Frontpage» Research

Q Methodology in Research with Young Children

The objective of this discussion is to raise ethical, methodological, and practical issues concerning research with young children and the use of Q methodology through our experiences with a study of young children’s feelings when in situations related to parental divorce.

This article is published from a research and development project named the Bambi-project.

Q methodology was applied with 20 visual statements depicting a range of feelings for five-year-old children from Norwegian daycare centers to sort according to a “How you generally feel?” condition of instruction. The issues resulting from this work are ethical considerations, methodological reflections, and practical concerns.
 

Keywords: Ethics, children’s feelings, divorce, Q methodology, visual images
 

Reference:
Thorsen, A. A. & Størksen, I. (2010). Ethical, Methodological, and Practical Reflections when using Q Methodology in Research with Young Children. Operant Subjectivity: The International Journal of Q Methodology, 33 (1/2), 3-25.
 

The Research Council of Norway supported the project through grant number 187572/S20.

Last edited by Trude Havik (10.08.2010)

Print print symbol

Norwegian Centre for Learning Environment and Behavioural Research in Education produces research based knowledge on the devel-opment of social and emotional problems among children and adolescents, and the reduction and prevention of such issues.

At CBR the researchers study bullying, learning and inclusion, school development, social and language skills, special school settings, discipline, motivation, management and practice.

If you have tips, contributions and suggestions about the research information on the website, contact our editor.