Who to recruit, Piloting, Peer feedback, Making informants feel at ease, Compensations

1. Antti Salovaara
Aalto University, School of Business
23 January 2015
Methods in User–Technology Studies
Practical tips
12.45 – 13.15

2. Who to recruit
Piloting
Peer feedback
Making informants feel at ease
Compensations
Practical tips

3. Who to recruit
Only recruit representative participants
Don’t prioritize ease of recruitment over its representativeness
Heterogeneity vs homogeneity
1) Comparability of individuals against each other
è homogeneous sample
2) Covering spectrum of examples to investigate a phenomenon
in the richest possible way è heterogeneous sample
Random vs. convenience sampling
Random = each case in your data has a prior probability of having
been selected at random
Convenience = you recruit cases as you see best fit (e.g.,
snowball, recruiting until you have a “good” number of participants,
etc.)
Don’t spoil your data by using bad methods!
In many cases you can carry out your data collection only once

4. Piloting
= trying out your methods on people other than your
sample
Example pilot participants:
Yourself (e.g., in survey fill-in, usability studies)
Friends and colleagues
Pilot alternatives:
Asking for comments
Doing the study “for real”
Small-sample study (e.g., in surveys)
Piloting as a part of another study
Several pilots may be necessary
Pilots often save you from many embarrassing errors

5. Peer feedback
Gather feedback to your research plan as much as you
can
Colleagues:
Trading favours (“if you comment this, I owe you one favour”)
Research seminars
In your department
Also other school’s/departments’ seminars as a visitor
Purpose of peer feedback: “early failure”
If your research plan has problems, it’s best to learn about them as
early as possible

6. Making informants feel at ease
= “establishing rapport” in ethnographic research
Some techniques:
! Non-judgmental behaviour
Spending time with the participants
Show that you know the culture and practices of the community
Reciprocate informants’ stories by revealing something meaningful
about yourself *
For interviews, choose the right place
Tell what happens to sensitive content that is collected (“it remains
within the research team”)
* Ignatius, E. & Kokkonen, M. (2003). Tarpeeksi mutta ei liikaa: itsestä kertomiseen vaikuttavat tekijät [Enough but not too
much: Factors affecting self-disclosure]. Psykologia, 38(5), 346--358.

7. Example: peak experiences in live-action
role playing Show that you know the
culture and practices of the
community:
Upon arrival to the game
location, asking what kind of
“start briefs” there will be
Reciprocate
informants’ stories by
revealing something
meaningful about
yourself:
Prepare stories of
one’s own peak
experiences (also
emotional ones) in
LARPing
For interviews, choose
the right place:
Some background noise,
arranged in a neutral
social space, warm
colours (è a café)
Chairs arranged so that
researcher does not
seem to block
participant’s exit
Tell what happens to sensitive content that is
collected:
“Some of your stories may be very personal. I’ll
transcribe these interviews by myself, and while I
may use the sensitive material in my analysis, I will
not use it in the reports and publications”
© Author

8. Compensations
It’s fair to compensate participants for their efforts
Gift cards, movie tickets, money
Universities differ in their policies
Administration personnel tends to be overly careful
Be ready to fight for your right to compensate
@ Aalto: Two forms of compensations:
1) Compensation for efforts for each participant
A gift card, money, or movie tickets
Considered as salary, must be paid through Aalto salary system
If 20 eur or above, income tax deduction must be applied
2) Lottery
Income tax deduction not necessary if remains under 100 eur
If above 100 eur, Tax authority must be informed
Same person can be compensated many times as long as it is lottery

9. Coffee