The primary information collected during the researchers direct observations of participants, being the production of interview transcripts is un-biased, as the researcher collected it themselves, giving them more control in the data being original.
Nonetheless, participants may have unknowingly held back information or might have given answers that they thought would give the known researcher what they wanted and/or needed to hear. On the other hand, some answers were not as detailed, this could have been due to withholding information due to the knowing of each other.
The data was reported in the language of the participant and was analysed by themes from the description given.
When using thematic analysis (Braun & Clark, 2006), several themes were identified:
Theme 1- Both participants have jobs and can financially support themselves.
Theme 2- Both are concerned with their time management.
Theme 3- No problems were mentioned from either, when adapting to new peers or environments.
Theme 4- Both have active family and social lives, making the workload a concern for both.
The main concern was identified as time management and workload based on the summary of the similarities and differences from both interviews.
Additional support of this result can be found in the wider reading journal articles published by Burston (2017), Anderson et al (2017) and Graham (2015).
In accordance with the literature review articles, each acknowledged the main concern of time management but considered it was not the primary concern.
Furthermore, by not using a leading title question, the research data was considered non-subjective, which in regard made strength in providing qualitative data accessible.
Then again, the word ‘concern’ wasn’t suggestible in each question, therefore not focused upon to influence answers. This made the advantage of forming a conclusion more viable.
However, by carrying out the interviews, advantages of using open questions resulted in rich and detailed data being collected.
What is more, differences arose within the result similarly. Participant 1 has no in-depth knowledge of the course only brief information known. Whereas participant 2 has previous experience from starting the course prior, therefore knowledge is apparent.
Weaknesses in the research was evident by the barrier that was found in relation to gathering results from each researcher, evident by only 2 interviews being conducted, transcribed and provided for thematic analysis within the time period.
What’s more, made the results limited and refutes the validity of them as more data could have been analysed and used to narrow down the themes.
Results were also different in the area of the age difference of the participants. More life experience was evident from one participant than the other.
