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Bootstrapping Q Methodology to Improve the Understanding of Human Perspectives

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  • Aiora Zabala
  • Unai Pascual

Abstract

Q is a semi-qualitative methodology to identify typologies of perspectives. It is appropriate to address questions concerning diverse viewpoints, plurality of discourses, or participation processes across disciplines. Perspectives are interpreted based on rankings of a set of statements. These rankings are analysed using multivariate data reduction techniques in order to find similarities between respondents. Discussing the analytical process and looking for progress in Q methodology is becoming increasingly relevant. While its use is growing in social, health and environmental studies, the analytical process has received little attention in the last decades and it has not benefited from recent statistical and computational advances. Specifically, the standard procedure provides overall and arguably simplistic variability measures for perspectives and none of these measures are associated to individual statements, on which the interpretation is based. This paper presents an innovative approach of bootstrapping Q to obtain additional and more detailed measures of variability, which helps researchers understand better their data and the perspectives therein. This approach provides measures of variability that are specific to each statement and perspective, and additional measures that indicate the degree of certainty with which each respondent relates to each perspective. This supplementary information may add or subtract strength to particular arguments used to describe the perspectives. We illustrate and show the usefulness of this approach with an empirical example. The paper provides full details for other researchers to implement the bootstrap in Q studies with any data collection design.

Suggested Citation

  • Aiora Zabala & Unai Pascual, 2016. "Bootstrapping Q Methodology to Improve the Understanding of Human Perspectives," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 11(2), pages 1-19, February.
  • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0148087
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0148087
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Davies, Ben B. & Hodge, Ian D., 2012. "Shifting environmental perspectives in agriculture: Repeated Q analysis and the stability of preference structures," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(C), pages 51-57.
    2. Buckley, Cathal, 2012. "Implementation of the EU Nitrates Directive in the Republic of Ireland — A view from the farm," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 29-36.
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