Overall I am very pleased with the work undertaken on this project, and what both I and my course team have learned from this body of research.
I feel lucky that I had undertaken this kind of research before in both professional and acadmeic settings, which meant that I felt able to hit the ground running and carry out perhaps more varieties of research than I would have done if I was exploring qualitative research, grounded theory and so on for the first time ever.
That said, this prior experience did maybe make me over-ambitious, and there were some times during the project where I felt very stretched, particularly due to the looming end of term, before which I wanted the chance to test my intervention. In the event, I got it done well before this deadline (probably becaude of the pressure I felt!) so all’s well that ends well — I should probably have put more trust in my gantt chart, which did work out as intended.
It is worth noting that there was one type of research I had planned to carry out but failed to do, which was studio observations. I’d overlooked the fact that within our studio, this year’s timetabling means there is very little unstructured studio time, and none whatsoever on the days I am in. For our neighbouring course’s studio (which I also hoped to observe), their only unstructured times were during times I was teaching or on days I wasn’t in. Due to additional work commitments, coming in on days I was not scheduled to teach was not possible during this unit, so I had to abandon the idea.
I am very keen on observation (and subsequent analysis) as a research method and had been excited about the chance to try it out, as it is regularly something we ask our students to do… But I feel reassured that I did plenty of other research, so failing to do this did not leave a major hole in my project!
Another change to my original plan was that I conducted my student interviews in a group rather than solo. This was for a couple of reasons — firstly, time constraints (I simply didn’t feel I had the time to undertake and analyse four individual interviews), but I also became interested in the group interview as a format. I realised taking more of a ‘focus group’ approach as outlined on gov.uk (2020) and by Roller and Lavrakas (2015), offered certain benefits. The focus group, while not a direct substitute for one to one interviews, can elicit greater discussion, idea sharing and debate than in a one to one setting, and may stimulate more spontaenous thoughts than in a solo setting. Inviting the students to a conversation with their friends was decidedly more appealing than one to one chats with me, and did elicit great discussion.
I also acknowledge that due to time constraints, I specificially invited students who I know are keen, chatty, and who I already have a good relationship with. That said, I did consider them valid participants in the research, as they too were not regular users of our student space, so asking them why they didn’t spend time there did make sense in their case. That said, a more in depth study would also have sought out some harder to reach students from a wider diversity of backgrounds. I suspect that the conclusions of my research (that students were predominantly seeking community and connection), while true, were particularly apparent in this group of outgoing, amibitous students.
One other potential weakness in my project is that I do not feel I have had enough time to seek out a depth of reading about my project’s subject matter (studio pedagogy). While I managed to find and explore lots of reading about the research processes I used, I made less time for comparative literature about the specific subject of my research. This may simply be how almost every researher feels at the end of their project, but for future projects I might choose to undertake less primary research, and make more time for reading and comparison of existing literature.
Overall I am pleased with the work I have done, and I have certainly learned even more about these research processes in action — this is incredibly valuable, as these kinds of research are a core part of teaching on user Experience Design.
I intend to continue reflecting on and exploring the challenges of building an inclusive, busy, popular studio space which fosters that vital collaboration and connection amongst students.
References
Office for Heath Improvement and Disparities (no date) Focus group study: qualitative studies, GOV.UK. Available at: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/focus-group-study-qualitative-studies (Accessed: 15 December 2024).
Roller, M.R. and Lavrakas, P.J. (2015) Applied Qualitative Research Design: A Total Quality Framework Approach. 1st edition. The Guilford Press. (pp 111 – 112)