Non-participant observation is when a researcher observes the participants but doesn’t join in with the group’s activities. It can be unstructured, meaning the researcher observes and records everything they think is relevant or structured, meaning the researcher draws up an observation schedule. This is usually conducted in an overt manner, where participants are aware that they are being observed as part of a study.
As item B outlines, an advantage of using non-participant observation to study anti-school subcultures is that it can allow researchers “to see how pupils actually behave” within their natural environment. Researchers are more likely o witness first-hand anti-social behaviour e.g. missing lessons, bad behaviour in class and smoking, meaning that the data they collect is high in validity.
However, a practical consideration must be linked to the social characteristics of the researcher as if they are older then it may not be possible for the researcher “to observe pupil behaviour in a covert manner” (Item B) unless they pretend to be another teacher. Furthermore there may be difficulty in gaining access to schools where anti-school subcultures are prominent because the school may not allow the researcher to observe the students in a covert manner for safety risks posed to the students.
If the researcher is overtly observing, the Hawthorne effect may occur whereby anti-schools students know they are being observed and therefore change their behaviour e.g. acting more anti-school as this is what they believe the researcher is looking for. This might lower the validity of the results because the behaviour could be ‘artificial’ or exaggerated by the students e.g. truanting even more so that the data is less valid.
Overt non-participant observation does help to reduce ethical issues as there is no deception and this is very important “when observing pupils, especially younger ones” (Item B). This is because the researcher doesn’t have to lie about who he is or why he is at the school, which would occur with covert observation. Furthermore, informed consent would be easier to obtain from the parents as there is no deception to the students.
If using structured and non-participant observation, the predetermined behaviour categories allow for the data to be quantified and comparisons to be drawn easily. For example it may be possible to quantify the anti-school behaviour e.g. how many times a fight broke out, how many times students swore at a teacher etc. This would mean that the data was more reliable as the observation could be conducted again to obtain similar results.
However, this means the researcher predefines the results with the behaviour categories selected. This could be a problem if the researcher has not anticipated all of the types of anti-school behaviour and missed out a behaviour category such as ‘female-bullying’. This would lower the validity as incidents of female bullying might not get recorded if the teacher is not looking out for this behaviour.
In conclusion, while non-participant observation can lack the rapport gained from participant observation it is more ethical and practical when used to observe school pupils. However, an alternative method could be to triangulate unstructured interviews, structured questionnaires and overt non-participant observation. Unstructured interviews would allow for increased validity through a rapport built-up between the researcher and student e.g. the student may feel more happy to open up to a researcher about their true feelings about school such as bullying or teachers if they can answer in their own time. This also allows for verstehen from the researcher to understand the true meanings, feelings and motives of the student. Questionnaires will allow the researcher to gain reliable, quantitative data which could be replicated to obtain similar results and overt non-participant observation can also help to gain data that is high in validity. By triangulating all three, the data would be both high in reliability and validity.
