FED Postgraduate Seminar (III): Grounded Theory

On 14 March, organized by the Educational Research Centre, the third FED Postgraduate Seminar was held in L105. Participants included Prof. Vong Sou Kuan, Director of the Educational Research Centre, and many postgraduate students from FED and FBA and FSH.

The theme of this seminar was “Grounded Theory”. Focusing on the theme, the speaker Claire OUYANG, a doctoral student, clarified the Grounded Theory in different times. Claire OUYANG then summarized some points on the grounded theory. She suggested juxtaposing constructivist and objectivist forms of grounded theory for clarity. A constructivist approach places priority on the phenomena of study and sees both data and analysis as created from shared experiences and relationships with participants. Objectivist grounded theory resides in the positivist tradition and thus attends to data as real in itself and does not attend to the process of production. Then she touched on the application of literature review, existing findings, sampling strategy, the quality of data, and how we use it etc.

During the Q&A session, the students voiced their views about grounded theory from different perspectives. Claire OUYANG concluded that if we want to make good use of grounded theory it is necessary to read many related books, and then carry out research by applying grounded theory.