first appear. The supplantion of sometimes stereotypically negative characterisations of qualitative methods, designs and data into a more critically nuanced appreciation of the strengths and limitations of diverse approaches to generating practical knowledge from necessarily idiosyncratic findings remains a real challenge.
In Systematic synthesis of qualitative research, reviewed here by Martin Webber, Saini and Schlonsky argue that systematic synthesis can indeed enable the translation of accumulated bodies of findings from diverse studies into meaningfully relevant messages and proscriptions for practice. They do not suggest that this is a simplistic or straightforward endeavour, separate or different from the logic or techniques of established approaches, or that the outcomes of integration will necessarily mean that practice is less’ messy’. Rather, they emphasise the complementary value that the detail and depth which characterises the findings of qualitative studies can add to more traditional systematic reviews. The questions that their findings embody – to do with the process and experience of intervention – are equally as important to overall outcomes as whether or not practice has achieved its objectives. Indeed, arguably it is not possible to adequately answer these latter questions unless the former issues are also addressed. Here, then, is a restatement of the necessity of integration of knowledge derived from multiple sources as we struggle to arrive at the most accurate representation of the truth possible in a particular situation. Such integration may not lend itself to findings which are definitive, but if depth of knowledge is important, it is nevertheless a pre-requisite in arriving at a fully informed understanding.
How best to capture ‘truth’ is of course a profound issue. As co-founder of this journal, Ian Shaw has been influential in contributing to debates regarding the value that qualitative social work research can have here, both as regards social inquiry and its relevance to practice. The distinction between research and practice is an important one, whatever the similarities in aim or method that may sometimes be highlighted. As separate activities, they have distinct but related developmental trajectories and so should not necessarily be taken as straightforwardly complementary. Links between them need careful investigation and elaboration, and it is this more than any other theme which emerges most forcefully from this self-selected anthology of Ian’s work over three decades. Although foci are diverse, they are cross cutting, with the potential that qualitative methodology might play in aiding our understanding of people and practice a consistent bridge.
Practice and research – reviewed here by Malcolm Carey – highlights the extent to which social work research, and the people who undertake it, have evolving concerns and characters. The role that specifically qualitative work might play within this overarching endeavour is both distinctive and significant. It has its limitations, of course, but as has been pointed out again and again, limitations usually mirror strengths, which here are many and varied. Ian Shaw’s work emphasises – though not uncritically – these merits and the distinctive potential that qualitative research holds. This book exemplifies the contribution that Ian has made to date. Despite his recent semi-retirement, I am sure there is plenty more to come!