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Observations, Case studies, Recordings
September 17, 2008
Human subjects research
ObservationsCase studies RecordingsExperimentsQuestionnairesInterviews
Before starting . . . IRB (Institutional Review Board) http://orca.byu.edu/IRB/
Human subjects research
For each type of HSR, we will examine
a. What it is/when to use it (with what kind of data)
b. How to use it (example studies using these methods)
c. Advantages and disadvantagea. observer’s paradox
b. data collection
c. data analysis
d. variable control
1. Observations
a. What are they/when to use them: "The collection of data without manipulating it: Simply
observe ongoing activities, without making any attempt to control or determine them"
When to use them:a. When the subjects are too young or too vulnerable to
get good data otherwiseb. When you really want to avoid the observer’s
paradoxc. Mostly used by sociolinguists/L1 and L2 acquisition
researchers examining behavior in social situations (conversation analyses, pronunciation differences, classroom behavior, children at play)
1. Observations
b. How to use them/previous studies:
3 types:
a. Non-participant observations (speech errors, comments in classrooms, Oprah study, FLSR)
b. Participant observations (jocks and burnouts, children play time)
c. Covert observations (street and shtreet, might could, fourth floor, help desk at ASB)
1. Observations
b. How to use them/previous studies:
General methodology:Different environments yield different data (e.g. slips of the
tongue) Make notes on environmental variables (time of day,
number in group, what doing, male/female, etc) If possible, decide what you want to examine, make a tally
sheet for easy analysis
Observations Example
Goldin-Meadow (1982) and Judy Kiegel: Looked at children in Nicaraugua who grew up in a school for deaf children—were not allowed to learn sign language—but still developed sign language together
Goldin-Meadow (1997) looked at children in Nicaraugua who develop their own sign language—the language looks very similar across all the children
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=3922325http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/evolution/library/07/2/l_072_04.html
1. Observations
c. advantages/disadvantages
Advantages:
Disadvantages:
2. Case studies
a. What are they/when to use them: Case studies involve observing one or more individuals (but
usually very few) over an extended period of time
When to use them: Longitudinal studies (sign language study)Individual circumstances (Paradis aphasia victims)Complex phenomena/interesting cases (Christopher)Can use in: L1, L2 Speech impediments / aphasia-stroke / speech therapists
2. Case studies
b. How to use them (example, Genie, Christopher)
Hopefully someone you know and who feels comfortable with you (often researchers use their children)
Treat the subject with respect Create baseline and measure from there Measure often and the same thing over and over againTend to collect a lot of data, then sort through to determine
what is important
Case Study Example: Christopher
(Neil Smith, 1995)
Non-verbal IQ of 60
Cannot tie shoes or live on his own
Can speak 16 different languages.
Learned Dutch on the way to an talk show interview through reading a book
Learned Hindi from brother-in-law—just by listening to him speak
http://www.uga.edu/lsava/Smith/Christopher1PD.movhttp://www.uga.edu/lsava/Smith/Christopher1.html
2. Case studies
c. Advantages:
Disadvantages:
3. Recordings
a. What are they/when to use them:Note: Ethical question on recordings (book says OK, but
US / IRB issues)observations/case studies/interviews pronunciation:
ethnic influence foreigner talk first language acquisition
vocabulary: frequency of usage regionalisms
conversation analysis
3. Recordings
b. How to use them
Practical considerations:Audio only or audio and video? What kind of recorder/microphone? (analog or digital?) Problems with subjects wanting/being able to record Identifying speakers Quiet place, no kids running around, traffic
New technologies:Recording from Internet (e.g. BBC or regional English): Replay A/V For transcripts only, can sometimes get these on Web: e.g. CNN, NPR,
movie scripts PodCasting, etc
3. Recordings
c. Advantages/disadvantages
Advantages
Disadvantages
3. Recordings
Examples of Recordings
Linguistic Data Consortium: Membership, collects corpora, used by programmers, speech recognition-transcribed orthographically, phonetically, time stamp. Examples:
Switchboard
CallHome
CallFriend
Santa Barbara Corpus of Spoken American English
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