Barbara Wildemuth – A Conversation on Mixed Methods Research, With a Focus on Why and How

In his latest book, Creswell (2015) defines mixed methods research as “an approach… in which the investigator gathers both quantitative (closed-ended) and qualitative (open-ended) data, integrates the two, and then draws interpretations based on the combined strengths of both sets of data” (p.2). Our conversation will focus on several aspects of this definition, including the nature and status of qualitative and quantitative data as research evidence, and the challenges and opportunities of using both forms of data in the same study. We’ll also discuss the underlying reasons to use mixed methods (the why) and closely examine several examples of mixed methods research in information science (the how).

Dr. Barbara Wildemuth is Professor and Associate Dean in the School of Information and Library Science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (USA). She is the author of the monograph, Applications of Social Research Methods to Questions in Information and Library Science (2009), and is currently working on a chapter on mixed methods for its second edition. Her research is focused on people’s interactions with information, particularly when those interactions are computer-mediated; recent studies have focused on the design of the search tasks assigned in interactive information retrieval experiments and the search tactics used when searching for digital videos. She regularly teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in research methods.