I am conducting a qualitative study and need some advice about the no of participants. I am using only semi-structured interviews & I have tried everywhere I can think of to get particpants and I have only got one organisation on board who will give me access to ten people. The problem is that my research is focused on a mental health issue so I cannot ask the general pop. It's such a small number though. My supervisor is going to go crazy and I really don't know what to do. I did hear of another person at my uni who did a qual study with 8 participants a few years ago but my sup has made it clear that 'nowadays' a PhD requires around 30. I dont suppose anyone on here can help really but got no-one else to go to. I'm approachiong the end of 2nd yr, have no data & still waiting on ethical approval, should I just quit?

Don't quit!

I know many people myself who did semi-structured interviews and had only 10-15 participants. Search the forum, there are actually a number of threads on this issue.

I agree with Otto. Is this just one study (e.g. chapter), or the whole basis of your PhD? If it is just one study then I would say 8 participants are fine. It really depends on what analytical methodology you are using though. Things like Grounded Theory and Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis would be fine with 8 participants.

Don't quit because of that! It is hard to recruit participants for 'sensitive' research, which your supervisor should understand that. Your supervisor should also be thinking of ways around this and suggesting things you can do--it shouldn't just be left to you to work out how to recruit! Grrr.

There seems to be some perception in the world of publication that 18 is the 'magic' minimum number for participants in qual papers (ie, for the purpose of rigour/to reach 'saturation'). I've no idea where that came from though and it really only applies to journal publication, not your PhD. Like fluffy said, it also realy does depends on what analysis you do. Some qual researchers would say 1 is enough.

cont.
I would get clued up on qual theory and be prepared to challenge why your supervisor believes 30 is the 'acceptable' no for qual work, as it sounds like she/he is applying some pseudo-quant ideas about reliability and validity to the work.

I'd also ask them to give some input into the best methods for recruiting if they really feel that you need more. You could always think of trying to access people through primary care (identifying people through GP records and writing to them) or try contacting organisations like Mind or NIMHE http://www.nimhe.csip.org.uk/

Thanks guys, I'm not in England but I have contacted similar orgs to Mind in my area which has led me to the ten people I have so far. I'm also proposing a snowball sampling method in the hope that those ten will lead me to some more people. My sups will only let me access people through voluntary orgs and similar because of ethics so I cant go down the GP route. These qualitative interviews are the basis of my whole thesis. I feel sick at the thought of going back to my sups, I feel I am always under the threat of being demoted to MSc.

My initial quant. study will use 120 but the follow-up qual. study will only be focussing on around 10, as put forward by my very experienced supervisor who has conducted an awful lot of research in my area over the last 10 years.