Theme 4: Post-reflections

This week we focused on how and why to use quantitative methods in study purposes.
 I read the text Social Networking Sites: Their Users and Social Implications - A Longitudinal Study, which is written by Petter Bae Brandtzæg, and then I analysed the methods the author used, and the advantages and disadvantages of these methods.
Last year I read some human-computer interaction courses. We read a lot about different survey methods, so the term ‘quantitative method’ was familiar to me. The MDI-courses was interesting and it was a good experience to read about the methods and analyse their importance. When I wrote my degree project last spring I had good use of my experience about quantitative and qualitative methods.
Just as I wrote in the text before there is both advantages and disadvantages with quantitative methods. You can easily and quickly get information from participants but if you need more thorough information you need to use a qualitative method as well. So a combination of these two methods is to prefer.

At the seminar this Monday we were divided into small groups and discussed the texts we had written about in our last assignment. Each group selected a text to present to the rest of the class. The task was to break down the method that was used in the text into smaller parts. I, Felicia and Johan who was in the same group had read the same text, which made the choice easy. It was useful to reflect on how a study is structured. How we collect data and which methods that can be used, is useful knowledge that I think is a good experience for future tasks.