What is participant observation and why apply it to acute wards?
Participant observation, also known as ethnography, is a style of research that examines real life situations from the inside . The researcher becomes involved in the daily life of the social group or organisation that is being studied. He or she does this by establishing relationships with the people in the study setting, participating in what they do and talking to them about the events that have been observed. The focus is on the ordinary situations that people encounter and how they behave in them. Observations, and transcripts of conversations and formal interviews, are recorded as fieldnotes . This typed text is the raw data that are analysed in a systematic way, typically with the help of computer programs developed for the purpose. Rather than being the starting point of the research, hypotheses are generated and tested as part of a cyclical process of sampling, data collection and analysis (Hammersley & Atkinson, 1983). The rationale for using this approach is simply that the
