Essay Weaknesses of Quantitative Research Methodology – Social Science Assignment Help

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The Weaknesses of Quantitative Research Methodology

The strengths of quantitative research can, however, also be weaknesses. Many important characteristics of people and communities including both rich and poor, for example, identities, perceptions, and beliefs that cannot be meaningfully reduced to numbers or adequately understood without reference to the local context in which people live. Effective quantitative research usually requires a large sample size sometimes several thousand households. However, lack of resources sometimes makes large-scale research of this kind impossible. In many settings particularly developing countries, interested parties (e.g., governments, nongovernmental organizations and public service providers) may lack the skills and especially the resources needed to conduct a thorough quantitative evaluation. In term of disaster survey, the shortcoming of quantitative data is that it fails to provide an in-depth description of the experience of the disaster upon the affected population. Knowing how many people are affected and their locations does not provide enough information to guide agencies and sectors on what they should plan for in terms of response.
 
The Weaknesses of Qualitative Research Methodology

The major drawbacks associated with qualitative cultural analysis are firstly, the process is time-consuming, and secondly, a particular, important issue could be overlooked. The second potential problem is that an issue could go unnoticed. All researchers? interpretations are limited. As positioned subjects, personal experience and knowledge influence the observations and conclusions. Also, because qualitative inquiry is generally open-ended, the participants have more control over the content of the data collected. ACAPS?s supporting document states the weaknesses inherent in qualitative data are that it, firstly, results in data which is not objectively verifiable. Secondly, it requires a labour-intensive analysis process such as categorization, recoding, etc. and thirdly, it needs skilled interviewers to successfully carry out the primary data collection activities.