Focus Groups in Qualitative Research

Importance of Focus Groups in Qualitative Research

Focus groups have a large value in qualitative research. Before we dive into its significance, let’s first review what a focus group is.

Depending on the research conducted, members of the focus group could all share similar opinions or host different ones.

Fig. 1 -What could you participate in a focus group for?

Focus groups allow the moderator to ask direct questions and get answers and opinions from the participants. The participants’ true thoughts might not be collected without this means of qualitative research. Additionally, focus groups allow people to form new ideas based on the answers of the other focus group members.

Focus groups are also a useful tool in qualitative research because they allow the researchers to conduct a large amount of data in a shorter amount of time. This efficiency allows the researchers to either include more participants in their research or further analyze their data with that saved time.

Types of Focus Groups in Qualitative Research

If you decide to use a focus group as a means to collect your qualitative data, you have a wide variety of options from which to choose. Let’s review five of the most commonly used types of focus groups.

Single Focus Group

A single focus group has a moderator and a small group of participants who discuss the research topic. While there can sometimes be multiple moderators in the room, this is the standard setup for a single focus group.

Two-Way Focus Group

A two-way focus group has two focus groups running at the same time. The first focus group and a moderator will discuss a topic while the second group watches them. Typically, the second group observes behind a one-way mirror so the second focus group can see the first but not vice-versa. During the first group’s discussion, the second group will observe them, and the second group’s moderator will ask them questions. The goal of this type of focus group is to have the first group’s answers stimulate new ideas in the second group.

Dueling Moderator Focus Group

Dueling moderator focus groups have what you might imagine – two moderators with different opinions. In this setup, one focus group will have two moderators with drastically different viewpoints. This disparity between the moderators will hopefully expose the participants to new perspectives, leading to the inspiration of fresh ideas.

Mini Focus Group

As you might guess by the name, mini focus groups are even smaller than regular focus groups. Typically, the reason for the use of a mini focus group is that the potential participant pool is so small.

Online Focus Group

Even though online focus groups seem self-explanatory, let’s review them anyway. Online focus groups take place over the internet and can be in a chat room, forum, or any other way you can think of. This online characteristic allows the researchers to reach a wider audience since the participants don’t need to be in person to partake in the discussion. However, online focus groups are limited to those with computers and those who would know how to access an online focus group.

Focus Group in Qualitative Research: Example

Focus groups are used for a variety of purposes in qualitative research. Let’s pretend you’re researching racial housing discrimination in the suburb where you live. You base your study on talking with people and learning about their experiences, so you choose focus groups as a means to conduct research. You conduct multiple focus groups of people with similar characteristics – for example, one focus group with white residents, one with black residents, one with mixed residents, one with Latino residents, and so on.

Fig. 2 How diverse is your neighborhood?

When the participants are in a focus group with other residents that share demographics, they will talk more freely about their experiences since they know others in the room have had similar occurrences. A focus group will elicit an honest discussion about certain racial groups' discrimination and what can be done to remedy the situation.

While researchers can collect similar data in an interview or survey, it would not have been as comprehensive as a focus group. Choosing focus groups as the means to collect the data opens the door for frank conversations among people who share similar experiences. These discussions would not have happened in an interview or a survey.

Advantages of Focus Groups in Qualitative Research

As we’ve touched on before, focus groups are a great way of having the participants interact with other participants to formulate different ideas. Focus groups expose participants to other ideas or viewpoints that they might not have considered without the exposure to the other participants. Additionally, since the researcher serves as a moderator, they can direct the conversation to focus on what they want.

Focus groups are a time-efficient way of conducting research. In an interview, the moderator speaks to one person for an hour, while in a focus group, the moderator speaks to a group of people for an hour. This difference saves the researcher time and increases the number of participants.

In focus groups, researchers can also read the participants' body language and social cues. While this advantage of a focus group might not be applicable in all educational fields, if the moderator is a psychologist, they would understand the unspoken cues about the participants’ answers.

Disadvantages of Focus Groups in Qualitative Research

Despite the peaks of focus groups, there are disadvantages to this type of qualitative research. While focus groups can lead to good discussions and the participants formulating new ideas, it’s never guaranteed that the participants will have good chemistry. If the participants get along well, it could lead to a great conversation about the research topic. However, if the participants do not take well to the other participants, the conversation could be stiff, and limited, and not provide the researchers with good data.

In that vein, a participant could dominate the conversation or make others feel uncomfortable. This control would lead to the other participants not being truthful, limiting how valid the focus group can be. Additionally, participants might not want to voice their opinions if they deviate from the group (or social) norm.

Even with the best intentions, the moderator of the focus group can hold biases. Since the moderator leads the discussion, these biases may influence the participants' opinions.

Finally, focus groups can produce data that is hard to analyze. Since focus groups rely on conversation amongst the participants, there is no structure to the group. This lack of structure makes it difficult for researchers to analyze the data since it has no path or outline.

Focus Groups vs. Interviews in Qualitative Research

In qualitative research, there are a handful of great options to collect research. Focus groups are often compared to interviews since they both involve a researcher or moderator speaking with a participant (or participants). Despite these similarities, there are key differences between these qualitative research methods.

Interviews have the same setup as a focus group, but the researcher only asks one participant the questions instead of a handful of people. Only having one participant interviewed at a time leads to them honestly answering the questions, a limitation of focus groups. The researcher can tailor their questions directly to the participant which can produce data that is more directly related to the research topic.

However, interviews can be significantly more expensive and time-consuming than focus groups.

Interviews and focus groups are both great tools for researchers; it just depends on the researcher's budget and how they want to conduct their research.