The Qualitative Research Methods for Everyone podcast brings author and professor Karen O’Reilly into challenging conversations with students, academics and practitioners around the world. Together, they explore how the toolkit approach - a curated collection of expert skills, knowledge, procedures, tools and information - can help navigate the complex terrain of contemporary qualitative research methods. 

Today I am fortunate to have Dr Nick Osbaldiston joining me from Australia. Nick is Associate Professor at James Cook University and a research fellow at the Cairns Institute. His research work focuses on lifestyle migration, internal migration, social theory, Australia's coasts, higher education labour and climate change adaptation.

Our chat centred around Chapter 5, Group Discussions. Nick teaches focus group methods to social work students, who enjoy using the approach to investigate policy. Nick also has unique insights because he uses diverse quantitative and diverse qualitative methods in his own research.

He raises the issue of power in group interviews and surprisingly tells us he sometimes finds it more valuable to observe power dynamics in a group rather than trying to manage them. For example, he has brought government officials, NGOs and community members together to see how they interact and to note the nature of dominant voices.

We also touch on body language and emotional reflexivity, highlighting how emotions—not necessarily negative ones—can inspire fantastic group discussions. It is great to hear some of Nick’s anecdotes from his applied and coastal research. A fantastic insight insight he offers: you can teach methods for decades, but you only really learn them with experience. 

Special thanks to Bahar Celik Muller, Senior Marketing Executive and Martha Gleeson, Digital Marketing Executive, for their support, advice and expertise.

Find out more about the book: https://policy.bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/qualitative-research-methods-for-everyone

Intro music: Good Times Are Coming by Bohdan Kuzmin from Pixabay.

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