Methodology - Edit

Investigation methodology

Rough title: ‘How does a child’s language change dependant on who they are conversing with?’

The data that I chose to collect is based on child language acquisition. Before collecting my data there were many factors that I had to consider, including:

• ·         Reliability
• ·         Confidentiality
• ·         Ethicality
• ·         Comparability

Reliability was a main factor that I thoroughly considered.  I had to collect enough data so that any unrepresentative aspects do not seem significant. To do so I:

• ·         Recorded for the same amount of time (ten minutes)
• ·         Recorded on the same day, every week for six weeks

As I was recording the child’s natural speech I had to consider ‘the observer’s paradox’. This states that people change their speech and behavior as soon as they know they are being watched/recorded. To ensure that I collected fair speech, I have only transcribed between four and six minutes of speech leaving me with six lots of two minutes conversations.  However, the child was not completely aware that I was recording him due to permission being granted from his parent as he is aged under sixteen.

This then leads me onto the factor of ethicality. I had to gain informed consent from the parent of the child, as well as the others that were included in the recordings through interacting with the child. To do so, I wrote a formal letter stating my intentions, which was then read through, agreed and signed by all participants. Informed consent allowed everyone involved to understand why I was taking these recordings, who will be accessing it and how I will protect their confidentiality.

Confidentiality was important to me as I wanted to ensure that everybody knew they could have an open, random conversation that will be kept anonymous. To do this, I have changed all names when transcribing the speech, and any personal details have been changed such as birthdays, addresses etc.

I am also looking into comparability between the recordings because who the child is talking to varies between each one. I am going to look at how the child responds and communicates with the different members of the conversation and also determine if it’s due to the language and techniques used by the adult. This is things such as questions and child directed speech. To be comparable, I took the recordings at approximately the same time every week. This was every Wednesday evening starting between 6-630 pm. This is to ensure that the speech was typical of an evening conversation between members of my family.