The Challenges and Benefits of Using Participant Observation to Understand the Social Interaction of Adults with Intellectual Disabilities

Abstract

Observation methods have been used in both communication and interaction research. Qualitative interpretive approaches are rare where participants have complex communication needs. Issues for qualitative researchers utilizing participant observation research methods have been well documented, but a similar discussion is lacking where the participants are people with severe intellectual disability. Observational data collected from a study of adults with severe intellectual disabilities in interaction with their social network members were scrutinized to identify challenges and benefits of participant observation. Challenges identified include the consent process, changing roles, and researcher intrusion. The use of participant observation with adults with severe intellectual disabilities allows for unexpected insights and provides context and credence for other lines of inquiry. Participant observation may be useful with other groups of people.

Keywords::

• Severe intellectual disability
• Interaction
• Adult
• Participant observation

Declaration of interest: The authors report no conflict of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of the paper.

Notes

1. AAC conventions were added for the purposes of the article, although they may not have been applied in the author’s original field notes.

2. FN represents the field notes, S represents the first letter of the central participant’s name, 10 represents the 10th observation session.

3. Sign and gesture used with people with an intellectual disability (Grove & Walker, 1990).

4. Australian Sign Language (Johnston, 2010).