I do my fieldwork in the UK so not quite the same but I was very apprehensive.  I was nervous about recruiting as mine involves face to face recruiting and I thought I'd struggle with rejection. In actual fact, it's fine.  I like talking to people and I've been very lucky in that my non-participant rates have been very low indeed.

I was also nervous of doing interviews and focus groups with "elite" participants, i.e., people in positions of power. But, I've absolutely loved it.  I came into research because I enjoy trying to understand the way other people understand the world so this data collection stage was just wonderful! And people are so grateful to be able to tell their stories.

It is scary but once you've thrown yourself into it it's really very rewarding.

Good luck!

A

======= Date Modified 17 Nov 2009 12:30:04 =======
[quote]Quote From stressed:


That its actually ok to be a wife and mum if that's what they chose, or to be a working woman with a high flying career./quote]



But this to me is feminism. It's about the the choice.

I've read the BdJ blog for a while now and had my suspicions that she was an academic. I can't remember exactly what she said but she talked about her degree subject being obscure and of limited value - an academic if ever I heard one.

My parents showed me the article on Sunday in the Times and said to me "please come to us if you ever need money". I've been thinking about her "coming out" a lot. Still don't really have my thoughts completely in place but I just wanted to add a little something. Whilst it's not my area, a while ago I co-authored a paper on women involved in prostitution. I genuinely think there is a big difference between the women working the street for a tenner a time and the women in the brothels. And then again, the women working the high-end market. £300 an hour really is a very different kettle of fish. The motivation of women doing it is going to be very very different to the women working the street etc.

Without getting into the moral issues, I just wanted to suggest that you really can't just talk about all sex workers or prostitutes as the same. As well as the obvious individual stories, there are considerable differences between groups of workers.

Belle/Dr Magnanti was not a typical sex worker, however, she wasn't an rarity either.

A

p.s. - I know nothing about men hence the focus on women!

Find a local friendly University statistician and buy them a huge mug of coffee and they are generally (in my experience) the nicest people ever.

A

p.s. - I'd use regression too.

I've done this loads and as long as your English is reasonable (and yours seems much better than reasonable) you're more than capable.

A

Hi,

I've only just seen this. I assume you were at the DHP conference at Aston University? I was there too. Absolutely loved it! Had a lot of fun.

Did you make it to the last day? I stayed in Sumpner Hall all morning and came away feeling more motivated than I have in a long time.

And the key note speakers were all great!

A

I've never had a long distance relationship but I was just thinking that it would be a great way to build up some wonderful love letters. I've never had a love letter. Clearly I'm just one big romantic.

Also, could your other half come visit halfway through or something like that? Just for a weekend.

A

could you say something like "the framework for this discussin was adapted from Jones (2006)"...

Uh, don't normally get involved is this kind of thing but what a completely pointless and rude post!

Sorry Bobloblaw, not my area but hopefully someone can help!

A

Just wanted to give my thoughts. In the cases you've outlined the sample size issue can be thought of in terms of analysis, and in qualitative data analysis (regardless of the exact method used) the important thing is to keep analysing until data saturation is complete, that is, until no new issues are arising from the data.

So, in the example of the ethnography in one community, you have to make sure you've pulled everything from the data you've obtained.

In the discourse issue - you need to make sure that the entire text has been extensively analysed, not just sections of it.

Does that make sense?

get an olympus .dss recorder. i got my (almost) top of the range one from ebay for 40 quid. the sound quality is excellent.

I can confirm this as I worked for the council side of student loans. If you are not paying tax you do not have to make student loan payments. You can chose to opt in.

A

Oo, I hope it's normal! I do this all the time with NHS jobs that I want.

I worked between 16 and 24 hours paid work during my full time MSc. I was certainly not the exception and some people on my course did more hours (I also had a bursary but I only had change after paying my fees!).

I'm extremely close to the HoD from my MSc and she said she thinks it's appalling that some people don't work (this actually wasn't the case on my course, everyone did at least 8 hours) through their MSc given that they're (normally) at least 21.

It certainly shouldn't stop you getting a place, what with widening participation etc. They normally suggest not working more than X hours but unless you're research funded it won't be a problem.

Good luck.

A

Eugh!!!! Eugh eugh eugh eugh eugh! Sorry to digress but how can you compare Dr Goldacre to Mr Stallone. I will admit, I tend to go for more "interesting" looking men (apart from the bf. He, of course, is an adonis...just in case he's reading!). His twitter is great, links to some very disturbing news stories about research and is really very funny. And I stand by my original point - he's pretty!