Systematic Inquiry into Barriers to Researcher Access: Evidence from a Homeless Shelter

Abstract

Geographers using qualitative methods face numerous challenges, including barriers to access to the research setting that emerge through the interactions among the researcher's identity, participants, and the research setting itself. However, few geographers have systematically traced, within a single research setting, (1) how barriers originate, (2) how they subsequently complicate the research enterprise, and (3) how they may potentially be overcome. Upon defining various generic barriers to access, I focus on the origins of, encounters with, and potential strategies to overcome two barriers (factions and spatiotemporal limits) during my research experiences at the Palms Mission, an emergency shelter in Central Los Angeles. Ultimately, understanding the negotiation of these barriers informs the broader research process.

Key Words:

• qualitative research methodologies
• barriers to access
• homeless shelters

Notes

1 The vast majority of publications tends to understate or ignore the importance of human subjects review, especially how it may present a bureaucratic barrier that potentially disrupts both the timing and methodological approach of the research.

2 There is also a tendency for ex-clients to become staff members who are particularly prone to “tough love” tactics ( 34 Weinberg and Koegel 1995 ).

*I would like to thank Bonnie Hallman, Lois Takahashi, and Jennifer Wolch, as well as the National Science Foundation Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement Award (BCS–0000248), the Weingart Center, and the Haynes Foundation for their support.