In qualitative comparative analysis, as with all methods, there is a question about how many cases are needed to make an analysis robust. In deciding on the number of cases, a key consideration is the number of conditions to be analyzed. I suggest that adding cases is preferable to dropping conditions if there are too many conditions relative to…

Data donation is a novel approach to collecting digital trace data, where users are asked to download their retrospective data from a platform and share them with the researchers. Little is known about the willingness to donate data and the potential bias that may arise from nonparticipation. We conducted a study among over 900 German Facebook…

Emotions are omnipresent in any court of law. In this short take, I suggest applying the Articulated Thought in Simulated Situations (ATSS) paradigm as a useful addition to supplement methodologies like interviewing and observations. ATSS, which originated in social sciences to study cognitive--behavioral topics, can be easily adapted for use in…

The objective of our project was to develop a smartphone app for administering shorter ("modular") surveys. Given the paucity of research on this topic, we decided to use "co-design" techniques to generate design solutions. To implement these techniques, we recruited respondents in the survey target population to work in small…

Qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) is an empirical research method that has gained some popularity in the social sciences. At the same time, the literature has long been convinced that QCA is prone to committing causal fallacies when confronted with non-causal data. More specifically, beyond a certain case-to-factor ratio, the method is…

Despite recent methodological advances in saturation, guidelines for its estimation in more complex research designs--such as ethnographic studies--have been lacking. We present an accessible, step-by-step approach to empirical assessment of data saturation, tested on a moderately sized ethnographic study with 109 combined direct observations and…

Not knowing the population size is a common problem in data-limited contexts. Drawing on work in Sierra Leone, this short take outlines a four-step solution to this problem: (1) estimate the population size using expert interviews; (2) verify estimates using interviews with participants sampled; (3) triangulate using secondary data; and (4)…

Conducting research among hard-to-reach populations is a difficult endeavor because some of their characteristics are known to be associated with survey nonresponse and panel attrition. In the case of the Parchemins study, which followed undocumented migrants over their process of regularization and during the first years of regularized life in…

The American Family Health Study (AFHS) collected family health and fertility data from a national probability sample of persons aged 18-49 between September 2021 and May 2022, using web and mail exclusively. In July 2022, we surveyed AFHS respondents and gauged their willingness to become part of a national web panel that would create novel…

Guidelines for conducting surveys by mobile phone calls in low- and middle-income countries suggest keeping interviews short (<20 minutes). The evidence supporting this recommendation is scant, even though limiting interview duration might reduce the amount of data generated by such surveys. We recruited nearly 2,500 mobile phone users in…

To date, research on elite interviews has primarily focused on political or business settings in European and Anglo-American contexts. In this study, we examine the procedures involved in conducting elite interviews in academic settings, drawing on fieldwork with 53 senior scholars at 10 universities across five regions of northern China. We…

Participatory modeling (PM) is an engaged research methodology for creating analog or computer-based models of complex systems, such as socio-environmental systems. Used across a range of fields, PM centers stakeholder knowledge and participation to create more internally valid models that can inform policy and increase engagement and trust…

Photovoice involves respondents taking photographs of their environment to promote critical discussions and reflect on their experiences. Photovoice empowers marginalized communities and serves to reach policymakers. The Arizona Youth Identity Project (AZYIP) used photovoice with an innovative approach in a multisite research design with a large…

Researchers based in low- and middle-income countries (LMIC) often cannot access conventional but high-priced ethnographic tools. I developed a low-cost methodology as an exercise in meeting the needs of both LMIC-based researchers and the broader qualitative community. As demonstrated in this proof of concept, ethnographic researchers should…

In a mixed-methods study on poverty in Germany, we conducted qualitative interviews and collected quantitative data on ego-centered networks using a name-generator approach and a single set of respondents. Based on the qualitative data, we first developed a typology of negative ties and then evaluated which of these ties the name generator (on…