Fire Fighters, Neighbourhoods and Social Identity: the relationship between the fire service and residents in Bristol
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- Qualitative research
- Reflexivity
Research questionsAs discussed in the Literature Review, this research project draws particularly on social identity approaches. This is reflected in the methods used, which will help me to consider the interaction and relationship between groups, in this instance the fire service and local residents, including examining how hostility arises, how social identity approaches can help us to understand this and to what extent the fire service’s current interventions are effective at dealing with hostility and resistance to fire safety messages. Again, this is discussed in more detail in relation to each of the separate studies. Although the fire service and local residents are not entirely comparable as groups – for a number of reasons – the research looks at the relationship and interactions between them. In this research project, I have used three linked but discrete studies, which could also be described as ‘phases’ of research, emphasising their interconnectedness but also a temporal and thematic distinction between them. In the first study, the focus is on the fire service, the nature of their identity and how they view themselves and local people. In the second study, the focus is much more on residents, considering how they view their own communities, and how they form their identities in relation to being a part of this community (or by being distinct from others) as well as their experiences of the fire service. The third and final study looks at what happens when the two groups come together, and uses observation methods to explore this dynamic relationship. Qualitative researchArguments for and against qualitative research are well rehearsed throughout academic literatures (Ritchie, Lewis 2003, Denzin, Lincoln 2000, Bryman 1984, Brewer 2000), not least in those stemming from social psychology (Parker 2005, Breakwell 2006) and human geography (Pain 2004, Ward 2007), which have roots in the more ‘scientific’ disciplines. Further, research in social policy areas is also, frequently, expected to take a quantitative approach with a cultural reliance on ‘evidence’ which tends to privilege hard facts and figures. Whilst perceived wisdom in some quarters suggests that ‘proper’ research has a quantitative dimension, and this is perhaps the case within the fire service. Alternately, Bryman (1984) asserts that qualitative research is characterised by the obligation to perceive the social world from the perspective of those engaged in it, with an emphasis on close involvement so that these behaviours can be seen and understood in context (Bryman 1984) – although, of course, such contexts can be altered or manipulated by the researcher (Blaikie 2000, Bryman 1984). As explained above and elsewhere, this research project seeks to come to an understanding of a group of phenomena, as opposed to enumerating them. The fire service presents an interesting social milieu in which to conduct research, and as this research is implicitly concerned with the understandings of the fire service, and the way in which they are perceived by residents, it is appropriate to use qualitative methods. Further benefits of such an approach include its perceived fluidity and flexibility (Bryman 1984) and its varying methods which facilitate an ‘insider’ view (Hammersley 1992, Hammersley, Atkinson 2007). Furthermore, many of the researchers who have worked in comparable fields – for instance with the fire service (Myers 2005, Childs, Morris et al. 2004, Ward, Winstanley 2006, Yarnal, Dowler et al. 2004), with crowds (Stott, Hutchison et al. 2001, Reicher 1984), or in neighbourhoods (Mathers, Parry et al. 2008, Gosling 2008) have also used qualitative approaches. As such, the choice of such methods is as much pragmatic as it is philosophical (Bryman 1984). Qualitative research necessarily includes a range of different methods, which can include documentary methods, interviews, group methods and observations, the latter being most associated with ethnography. Needless to say, Ethnography is not a particular method of data collection, but a style of research that is distinguished by its objectives, which are to understand the social meanings and activities of people in a given field or setting, and an approach which involves close association with and often participation in this setting Brewer, 2000, page 59. Ethnography, then, grounds this research study, allowing me the flexibility to use various methods (interviews, focus groups, participant observation) as appropriate at different times. The ways I have utilised these different facets of ethnography is examined in more detail within the sections on each study (below).
Although considered a ‘slippery concept’ (Webster 2008), reflexivity is ubiquitous in ethnographic research (page 65). It tends to refer to the focus of the researcher on themselves as part of the research project. In its most derided sense, it is synonymous with navel gazing and an unhealthy level of introspection (Lynch 2000), in which the researcher becomes the focus of the research itself (Denzin 2000) at the expense of the original subject. For Lynch (2000), this is corrected through the use of ‘ethnomethodology’ and Van Maanen (1988) explicitly uses reflexivity to link introspection to confession (as discussed below in relation to writing) through the ‘fieldwork confessional’ (page 73). This has particular relevance to this research project, where the confessional tale is seen as constructing a particular type of reflexive ethnographic self. Webster (2008) concludes that: Reflexivity is not a ‘sense of honour’ to be defended, but a ‘principle of practice’ to be deployed – not a moral principle based on virtue or an essentialised principle based on unavoidability, but a principle of practice based on the historically contingent nature of knowledge production (Page 75) Reflexivity is used in this research project in this spirit, whereby it is a tool and a type of conduct, rather than an end in and of itself.
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