Description

Qualitative, quantitative, or mixed methods: An analysis of research design in articles on principal professional development (1998–2008)

OKSANA PARYLO

Department of Lifelong Education, Administration and Policy, College of Education, University of Georgia, Athens, GA, USA

Abstract

The study’s purpose was to examine the articles on principal professional development published in eight peer-reviewed journals (1998–2008) to assess trends in the types of articles, prevalence of mixed methods designs, and purposes for mixing. Data analyses were implemented in two stages. First stage, a systematic conceptual content analysis was used to categorize articles as conceptual papers (35%), qualitative (22%), mixed methods (18%), quantitative (15%), and literature reviews (10%). Second stage, the analysis of the purpose and design of the mixed methods studies revealed that the method of integration occurred typically at the data interpretation stage; sequential designs and dominant– less dominant designs were prevalent; and complementarity was the most common purpose for combining methods. Implications regarding the identified trends are discussed.

Keywords: principals, professional development, mixed methods, research design, literature review