Six Impossible Things Before Breakfast

SITBB Vault: Genetics, Adoption and ART: Class Discussion Points

Greetings, Dr. Rossmann's psychology students! (And all others are welcome to this post as well!)

The discussion and questions below are meant to provide further context for my remarks about genetics as it relates to adoption and ART.

Introduction

Genetics has always been an issue in adoption, although not always an explicit issue. For example, some observers note that the legal process of adoption disconnects genetic parent-child bonds to create non-genetic parent-child bonds. The practice of adoption has at various historical times and geographical places intersected with genetics in various ways: sometimes creating informal family arrangements within pre-existing genetic kinship networks; at other times using the latest in developmental and behavioral science to assess the likely outcomes of adopted children; and at still other times de-emphasizing the role of genetics in favor of the power of environments.

Adoption is an ancient practice. More recent developments in another means of family formation--assisted reproductive technologies (ART)--have spurred new examinations of this longer standing practice. In particular, ART and related technologies have made genetics, once again, a key area of interest in research on and policy discussions of adoption.

Video: Pre-implantation Genetic Diagnosis

Please click here to view the video from the New York Times online. The video (less than 6 minutes long) provides a brief explanation of a particular type of reproductive technology known as pre-implantation genetic diagnosis, or PGD.

In addition to providing an easily understood description, the video touches on several points illustrating some parallels as well as divergences between methods of ART and adoption. As you view the video, think about the following points and questions:

1) Early in the video, the father mentions that the decision making around whether or not to use PGD was difficult, but that in the end "having a healthy child outweighs everything." Further, the narrator describes his daughter born via PGD as "a perfectly healthy" toddler. Did this technology really guarantee that this child will be "perfectly healthy? Is it OK for people thinking about becoming adoptive parents to also strive to only adopt "perfectly healthy" children?

2) In adoption, one issue that is frequently discussed is which children get "chosen" or who are seen as "adoptable" and which children are not. An interesting combination of groups of activists have also raised similar issues with regard to PGD and similar technologies. For example, people who are against abortion point out that to create the "perfectly healthy" embryo to be implanted, other embryos that are created in the process may be destroyed. Some in the disability rights community have objected to such practices because of the fear that they change the way we view "normal" and what is considered to be an acceptable range of human illness, functioning, and capacity.

3) Another area where adoption overlaps with ART involves isues of cost and access. However, many adoption advocates note that it is increasingly the case that couples and individuals are paying much more money to use services such as PGD than they would have spent by adopting, especially adopting from the foster care system. What reasons can you think of for people choosing to build their families through methods of ART rather than adoption?

Family and Individual Psychology

All of these (and many more) questions have both ethical and psychological components. At the core of these questions, for me, is this one:

What is the importance of genetics for people in the context of their family lives?

In other words, I am interested in my work in trying to figure out how genetics "plays out" in how people think of themselves; how they function as members of families, communities, and racial/ethnic groups; and what decisions they make in areas as diverse as health care and educational attainment.

Coding for Process: Basics of GTM

When listening listening to a piece of music..., one cannot help but be struck by all the variations in tone and sound. We know that music, whether it be jazz, popular, or classical, is composed of a series of notes, some played fast, some slow, some loud, others soft, sometimes played in one key, sometimes in another, often with movement back and forth between keys. Even pauses have purpose and are part of the sound. It is the playing of these notes, with all of their variations and in coordinated sequences, that gives music its sense of movement, rhythm, fluidity, and continuity.

To us, process is like a piece of music. It represents the rhythm, changing and repetitive forms, pauses, interruptions, and varying movements that make up sequences of action/interaction...

~Straus & Corbin, Basics of Qualitative Research: Techniques and Procedures for Developing Grounded Theory, p. 164

By the way, the music on random play on the perryPod while I was reading this chapter:

Be Still My Beating Heart-Sting
Thickness-Jill Scott
(Not Just) Knee Deep-Funkadelic
Love Is Blindness-Cassandra Wilson
American Woman-Lenny Kravitz
Sweet and Lovely-Thelonius Monk Quartet
Break You Off-The Roots
Black Orpheus-Regina Carter
Agua de Beber-Al Jarreau
Cisco Kid-War
Wholy Holy-Aretha Franklin
Poetry Man-Zap Mama
"Autumn": II Adagio Molto (Vivaldi Concerto in F Major)-Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg
Be Real Black for Me-Roberta Flack and Donny Hathaway
Chant-Robert Glasper
Freedom-George Michael
Bada Bing-Danger Doom
Love Calls-Kem
Flamenco Sketches-Miles Davis

If, indeed, process is music, hopefully my own process of coding for process will turn out to have been more holy, sweet and lovely and not so much blindness, war, and doom. (Previous "Basics of GTM" post: Questions for Dummies.)

Questions for Dummies: Basics of GTM

Now, I'm not saying you're a dummy--and I am certainly not claiming to not be a dummy myself about qualitative research (that is, the hypothetical book to the right could just as well be by as for a "dummy"). But I think I may have some small nuggets of non-obvious knowledge to pass along as I continue to develop my expertise in one method of qualitative research, Grounded Theory Methods (GTM).

So, I present here one such nugget. Enjoy!

The Importance of Questions in Grounded Theory Methods (GTM)

Definitely NOT a book about GTM "by dummies" is Strauss & Corbin's Basics of Qualitative Research: Techniques and Procedures for Developing Grounded Theory. These authors--one (Strauss) was a co-founder of the Grounded Theory method--say that asking questions is one of the "two operations [that] are absolutely essential for the development of theory" using the method. There may be no dumb questions in the classroom, but there are questions in GTM that are, if not "dumb," better than others.

What are good questions in GTM? According to Strauss & Corbin,

A good question is one that leads the researcher to answers that serve the developing theoretical formulation. Many questions can be asked, and just as many can lead the researcher down a subsidiary path, one that might be interesting but not in service of the evolving theory (p. 76, emphasis added).

The authors go on to describe their suggestions for four different types of questions. The first two of these are "sensitizing questions" that "tune the researcher into what the data might be indicating," and "theoretical questions" that "help the researcher to see process, variation, and ... to make connections among concepts" (p. 77). (The other two types I'll not discuss: practical/structural and guiding questions.)

Did you get that? Unless you've had your nose in qualitative research books non-stop for almost a year like I have, probably not. I often feel like I did not start "getting" GTM until I drank the methodological kool-aid. A lot of this stuff does sound kind of cult-ish in nature, like if you do not understand you just haven't properly given over your mind and spirit to The Method. But actually, it is not so difficult.

For example, questions of the first kind, sensitizing, include:

• What is going on here (e.g., issues, problems, concerns)?
• Who are the actors involved?
• How do they define the situation?
• What is its meaning for them?
• Are their definitions and meanings the same or different?

And examples of the second kind of questions include:

• What is the relationship of one concept to another?
• What would happen if...?
• How do events and actions change over time?
• What are the larger structural issues here, and how do these events play into or affect what I am seeing or hearing?

Hypothesis vs. Question: Null

One of the first things learned by students of qualitative research is that while quantitative research speaks of research hypotheses, qualitative research speaks of research questions. (The extent to which that is true or not can be debated--for example, some quantitative research is more exploratory in nature and deals in research questions while some qualitative work is more confirmatory in nature and deals in explicit hypotheses or more hypothesis-like questions. But that's a digression for another time.)

A staple of much quantitative analysis (especially for those learning it) has been the idea of the "null hypothesis". Again, some disclaimers are in order: there is some fair amount of controversy in research about just what the null hypothesis does/can tell and does/can not tell researchers. Additionally, it is not uncommon for research to make unfounded conclusions about alternative hypotheses based on their statistical rejection or non-rejection of the null. But the idea of the null hypothesis, to me, is a useful metaphor--if nothing else--for the research process: We want with our research to clear away randomness and the meaninglessness in order to be able to see the patterns and the logic.

Thinking about the null hypothesis got me wondering: What would be the equivalent qualitative question to the null hypothesis? What is the question that you, as a researcher, are trying to reject?

One possibility of a "null question" is actually a two-parter, question plus answer: Is there anything of interest going on here? No, there is not. Just as you might try to find statistically significant differences in quantitative scores to disprove such a statement, in qualitative research we might think of analyzing data for qualitatively significant differences in participants' responses to disprove this null Q&A.

The null question may end up being true. It may be that there is nothing patterned or analytically meaningful or otherwise news- or PhD-worthy about anything that any of my participants say, or--if there is--my qualitative skills are too weak to detect them and my dissertation and entire PhD quest has been all for nothing--

OK, that isn't so much a null question as every dissertator's deepest fear. (And that is a topic for another day...)

A Word from the Wise

Advice is one of those things it is far more blessed to give than to receive. ~Carolyn Wells

The Adoption Project Research Intern, Extraordinaire (henceforth, E.S. for short!) is currently using my lay theory* framework for an undergraduate research project examining responses from adoptive parents to an interview question asking them for their advice to prospective adopters. After a quick tour of various journal indexes, I see that there is lots in the literature on advice to and for parents (including adoptive parents). But there is not a lot about parents themselves as sources of advice for others. (E.S.: That would actually be a neat anecdotal stat to include in the introduction: Something about the number of advice books on amazon.com for adoptive parents.) This fact provides a clue about what an interesting and innovative research question this is.

Adoptive parents' advice to (hypothetical) prospective adoptive parents might give a quick but very vivid snapshot of their experiences as adoptive parents and their lay theories on adoptive family relationships. I have previously referenced one article that does discuss "advice-giving" in the context of people's lay theories. The article is not about parenting, let alone adoptive parenting. But often when you are exploring new areas, it is worth looking at articles that seem to be about topics very different from your own or that focus on an entirely different participant pool. This article is available on-line through the U's library system:

Lay theories of successful aging after the death of a spouse

Author: Bergstrom M J M
From: Health communication
Date: 2000
Volume: 12
Issue: 4
Pages: 377-406

Very similar to the interview question in MTARP, this study's participants were asked “Is there any advice that you would give someone else in a situation similar to yours?� According to the authors:

As a means of uncovering and explicating lay theories of aging, we investigate the advice a bereaved spouse would give to other bereaved spouses after the death of a partner. Such advice asking prompts participants to move from the “local narrative� (Bochner**, 1994, p. 21) of direct experience to generalized principles offered as guidance for others.

The major research question of this study involved comparing participants' responses to formal scientific theories about successful aging. The results were similar to other research on lay theories in that participants' theories were pretty eclectic, containing aspects of several scholarly theories simultaneously:

[M]ost of the examples reported earlier reflect multiple, formal theories of successful aging. ...The resulting lack of internal consistency is problematic for formal theories but is expected in lay theories. Future studies should recognize that older adults do have multiple, implicit theories of successful aging, and they do not appear to be troubled by resulting contradictions or inconsistencies. Our respondents’ most central meaning structure indicates that individuals currently coping with changes that must be met to age successfully recognize the importance of any one individual’s personal experience and meaning when adjusting to change.

While I do not think it will be necessary to do such a lay-formal theory comparisson in this project, I do think one interesting aspect of the project will involve looking at apparent "inconsistencies" in advice: including inconsistencies between adoptive mothers (as a group) and adoptive fathers (as a group), within each individual's narrative of advice, and between married couples. (Of course, "consistencies" will also likely be present and those will also be interesting to examine.)

The first step is to just determine the content of the parents' advice: What advice do they report they would offer to others thinking about adoption? In case anyone finding and reading this post is an adoptive parent, what advice would you give?

*Previous SITBB posts on the development of the lay theory concept here and here.

**Bochner, A. P. (1994). Perspectives on inquiry II: Theories and stories. In M. L. Knapp & G. R. Miller (Eds.), Handbook of interpersonal communication (2nd ed., pp. 21–41). Newbury Park, CA: Sage.

Further discussion questions:

1) What were the MTARP researchers' original intent in including the "advice" interview question? (E.S.: Feel free to ask Dr. G.!)

2) The article I discuss here talks about "successful aging." Do the authors provide any definitions for what constitutes success in aging? In our sample, what might some of the parents define as "successful adoptive parenting"? Is this different than "successful parenting, period"?

3) How might qualitative research be better able than quantitative research to capture the expertise of adoptive parents? In what ways might quantitative research be better able to do this than qualitative?

4) The article authors state that in lay theories inconsistent beliefs are not a problem for people--and are, in fact, to be expected. Why do you think this is? (To help you think about this, think of someone who might believe both of these sayings: "Birds of a feather flock together" and "Opposites attract.")

Fugue on Backpacks and Compasses

Backpack, backpack; Backpack, backpack; I'm the backpack Loaded up With things and knick-knacks, too; Anything that you might need I got inside for you. Backpack, backpack; Backpack, backpack!

Most of the time, the theme songs from the shows my children watch run through my head on infinite loop merely to drive me slowly but steadily crazy.

But every once in a while they exist for a higher, more noble purpose--such as to tune my subconscious into an intellectually fruitful frequency...some spot on the cognitive radio dial that usually comes in very static-y or not at all. Except during those rare and very brief moments when the atmosphere and invisible sound waves admit the tiniest audible communication.

Such was the case a few months ago when I was in the midst of my piloting phase of research. I had been working since 5 am following up on my coding team meeting the day before. I had been trying to nail down what the heck I aimed to capture through the qualitative coding process: How do adoptive lay genetics translate to observable and quantifiable categories? What is the overlap between aspects of these lay understandings and the actual data that I have available to me?

I went back to a key phrase from my research plan, the Dora the Explorer song in my head (Backpack, backpack; Backpack, backpack) thanks to audio from the kids' Dora video seeping into my workspace from the playroom. I wrote down this key phrase above the top line of a blank page of my yellow, three-hole-punch legal pad:

I underlined it. Underneath I wrote:

I thought about that for a minute. Was interrupted by one of my daughters who wanted to know if she could have her cookie from Perkins. Helped my other daughter put in a new tape ("Elmo's World"). Went back to the pad. Crossed out feel and wrote underneath navigate. This is a word that I have read a lot in different accounts of adoptive family life: Adoptive families navigate this and navigate that. I think I even used the term myself in the research plan for my dissertation fellowship. OK, so navigate it is. (Backpack, backpack...)

I scribbled some more stuff on the page and eventually got around to making a list and the list had four things on it:

• Thru accessing information


• Thru the exercising of power and control


• Thru the forging of alternate ties


• Thru the purposeful evaluation of sims and diffs

I had more scribbles where I tried out other words and asked myself questions:

"accessing?"
"Not just accessing--also deals w/evaluation/assessment of info."
"Exercising?"
"Not just exercise--orientation toward control--could decide no control OK."
"Evaluation" or "interpretation"?

So, how might adoptive parents navigate the fact of their lack of genetic tie to their adopted children? (Backpack, backpack...) Perhaps through information, agency, alternate ties, and intentional interpretation of similarities and differences between themselves and their children?

I was pretty excited here because the idea of navigation and the list that contained four items reminded me of a compass and its four main directional orientations. I tore out that page of my yellow three-hole-punch pad and began a fresh sheet. I copied at the top

Ahhhh, now it was not navigate but orient--as in directional orientation--because I had in mind the four directions: north, south, east, west.

Backpack, backpack; Backpack, backpack: I'm the backpack loaded up with things and knick-knacks, too...

About this time I realized I had been hearing this song in my head despite the fact that the video had been over for some time. In the margin of my yellow pad, at an angle, I jotted out the words to this little jingle. Above it I wrote

"different tasks" (referring to the oft-repeated statement by many adoption researchers and other professionals that adoptive parents must often perform additional tasks than do parents who are related to their children by birth).

"different tools."

That's what I am getting at--what I mean by how do they orient themselves. They may do this through the use of different tools.

I filled up the second half of the page and a third of the next with this little story:

Were going on a journey: Where do we go in order to view our family situation as compared to the family situation of others? Here's what we decide to take on our journey:

• Information
• Power/control/agency
• Alternate/replacement ties
• Interpretive glasses to view similarities and differences

Our backpack: We might pack light or we might pack a lot of stuff. We might require very specialized tools, or more general or flexible tools. We might rely more on formal guides, or depend more on our own intuition, or seek out tips from fellow or past travelers. We might be primed to see on the way foliage or birds or rock formations or woodland animals. Of these flora and fauna, we might focus on how they remind us of others we've seen, or how they are more exotic than what were used to. And we may think them beautiful or ugly.

...anything that you might need, I got inside for you...

Maps and books. Tools. Rope. Goggles. Everything we need to go either north or south or east or west. And from that place we look on our family a certain way--we have a certain "theory" about us as a family, a family that just happens to include parents and children who are unrelated genetically. We look at our family this way because of who we are and where we've been on our journey and the tools that we either already had or found/acquired/fashioned ourselves along the way.

...My thinking about my research journey has changed somewhat since I made these notes months ago. Actually, it is a little embarrassing, the breathlessness that characterizes much of my brainstorming notes. And of course there is still a lot more work to do. These thoughts represent just one step for me towards greater understanding of my research. But as Dora could tell me, any journey begins with just that.

Considering the Wars Over Quality in Qualitative Research (Part One)

These are just a few thoughts about one important issue I have had to consider in designing my secondary qualitative research methodology: quality--which is defined generally as "Having a high degree of excellence." Many things, to my mind, are involved in quality research. For example, research should be conducted in an ethical manner by capable researchers; it should begin with careful and intentional conceptualization of concepts that are then linked logically to indicators; and it should seek to impart tentative answers that are relevant and important to the broader world outside of the laboratory walls. But a small slice of this quality pie are the two issues of reliabilityand validity. With these standards, we become sure that the "knowledge" we claim to have observed/tested/discovered is not a one-time fluke and that it is actually what we claim it to be.

Ready, Aim, Fire

The very first methodology text* I ever used had a useful description of reliability and validity:

If you can think of measurement as analogous to hitting the bull's-eye on a target, you'll see that reliability looks like a "tight pattern," regardless of where it hits, since reliability is a function of consistency. Validity, on the other hand, is a function of shots being arranged around the bull's eye (p. 133).

In reality both concepts are a lot more involved than this: The actual arrows in your "measurement quiver" are of different sorts for different analytical needs. But I have always kept that description--and its corresponding concentric circle and dot scatter graphic--in my mind when I think about these important methodological issues. If "quality" in research is partly about "what do we know, and how do we know it," then with reliability we know the same thing over and over again, and with validity we (on average) know in the end what we claim to have sought to know at the start. The best situation is when we know what we set out to know, and we know that with a high degree of consistency.

In the realm of qualitative research, this overall goal is often the same, but the standards for reaching it have often been descibed differently. As with every other aspect of the Great Quantitative-Qualitative Wars, this issue has meant the deployment of many foot soldier scholars and much ink and paper--of course leaving us students in the crossfire. The issue of validity has seemed more battled over than reliability. This is perhaps because threats to reliability may be seen as random, or minor difficulties that can be corrected with more training, better concept/indicator-defining, or other relatively simple fixes. Threats to validity, however, are perhaps seen as more systematic...more fatal...more likely to involve sitting-straight-up-in-the-bed-in-the-middle-of-the-night-with-the-horror-that-your-whole-research-project-is- doomed moments.

Drawing Battle Lines (and Tables)

There seem to be two general approaches to validity (and reliability) in qualitative research. I'll discuss the second approach in a future post. But first, what seems to me to be the standard view: to redefine reliability and validity as they relate to qualitative methodology specifically, quite apart from quantitative methodology. In other words, it is typical to read disccussions of quality issues in qualitative research that assume that there are significant differences between how quality is and should be defined within the two research traditions. A fairly detailed summary is the following:

Morrow, S. L. (2005). Quality and trustworthiness in qualitative research in counseling psychology. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 52, 250-260.

The author provides a categorization of the approaches to--and, more importantly, labels for--quality qualitative work. So, for example, she groups the qualities of credibility, transferability, dependability, and confirmability in the postpositivist paradigmatic camp. These are likely familiar to most students who have taken an introductory qualitative methodology course, corresponding (in some difficult to understand new-math way) to the concepts of validity and reliability--which are taken to be quantitative research-specific concepts and inapporopriate to discussions of qualitative methods.

But Morrow describes other standards. (Or are they other words for the same or similar standards?) For example, under the interpretive-constructivism paradigm are such criteria as fairness and co-construction; and under the critical-ideological rubric is the standard of transgressiveness.

It is not that I find these categories uninformative or uninteresting. I think they are very rich for students of the philosophy of social science research. But I feel such a categorization forces most of us student-researchers to walk even deeper into the political research mine-fields: Now not only are we stopped at checkpoints and demanded at saber point to declare whether or not we are "quantitative researchers" or "qualitative researchers," but we must further state whether we are positivists, garden variety postpositivists, interpretivist-constructivists, or critical-ideologicalists.

Morrow's is not the only categorization system of quality standards in qualitative research. Creswell, one of my favorite scholars and research methodology writers, describes another approach. His books are must-haves, but the following article is a good summary of the issue I am discussing here:

Creswell, J. W., & Miller, D. L. (2000). Determining validity in qualitative inquiry. Theory Into Practice, 39, 124-130.

Overlapping Morrow's system, the authors provide a categorization of specific quality procedures employing the same three paradigms. In this case these camps are labeled "postpositivist or systematic," "constructivist," and "critical." But the authors provide a second dimension with which to group the procedures: "the lens researchers choose to validate their studies" (p. 124). The lens is simply the "viewpoint." The assumption is that, just as a researcher might fall into one of the three paradigm camps, she might also fall into one or more lens camps. These are the lens of the reseracher; lens of study participants; and lens of people external to the study (such as journal reviewers).

I read the description of lenses as meaning: "To whom do you feel you need to prove that your study is valid?" Thus, for example, if you are a postpositivist who feels the need to prove validity to and for yourself, your weapon of choice might be the procedure of triangulation--developing your themes via the convergence among several different types of information.

Again, this is informative and interesting. But again, it mainly alerts me, as an emerging scholar, to the existence of even more partially hidden explosive devices. I found myself intently scrutinizing the table on page 126 of the Creswell & Miller article, considering in turn each of the nine procedures filling out the table that is created after crossing the three paradigms with the three lenses. I felt I could cover my bases by trying to incorporate into my study at least one procedure--or, weapon in the fight for quality--from each row and column. Thus, I underlined "triangulation," "disconfirming evidence," and "researcher reflexivity"--satisfying thricely the lens of the researcher and giving me hits in all three paradigms; I also thought I might be able to build into my my study an audit trail (postpositivist/lens of external people), and "thick, rich description" (constructivist/lens of external people). That just left the participant lens row of the table un-marked-up. As a secondary study, I did not feel I could employ the member checking or researcher-participant collaboration procedures. But as I brainstormed, I thought that "prolonged engagement in the field" might still have been met by my history of participation on the larger research study from which my dissertation data are drawn...

Only later when actually trying to translate these procedures into a coherent methods section narrative in my dissertation proposal did I recognize that I had just added a couple layers of complexity to my study. Better armed may mean marching into battle better prepared. But not if I will be so heavily encumbered that I am unable to march at all.

An Army of One

Right now I have reached a point of aligning myself only with my own research study and my own learning process. I have chosen to be a methodological mercenary, casting aside the flags of specific research paradigms and lenses. I have decided to view the battle as one of knowledge versus ignorance, as opposed to positivists against postpositivists...researcher-lens-ers against journal editor-lensers... I am determined to turn "mine fields" into "mind fields"--vistas riddled with stimulating questions instead of project-deciminating missteps. In so pledging this (non)allegiance, I am leaning more towards the second approach to quality in qualitative research--one in which prolifer-label-ating distinctions between "quantitative quality" and "qualitative quality" are seen as largely unnecessary.

Stay tuned. More on that approach in an upcoming post.

*Babbie, E. (1992). The practice of social research (6th ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing.

The (2nd) Wind in the Research

Back in February I talked about looking at my dissertation research as an instance of secondary qualitative research. Since then, that aspect of the project has grown, and I am now a full convert to the benefits of secondary qualitative analysis as a way to take full advantage of the rich data set I have available to me. A metaphor describing my approach that has stuck in my mind is "second wind." In other words, I am taking open-ended interview data that was collected to answer other questions and breathing new life into it. As a result, instead of the knowledge being "exhausted," it is set to offer up a fresh round of insights.

Now, secondary quantitative methods are long standing and accepted research methodologies. (For an overview see Hofferth, S. L. [2005]. Secondary data analysis in family research. Journal of Marriage and Family, 67, 891-907. Also see my colleagues over at Family Research Quantitative Methods for general information on quantitative methods in family science.) But from what I have read, explicit secondary methods in qualitative methods are fairly recent. It can be considered, then, an emerging research methodology.

This is good news. This is bad news. The bad news is that there is not a lot of guidance out there about what makes for rigorous secondary qualitative work. But the good news is that I have been able to locate a handful of sources and a couple dozen examples that have been extremely helpful. Plus, by using an "emerging" methodology I have the opportunity to help define just what high quality work in this area will look like.

In my previous post I mentioned the new Sourcebook resources about secondary qualitative research. An early article about this topic is the following:

Thorne, S. (1994). Secondary analysis in qualitative research: Issues and implications. In J. M. Morse (Ed.), Critical issues in qualitative research methods (pp. 263-279). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

My bible, however, has become a thin lavendar book released this year. I'll give you the reference, but you'll have to promise not to recall it from the U of MN library from me! (Just kidding: I've already ordered my own copy, so recall away.) The book is:

Heatin, J. (2005). Reworking qualitative data. London: Sage.

I have only been able to find one substantial on-line resource: Issue 22 from the soc department at the University of Surrey's Social Reseach Update (also written, btw, by Janet Heatin).

It has been exciting to develop my secondary qualitative procedures through my pilot research. I have been paying special attention, for instance, to issues of "match" between the original research questions that resulted in the specific interview questions being asked, and my own research questions. I have been thinking about the broader conceptual lenses that I have adopted to think about my research, and how my secondary procedures fit in with these. I have been considering such issues as "credibility" and "trustworthiness" in qualitative research, and how these issues are manifested differently in secondary approaches. I have been struck by the mental stretching involved in going back and forth between deductive and inductive approaches to analysis, and between analysis of cases and exploration of variables. I have toyed with the idea that my approach to secondary analysis might parallel how laypeople come to "analyze" life data all around--which is kinda what my whole project is about in the first place...

Anyway, I'll have more to say about the specifics of these issues as my project moves forward.

In any dissertation project there is an ebb and flow to the dissertator's motivational level. My embracing a secondary approach came at a good point in my own motivational cycle, just when I was becoming frustrated with the lack of fit between my research and more "traditional" means to conduct it. Now I feel like, not only is the data experiencing a second wind, but I am too.

SITBB Vault: Making Sense of Sense-Making (Part 2)

The other day I discussed my crises of graduate student faith. So far so good, in terms of my recovery. I am going full steam ahead (despite distractions in the news) with my work.

Part of what I hope to do here today is take a stab at opening up my mind to document (for myself and anyone else who is interested) the process I went through in recovering what makes me excited about my work.

Background:

My dissertation will center on what I am calling (for now) adoptive parents' "genetic narratives"--the things they talk about when they speak of their relationships with their children, how their children are and are not like them, how their child fits into the family. (See this post and this one for some background about how I am thinking about this concept.)

I now have a 3-page summary of my research proposal. In addition to the genetica narratives piece I've settled on the concept of "lay theories" as the way I plan to analyze these narratives. This is not a framework that has been applied, so far as I have been able to uncover at this point, in adoption research. I was really excited about looking at this topic through the frame of lay theories. Others who had read my mini-proposal validated the innovation of this framework. All seemed peachy.

But Then...

Then I began to worry. My main question: Why "lay theories"? Why not just "beliefs" or "cognitions" or "attributions" or "justifications" or "attitudes"? Many of these concepts have long-standing, rich histories of application in family literature, especially regarding parenting. So why complicate things by examining these phenomena as "lay theories"?

Definition:

Lay theories are called by different names: implicit theories, folk theories, naive theories, to name a few. In general, these are thought of as fairly structured systems of beliefs, largely implicit, that people hold. They are thought to be the frame through which people evaluate situations, people, and information. They are thought to be a kind of filter, contributing to some things being selected for attention, and other things being filtered out. They are thought, through this process, to impact people's actions--or, barring such a direct causation, impact their motivation or their inclination or their predisposition to act.

Key is that "lay theories" are systems held by...lay people. Thus, we all have lay theories about all sorts of things. Unlike formal, scientific theories, lay theories can be (and often are) rife with contradictions, fuzziness. They may have as much to do with making sense of the world as they do with making predictions about the world.

Also key is that changing beliefs (or attitudes, or attributions...) is not so simple because of the linked nature of beliefs within a lay theory. So, things like "education" or "therapy" or "advocating" are not a matter of simply giving people more information, better information, correct information. Flipped: It is not a matter of getting people to see how their beliefs are sparse, inferior, incorrect. It is even not a matter of getting people to "empathize" or feel something on a "gut level" or "identify with" something. Beliefs in lay theories are bound up in a package, and a package that we are not even fully aware we are carrying.

There is more about lay theories-e.g., where they come from, why people have them, how people have them in regard to various content topics.

But just getting this far--to be able to articulate in my own words without rushing to some book or article to quote a citation--is an important step in my ability to answer my own question: "Why lay theories?"

What I have come up with is a multi-part answer. That is not totally true. Before I had an "answer" I had a rough sketch of what an answer to this question might look like. What would I like to be able to say, when justifying my choice of "lay theories" over "attributions" or something else?

As examples:

* I might want to be able to say that use of this framework is more innovative, taking this work in different directions.

* Or, I might want to be able to make a valid claim that analysis as lay theories will actually be more informative, or will resolve some dilemmas in the literature that analysis via other means has not been able to do.

* Or, I might want to be able to show how analysis in this way will contribute to my longer range research stream. (Actually this idea of being able to articulate your dissertation research as an important early step in a longer-term plan is increasingly important: "Programatic Research" is the buzz phrase of our time.)

* Perhaps related to the previous point, I might want to be able to justify my choice based on where such an analysis has been able to lead other, fruitfull areas of research on new, important topics. So, I'd be claiming a parallel of my work with other areas, showing how it fits in. Coming full circle to my first point, this might lead to greater innovation in my own topic while also contributing something new to the more established areas already employing this framework.

But knowing what an answer might look like is not the same as knowing the answer. Right. And it may seem like trivial nit-picking to break this process down in so many steps. Need an answer? Then state an answer, already. But when you are doubting yourself--as I was doubting myself--you can not take these things for granted. It's like when you're late for class and you can't find your keys. As much as you'd like to just think for a moment and say "Oh, yeah--They're in my sweatpants from yesterday!" you gotta retrace all your steps: "Hmmm...coat pocket? No...Kitchen counter? Noooo. Did I drop them onto the garage floor yesterday coming in from Cub? No (but that was a good one)...Freezer when I was putting away the orange juice..."

This process for me was similar: What first made me so excited about this framework? What was the first article I read about it in? Why did that researcher use it instead of attribution theory or something else? What other fields use this concept? Might it be called something else in those areas? And so on.

So, at this point in the story I knew what I was looking for. That helped me find it. Last installment of my resolution of crisis next time.

Spotlight on MN-TX Adoption Research Project

The research project I have been involved in, the Minnesota-Texas Adoption Research Project, is featured as a "Spotlight" on the U's Office of VP of Research site (here).

It is hard to believe that "Dr. Hal" (as my kids refer to Hal Grotevant) has been at this for 20 years. Meanwhile, wave 3 of the project is in full swing.

And as if the third phase of a longitudinal research project and full time professing (and his--I'm sure--most rewarding work: guiding me through my dissertation!) were not enough, Hal is also the editor-in-chief of Inner Geek here on UThink. (And you actually thought faculty members' lives "settle down" post tenure!)

Web Resources: Cluster Analysis

"Cluster Analysis" from Multivariate Statistics: Concepts, Models, and Applications, David W. Stockburger. WEB: http://www.psychstat.smsu.edu/

"Cluster Analysis" from StatSoft, Inc. (2004). Electronic Statistics Textbook. Tulsa, OK: StatSoft. WEB: http://www.statsoft.com/textbook/stathome.html

"Cluster Analysis" from Multivariate Statistics: An Introduction. Colleen Flynn Thapalia (From The Web Center for Social Research Methods) WEB: http://socialresearchmethods.net/tutorial/flynn/multivar.htm

Protection from the "Downward Spiral"

"The downward spiral for many manuscripts begins with the failure to adequately define the focal construct(s) of the study..." MacKenzie (2003), p. 323

The Coding Task Ahead

The next step in my dissertation work is to further define and develop the main construct, so as to then develop a codebook that can be piloted, then used in the fall for coding all the adoptive parent transcripts. I have brainstormed in the past about what this central construct is. I got so far as to call it "genetic narratives." However, this is still the ballpark topic, and not the construct that I will eventually try to test for empirically. The general topic I have now needs further work to get it to that point.

Which is where this entry comes in.

First, a recap of where I have been so far. Second, some brief discussion of other topic areas in the existing literature that currently employ conceptsclose to what I am aiming for. Third, I discuss one description of what a good construct should and shouldn't look like. Then in the final section I sketch a definition and description of the actual construct I want to use in my dissertation.

(S., D., and L.: It is not necessary at this point to read these articles but skimming the previous blog posts I list may be helpful.)

1) Recap

Probably the first time I had a substantial talk with myself about my dissertation topic was in this post. This was back when I had finally settled on the idea that I wanted to limit my dissertation to the adoptive parent interviews, and by extension make my project be about adoptive parenting. (I know this seems to be a pretty inconsequential thing. But when you have available so much data from so many sources, just getting this far is a big deal!)

Then the following month in this post I tried to work on exactly what it is about adoptive parenting I wanted to look at. But I really began to get some clarity about the subject in this post. (Hmmm...maybe I ought to break out the Miles Davis again...)

At the start of this calendar year I started to turn my attention to the methodologies I might use in my dissertation. Proof that this process is not a linear one: Thinking about this latter stage task actually helped me go back to my initial construct development to get a clearer idea of that. I explored that a little here, here, and here.

2) "Genetic narrratives" in the literature

There are three streams of literature I am bringing together to get at a definition. I'll just briefly touch on them here.

Family Narratives. First is the area of "family narratives" that H. and colleagues have already done work with using MTARP data. (S., D., L.: Family Narrative Consortium Project. This work should be in the lab.)

A key aspect of this work is that through the "stories" that family members tell, we can get a glimpse of how they have "made meaning" out of certain aspects of their lives. According to Fiese & Sameroff, family narratives

become a scrapbook of family history resulting from a process of meaning-making in the family. When family members are called upon to recount an experience, they set an interpretive frame reflecting how individuals grapple with understanding events, how the family works together, and how the ascription of meaning is linked to beliefs about relationships and the social world.

However, as I may bave mentioned in previous posts, what I am aiming for in this particular project does not necessarily meet the FNC definition of "family narratives"--though I may be positioning my work as a preliminary step in this direction. For one thing, the FNC researchers made a distinction between "narratives" (form and process) and "stories" (content). I am not confident at this point that I have enough data to make such a distinction, or that the genetic content of interest will be coherently found in such a recognizable structure. Again, though, I hope that exploration of my construct will assist in further research design meant to specifically elicit such fleshed out tales.

Gene Talk. Second is the concept of "gene talk" that I have already discussed in previous posts. One benefit of using this as a conceptual lens is that it is much more likely that the data I have will be in the form of this type of shorter, more telegraphic statements related to genetics than it will be in the form of full-fledged narratives. (Though I recognized this lack of congruency, I did use the term "genetic narratives" as a placeholder in my previous blog posts.)

A key aspect of borrowing a little conceptual light from Fox Keller's concept is that she does an excellent job of showing how this type of professional talk can serve all sorts of purposes in scientists' interactions--with each other, with the public, with funders and policy makers, and with their own further research efforts. While "gene talk" refers to how scientists talk about genes, I want to explore how lay persons talk about genetics. From one of my earlier posts:

So, my question becomes, in lay (non-scientific) settings, does something analogous to "gene-talk" exist?... What are "gene," "genetics" and their gene-based metaphorical stand-ins (e.g., "in her blood," "inner make-up," "blueprint," "biological program") "operational shorthand" for in the adoptive context? What are the "clearly uinderstood" social contexts in which this language is invoked by adoptive parents? What are the outcomes--both beneficial and not--for explaining one's adoptive family processes using genetic narratives?

Lay Theories. Although I think the concept I'll be exploring is not quite as developed as "narratives," I think it also has more form, complexity, and structure than what the term "talk" would seem to connote. So the third research area I'm bringing into this is that of lay theories, specifically lay theories about genetics. The key idea here is that people's talk about genetics will suggest a system of interconnected beliefs that have causes and that in turn may impact other areas of their lives. (This is not yet a definition of the construct as you can see below.)

I have spent a lot of space in previous posts talking about and defining lay theories. I'll add this quote, from Richards (1996):

The public's knowledge and beliefs about inheritance have not arisen de novo with the coming of the new genetics...they have long been part of family culture. Much family talk is about particular characteristics of family members, who these may have been acquired from, and who they may be passed to.

Nice circle back to gene talk and family narratives...

3) For want of a good construct definition...

Before jumping into my definition, I want to review one view of what any good construct definition looks like. MacKenzie (2003) says:

Good definitions should
(a) specify the construct’s conceptual theme,
(b) in unambiguous terms,
(c) in a manner that is consistent with prior research, and that
(d) clearly distinguishes it from related constructs.

(I'm going to shorten the above requirements to "THEMATIC, CLEAR, RESEARCH-BASED, DISTINGUISHABLE" and abbreviate to TCRD.)

A couple of other aspects of good definitions:

* The extent to which values of the construct are expected to differ across cases, conditions, and time are specified
* If the construct is multidimensional, the relations between the subdimensions and the superordinate construct are specified

But note what the author says is not a good definition:

* Defining a construct solely in terms of its antecedents (causes) or consequences (results)
* Merely giving examples of what is included in a construct

Finally:
4) Adoptive Genetics

(OK, number four should have been introduced by an audio clip of a drum roll and cymbal crash...) I am calling my core concept "adoptive genetics" and the entire enterprise as "adoptive parents' lay theories of adoptive genetics." Actually this is still just a placeholder label that I may change yet again. And I guess, now that I lay out the previous research and my previous blogging brainstorms like that it's really not such a brave conceptual leap. But I'm excited, anyway...

So, to try out the TCRD (THEMATIC, CLEAR, RESEARCH-BASED, DISTINGUISHABLE) criteria:

(Brief definition) Adoptive genetics are the ways in which heredity, genealogy, and similar aspects of human biology are thought to influence the experiences, relationships, and identities of adopted persons, their birth family members, and their adoptive family members. Lay theories of adoptive genetics are the store of interrelated beliefs and "common sense(s)" that people hold to explain this influence.

(Expanded definitions) Adoptive genetics suggests that the roles of genetics in the adoption context may be thought to be different from the roles genetics play in biological relationships, but may also be thought to be characterized as having some areas of overlap. Adoptive genetics suggests commonly-held beliefs about processes of inheretance and constitution of the human organism, applied to the adoption context.

Lay theories specific to the adoption context of beliefs about these processes and makeup will be verbalized differently by adoption participants depending on their past and current experiences with adoptive and biological relationships. Specifically, adoptive parents' theories of adoptive genetics will be related to their roles as parents of a specific adopted child (or children) as well as in some cases children related in other ways (e.g., by birth, remarriage, fosterage).

...Not quite totally TCRD-compliant, but I think a good start.

I have in mind several components that further flesh out this concept. (S., D., and L.: In a separate email, probably tomorrow.)

Again, the goal is a tentative codebook to begin piloting using actual data. This codebook would include these definitions (actually, revised versions of them), the components, and definitions of the components.

Families and Technology

Back Burner, List #1, Item #2

(Background, from my online CV. Also, you can read about Item #5, Engaged Scholarship, from my first list here. As always, I welcome comments, suggestions, critiques: Post a comment here, drop me an email, or stop me in the hall!)

Some thoughts and questions about my research interests in families and technology:

1. Promoting the topic as one worthy of study

As a lowly gradstudent, how can I do this?

I co-authored a paper on the topic, which I presented at TCRM to much positive response. I am a member of the fam-tech focus group in NCFR, and have greatly enjoyed our discussions at the annual conferences. I have even served as a manuscript reviewer because of my "expertise" in this area (translation, because of my willingness to read manuscripts in this area...)

But I will have to, if I am serious about this area, think of other ways to promote "family and technology studies" as a viable topic of research.

2. Further defining the topic as one worthy of study

The research model I think fam-tech would fall under involves exploring the interface between one huge system and the family system. The idea is that we have one complex interacting social system; we have another complex, interacting social system; then when we overlay these two systems Venn diagram like we get a marquise shaped slice that is a new complex interacting system...

An existing research area that typifies this model is the interdisciplinary area of "work and family." (See resources here and here.) This is an incredibly fruitful and active research area in my discipline.

But. It's unfortunate, I think, that the work-family area starts--literally, at least in a nominal sense--with "work." This naming may be a piddling technicality, one that does not impact the actual research theoretically, methodologically, or application-wise. But I am a strong believer in the power of labels to subconsciously exert influence, so I am wary of the type of influence that may be currently exerted because work is stated first. This naming may reinscribe the notion that folks' family lives should be positive, but only insofar as it helps them become/remain productive workers--a notion that many work-family researchers likely would not agree with.

If I were queen of the researchworld, I would do everything in my power to ensure that such does not become the case with the fam-tech area.

Anyway. Key in my mind is to develop strong family THEORY in this area. It may be that this interface can be best understood in the context of existing models, but my hunch is that the unique and encompassing nature of technological innovations means we have to develop new, or at least adapted, models for exploring their bidirectional influences with family life.

3. Problem of the "moving target"

One of my favorite paragraphs from our TCRM paper:

Meszaros (2002) has called on family and consumer science professionals to “analyze carefully each type of technology we envision using, and answer for our families, our communities, and ourselves, exactly why this technology is being employed and the impacts and consequences of use and non-use (p. 14).” But despite this call for a forward-looking perspective on families and technology, this area of research has lagged behind trends in the fast-paced world of technological innovations. For example, large-scale US introduction of the now-familiar technology of television occurred in the early 1950s. Yet, four decades later—when almost all US homes had at least one television set—only 22 articles related to television and families had appeared in the pages of the journals published by the National Council on Family Relations (NCFR) (Fabes, Wilson, & Christopher, 1989), and few of them had a theory base.

(See below* for references.)

4. Should biotech and other "artifact-less" technologies be included in the families and technology area?

An issue that has come up repeatedly in my casual conversations with folks about families and technology, as well as in our NCFR fam-tech focus group, involves deciding which technologies should be included as potential topics of family research. It seems when many people think "technology" they think "computers." I don't knoow where this technology=computers link came from, but I have so frequently encountered surprise when I talk about, say, genetic testing as being part of fam-tech that I am thinking this linkage is a widespread one.

I think a challenge for me will be that in general folks think of things as necessarily having physical presence to be technologies. So, a computer is technology, but the Internet may not be thought of as a technology separate from computers...HD televisions may be thought of as technology, but not the electricity that runs them...Some futuristic shiny silver robotic child would be viewed as technology, but not lab techniques for bringing sperm and egg together to create a regular old child...

So one thing I need to think about is the extent to which I want to continue to advocate for my particular research interests (e.g., genetics, assisted reproductive technology) being a part of this area--

OR. Whether or not it would be better to try to advocate for a separate family-focussed interest in reprogentics and other medical technologies.

OR...I may have to accept that if I want to do research in this area I may have to try to migrate to a research discipline that is already doing work on the technologies I am interested in. And in this case I would likely have to be a constant advocate for a family view of this research.

(Listen to me complain...like I wouldn't happily snatch up just about any job that might be offered me post PHD...)

5. Areas of overlap

Another thing I may need to do is find ways to exploit the areas of overlap between this research interest and other topics I'm interested in. For example: What are the implications of email use for contact arrangements between adoptive and birth families? How can academic departments use blogs with open comment capabillities to engage with families in the communities they serve? How are topics within bioethics (e.g., regarding reproductive rights, self-hood, informed consent) made more challenging by technologies (e.g., genetic screening for Huntington's) and considerations of families (as opposed to individuals)?
.
.
.
For now, a lot of other things on my plate. But these and other things are simmering, simmering on the back burner of my mind...

*References:

Fabes, R. A., Wilson, P. M., & Cristopher, F. S. (1989). A time to reexamine the role of television in family life. Family Relations, 38, 337-341.

Meszaros, P. S. (2002). The appropriate uses of technology: Our commitment to families and communities. Journal of Family and Consumer Sciences, 94(2), 13-15.

Perry, Y. V., & Doherty, W. J. (2003, November). Developing theory about families and technology: The case of cell phones. Paper presented at the 33rd annual meeting of the Theory Construction and Research Methodology Workshop, pre-conference of the 65th annual meeting of the National Council on Family Relations, Vancouver, British Columbia, CA.

The Structure of Adoptive Openness

One of the challenges in dissertation writing is conceptualizing reseearch questions that are "novel." We're supposed to be making a "unique" and "innovative" contribution to the field blah blah blah. One way to achieve this (assuming one buys that it must be achieved) is to...simply search for a truly new slant on a topic. But that is difficult, in that there may really be nothing truly new under the sun.

Another way, however, to achieve novelty is to attempt to resuscitate a concept or question that has taken its (presumed) last breath.

I think that is what I might be doing by reintroducing the idea of "Family Structure" into my proposed dissertation. I'm not sure right now, even, how big a role "structure" will play in my final work. But for now it is emerging as an interesting way to organize some of what I want to explore.

It's kindova long story--fascinating to me and necessary to document my thinking (even if I do not go much further with it, or if it becomes less central in my work)--but probably pretty tedious to most others. So, I'll continue "below the fold" for myself and any other interested parties.

For the rest of you, check out my post on Grokker below. I LOVE Grokker! It is the absolute coolest thing since...the last absolutely coolest technological thing that I got worked up about. If you are not now Grokking, you should be Grokking. Grok Grok Grok Grok! As soon as I figure out if it can be done, I'm gonna post some of my Grokker maps.

ANYway, back to structure:

What I may end up doing is to place family structure back into conceptualizations of adoptive openness. Now, some discussions of openness in adoption have never advanced beyond structural openness, or otherwise have been fairly limited in what constitutes "open" or "fully disclosed" adoption.

(What is "open adoption"? Grok it and see for yourself! Also, see the resources listed on the MTARP website, linked to over on the sidebar. As always, I must offer the disclaimer that the following represents my "take" on aspects of adoption as I have come to understand it in part through my work on MTARP. Please see the MTARP web site and publications for the official word on the project.)

Multidimensional Openness, Defined

However, in the project I have been involved with, the definition of openness has evolved into a complex, multi-dimensional concept. As put by Grotevant & McRoy (1998): "We conceptualize openness as a spectrum involving differing degrees and modes of contact and communication between adoptive family members and a child's birthmother" (p. 2).

With my emphases above, you can see that openness involves at least a four dimensional space:

(1) Degrees of contact
(2) Modes of contact
(3) Degrees of communication
(4) Modes of communication

Further, these dimensions may--and often do--change over time, and are experienced differently by the child and different members of the child's birth and adoptive families. (The "birthmother" in the above definition has been expanded greatly in MTARP work to include contact and communication with other birth family members, including birth grandparents, birth "half" siblings, and birth "step" fathers. See note* at the end of this post.)

So, as the project has evolved, also evolving is a conceptualization of openness as the ebb and flow of interaction; as a relational variable; as a multidirectional continuum. This has been an important view of the adoptive family experience, placing it in a new landscape of normative family diversity that focuses more on relational processes, subjective experiences, intentional actions and decision making, and multiple pathways to similar (and positive) outcomes--Largely replacing the previous prevailing view of one type of family=one type of family experience.

Bringing Back Structure

It is telling, I think, that the subtitle of the book I quoted from above is "exploring family connections."

My question: If openness creates different ways that families are connected (or "yoked"), then do these novel connections create new family units? In other words, instead of openness arrangements resulting in merely relational patterns between distinct family units, do the relational ties expand the bounds of the distinct families such that a new boundary is drawn--one that to some extent incorporates both families?

This idea has already been put forth in the context of MTARP in the form of the concept of the "adoptive kinship network" (AKN). Still the focus in this work has been largely on the dynamic processes within the network. The structure of the network only comes into play in defining the full range of who might be included in the AKN.

What I am trying to make a distinction about is a vague notion...So, I also looked outside of MTARP work to try to put my finger on it.

Another author writing on adoption calls what results from more disclosure and contact the "open adoption clan" (Gritter, 1997). "Every adoption brings families together for a lifetime"--but in fully disclosed adoption, the family members are all "active members of the system" (p. 51). Also he talks of the forming of a "sense of community" when more fully disclosed family systems are created. Still, though, since the focus of Gritter's discussion is on adoption as a system/institution aimed at serving the child, the notion of what this new whole that includes the child is is given little further explication.

I'm thinking that one way to start taking this "new whole" notion seriously is to step back (but not backwards) to look seriously at structure: Who is included in the family system? What roles do they seem to be taking on? What functions do the roles seem to be fulfilling? How are the roles related to each other?

Deja Vu, Again...

Sociologists in the house may recognize the above questions as forming part of the theoretical framework of "Structural Functionalism." (See below* for further references.) If you know this, then you also know that "structure" is considered by some (many?) to be a dirty word: conservative and restrictive, upholding a view of society and actors that apologizes for or even rationalizes current social inequities, descriptive in a way that equates "is" with "ought" and so on. At the very least, "structural functionalism" as a theoretical framework is considered by some scholars to be an interesting, though currently useless, relic from a dry and dusty scholarly archeological site.

Here are some random other features of Structural-functionalism as it has been applied in family social science:

-primacy of the nuclear family
-role expectations
-specialized roles, esp along "traditional" gender lines
-functional requirements of roles
-socialization of children as a primary function of families
-children as the "replacement members" of society
-ultimate goal is the continued survival of "the whole" (i.e., society)
-neo-structuralism, eases some of the features of traditional family S-F

What I am talking about now is recasting "openness" as a type of "family structure" for the purposes of my dissertation. From a research plan that I recently wrote for a fellowship application I "tweaked" the standard MTARP definition of openness in this way:

"A previous study with these [MTARP] data examined the dynamics of adoptive families in three types of structure:
a) a biologically-related nuclear family type, with no relationships with children’s biological mothers,
b) an extended family type with direct relationships with children’s biological mothers, and
c) a type with indirect relationships with biological mothers through adoption agencies"

Why STRUCTURE?

Why go back to this anacronistic notion of structure being important in and of itself? What are the implications of this slight re-definition of openness as structure that I sketched out above?

My first hunch: "structure" means nothing more than who is in the family--with no theoretical strings attached. If this is the case, perhaps I merely defined openness as structure in my research plan to make the definition more familiar to fellowship application reviewers who were not already steeped in adoption research.

But it is hard to say it is this simple--not to mention it is hard to convince others that this is the case in adoption. I think there is an inherent tension in how "we" (all of us, in non-scholar mode) think about adoption; This tension involves a sense that through adoption we create one family unit by means of dismantling another.

A subtractive, or substitutive process. Not an additive, or multiplicative one.

Thus, the first more complex reason for returning to structure in adoptive relationships is

-Structure is what the public fixates on--regardless of the extent to which academics may think we've moved beyond it.

The worry that "Heather has two mommies" might be articulated in the context of lesbian-couple headed families, open adoption arrangements, or blended families. The public is not so focussed on the "dynamic processes"--and further, policy is not so concerned with this. There is, however, interest and concern about what happens when there is a seeming excess of adults for what is assumed to be one family "slot" or role.

But there are other benefits such a reconceptualization might give me, as a researcher striving for novelty:

-Idea of "roles" can be further explored.

Some AKNs with similar membership may have different roles assigned to or taken by its members; We need not go back to old fashioned, rigid notions of roles for this kind of examination to be important. But we shouldn't be surprised if our new role examination reveals similar snapshots, for example the frequent finding in this MTARP data set that adoptive mothers are often the "kinkeepers" responsible for managing the exchange of information when children are younger...Sounds like the old S-F notion of the mother as the nurturer.

-Such a structural view may allow more fruitful comparissons to other kinds of families with "complex" structures.

The MTARP PIs have already put forth this as a wave of the future for this research (and other scholars have noted this as well; see Shapiro, Shapiro, & Paret, 2001). This may be a move in the other direction than that used in the past w/this data set: e.g., using more generic concepts from the close relationship model to show how the adoptive openness model is a case of broader processes. Instead, trying to pick out those more narrow and unique concepts that can be applied to other distinct types of families.

-Examination of structure allows for the examination of "boundaries"--and more importantly points me to not dismiss as different two AKNs that appear to differ because of who is part of each.

For example, consider the hypothetical example of one AKN that includes face-to-face relationships with the birthfather, who subsequently married the birthmother, and another network that does not include this mode and participant of contact. But in the second AKN the birthfather may be "psychologically present" (see Pauline Boss's work) in that he is a large part of the content of the discussions between adopted person and birthmother.

-Even though sometimes convceived of as a static property, structure may allow for interesting dialectical linking of dynamic process and structure, in that the processes over time may lead to new structures, roles and norms.

I have touched on many of these themes with other blog entries, for example on Adoption, ART and the social contract theory and also with a paper I wrote as part of my written prelim exam on adoptive "ties." Also, lots of other places, now that I think about it...

-Looking at openness as stucture may allow me to make explicit potential links to my interest in perceptions and talk about genetics.

For example, a key concept emerging from some of my pilot work is the idea that genetic and quasi-genetic concepts used by adoptive parents assist in "placing" children (and perhaps their birthmothers or other birth family members) in a kind of "reconstructed" family lineage.

This is a use that is just ripe with possibilities for the development of new conceptual concepts. For example, Pittman (1993, in the first Sourcebook in a piece entitled "Functionalism May Be Down, But It is Surely Not Out") talks about "scapegoat" as a useful conceptual product of S-F theory. In family therapy, this concept has largely negative connotations--but in identifying and labeling its occurence in families, the practice might be able to be averted or corrected. In parallel, for some adotive families there could be a "scapegoating"--not of a person, but of the genetic connection between an child and her birthmother. The Biblical scapegoat is a symbolic representation of sins; On the flip side, in the adoptive context there might be some positive role assigned to a genetic connection: the bond or the child as a symbolic representation of kinship connections.

So, I may end up rescuing the baby of adoptive structuralism--just putting it in some fresh bath water. So far, the "novel" ideas that this line of thought is generating in me is exciting. We'll see where it all leads.
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*For further information about how the openness concept has evolved in MTARP research see the chapter: Grotevant, H. D., Perry, Y. V., & McRoy, R. G. (2005). Openness in adoption: Outcomes for adolescents and their adoptive kinship networks. In D. M. Brodzinsky & J. Palacios (Eds.), Psychological issues in adoption: Theory, research, and application (pp. 167-186). Westport, CT: Praeger.

More on structural functionalism in social sciences:

Wikipedia entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Structural_functionalism

Beyond the Five Conceptual Frameworks: A Decade of Development in Family Theory, Carlfred B. Broderick
Journal of Marriage and the Family, Vol. 33, No. 1, Decade Review. Part 2. (Feb., 1971), pp. 139-159.
Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0022-2445%28197102%2933%3A1%3C139%3ABTFCFA%3E2.0.CO%3B2-K

Engaged Scholarship

Back Burner, List #1, Item #5

(Background, from my online CV. And remember that I welcome comments, suggestions, critiques!)

Random thoughts and questions about my desire to integrate engaged scholarship in my future academic career:

1) Is this a realistic goal for a new faculty member in higher ed? It seems the folks who do this kind of work who I respect are all tenured. They already have plenty of experience--and respect--in "traditional" scholarship and the engaged part comes as a sort of crown to their achievements.

I know that in our CHE task force report we tried to outline an agenda for incorporating such work throughout the professional life course. I know and LOVE Boyers work on this topic. (See, for example Scholarship Reconsidered: Priorities of the Professoriate.)

But is this a realistic movement to buy into? And at this stage of my career?

2) Will the current climate in higher ed away from land-grant ideals and towards corporate values make it less likely that this goal will (a) be a selling point as I try to secure an appointment, and (b) help lead to tenure even once I do land a position somewhere?

And forget Extension--I wouldn't be surprised if Extension eventually whittles away to next to nothing most places. I hope not. But I wouldn't be surprised if it does.

3) Now. Maybe there are opportunities to take advantage of the corporatization of higher ed in order to create engaged scholarship opportunities. One of my profs talks about his dream study in which he partners with Target to study various family spending issues.

And of course there is my dream: Opening up a full service branch of the University of Minnesota at the Mall of America.

I mean, you can ride a roller coaster at MOA. You can have an all-night slumber party in an aquarium. You can see a movie, drink a glass of wine, have generously endowed women in tight t-shirts serve you beer and hot wings. Buy an engagement ring, choose a wedding dress, rent a tuxedo, get married, have wedding portraits taken, buy luggage, book a honeymoon vacation. Take courses at a for-profit college, buy books, buy all manner of college sports team paraphenalia. Get a manicure, get your hair done, buy shoesclotheshatseyeglasses. Buy an iPod, Bose speakers, cell phone, video game system--

All at MOA.

And much much much much more.

But what you can't do at MOA is pick up a copy of of the Extension publication Who Gets Grandma's Yellow Pie Plate? You can't take a summer U of M course in African Cinema or Beginning German.

Anyway, I have mentioned this dream many times in various contexts, but I think people think it's a silly idea.

4) How will the general higher ed retreat from diversity initiatives impact my desires to continue with service and engagement efforts in this area? Just in my time from undergrad to now I've seen a move from "affirmative action" to "multiculturalism" to "diversity" to "non-traditional student" access. This last term I have seen applied to widely that virtually anyone can be considered "non-traditional" in some respect.

A worthy goal, increasing access for "all." Except that most of these efforts have seemed to involve further dividing the already-small slice of pie already allocated for "diversity" (or whatever previous term was used) to meet this goal...

Related to this, how will I balance my service and advising commitments so that they do not prevent me from doing the things I need to in order to have a strong tenure review package--While at the same time being true to my commitment to providing a different voice to committees I care about as well as being a mentor to students who look like me?

5) How might I take advantage of technology in order to help meet my outreach/engagement goals? I am really excited about the possibilities here: blogs such as this one, WebCT Vista course sites, using on-line games and simulations to illustrate and disseminate research findings...

I'll have to keep my eyes open for opportunities to explore these and similar possibilities further.

Back Burner List #1

Last time I said I'd list some of my "simmering ideas" in an effort to keep them fresh for future development. Most of the things on this list are projects that I have already made some commitment to, especially since they are listed in some form on my CV. (See my "About Page" for a link to my on-line CV. I haven't updated it in a while but most of the stuff on this list can be found there.)

I also keep a private, "fantasy project" list. With any degree of restraint, I won't be listing that stuff here for all to see. (And laugh at!)

Again, these are projects, ideas and activities that I think have some chance of actually becoming a reality. Just a list for now. I'll be taking these ideas up from time to time over the next several months.

OH--And any ideas are more than welcome!!!

Back Burner List #1

(1) "The Ties That Matter" TCRM paper

(2) "Families and Technology" TCRM paper

(3) Papers, other projects from the Consortium project

(4) Research plan for the use of games and simulations in family science research and teaching

(5) Projects for instituting the model of outreach/engagement developed as part of the CHE O/E Task Force and Committee

Back Burner

I have a beautiful stainless steel teapot, given to me years ago by my husband as a birthday gift. I will heat water for tea. After I pour the steaming water over the bag in my cup, I put the teapot on one of the back burners of the stove--still with water in it. I do not pour out the water because I think I might later get a second cup of tea. I rarely do. So, the next time I want tea I, of course, pour out this stale water that I never used for that second cup days before, and refill the teapot fresh.

Again with enough water for about two cups. Again, rarely getting to that second cup.

Sometimes weeks will pass between cups of tea and all the water has evaporated...

Whenever in my school and other work I say "I'm going to put that [paper, project, idea, revision] on the back burner for a while," I think about this teapot. The fleeting thought is usually accompanied by a great deal of guilt. Like putting the shiny teapot on my stove's literal back burner, I know that putting a project on the figurative back burner will likely mean that I will never get to it again--or, that when I do get to the project again, it will have become so stale that I will have to start over from scratch.

In an attempt to at least document some of these ideas, I have decided to write a little about them from time to time here on this blog, a kind of "cold case file" for my abandonned projects. First I'll list some of the ideas most interesting to me and/or most likely to be rescued for further development. Then I'll take one of those ideas at a time to develop here in future posts. I may return to these entries after posting if new ideas and thoughts come to mind. I may delete whole posts if I come to think of any ideas as entirely stupid.

My notes on each "cold idea" may be very vague, random, incoherent. My idea isn't so much to fully flesh out these ideas: If I were in a position to do that these projects wouldn't be abandonned in the first place.

So, I'll be away from the blog for the next week or so. When I come back, though, prepare yourself to be amazed and enlightened (or alternately, bored and confused) by my simmering ideas.

M2M: Re-inverting the Pyramid (Part 2)

Recap: Again, I need to articulate a rationale that will motivate my proposed study: "Why spend time examining the genetic narratives of adoptive parents?" I've already sketched out the Big Answer to this question, involving the huge explosion in understanding and "mapping" the human genome and other developments in the area of genomics. I likened this model to an inverted pyramid. Now my task is to flip the pyramid back around so that I begin my proposal with the most narrow justification for my particular proposed research: At the point, as it were--both in a literal and metaphorical sense. And part of this point, I say, is that I should study adoptive parents' genetic narratives because these genetic narratives exist.

This is how this argument, point at pyramid's top, sketches out:

How Do I Know Adoptive Parents (APs) Relate Genetic Narratives?

1) Common sense and logic says they are there...why wouldn't they be?

This will tie in closely with numbers two and three below. And this may not be explicitly stated. The idea is that I should present the notion of genetic narratives of APs in such an easy, jargonless way that it will seem even to a reader unfamiliar with my area that, yes--it is so obvious that this is a topic that needs further exploring.

-->So, one motivation for the study is to test scientifically something that has intuitive appeal, something that is commonly assumed but not fully explored. A case can be made that such a contribution that adds to/refutes/clarifies "common" views will be a more solid foundation for further research as well as education, policy, therapy, and other applied uses.

2) Existing theory strongly suggests they sould be there

Exploring this involves clearly defining my concept of "genetic narratives"--drawing the boundaries around it (tentatively, open to further exploration through my research, of course), saying how it is similar to and different from related concepts (e.g., folk theories about genetics, Keller's "gene talk," etc.)

Then the next step is placing my proposed concept in some larger framework. This may change, but for now my best hunch is that this concept is part of adoptive parents' navigation of difference in their family. I see it as being closely related to Kirk's "shared fate" framework that I previously discussed. I also see it as being part of, or on the same conceptual level as, adoptive parents' perceptions of how their child fits within their family, and there is another whole theoretical formulation related to such notions of "goodness of fit" that I can draw on. Also, it is part of views of the transition to adoptive parenthood in that this difference navigation is a normative developmental task that APs must address some way.

-->So, one motivation for this study is that it adds to and expands previous conceptual models of adoptive family life. Theories in the social sciences are frequently lacking in specification of "mechanisms" of change or relationships. A mid-level concept like this might potentially shed light on this, linking broader conceptual ideas to data.

3) Previous empirical research says they are there

No one necessarily has used my exact terminology, though, so I'll have to show how previous research (including MTARP-related) dealing with adoptive parents and their talk about genetics was really about just what I am proposing to study.

Once I've established this there is still more to do: I still need to answer why this needs to be addressed again empirically, by me, with this sample, and with these variables. Just a few possible justifications I might discuss:

--Previous research has not placed this topic in the theoretical contexts that I am (assuming, of course, that I have shown how/why those contexts are relevant, important, etc.).


--I am moving the concept forward by drawing out dimensions or sublevels that might lend themselves to development as quantitative measures in future research.


--Previous research failed to examine this topic dyadically, considering both adoptive mothers and fathers in couples.

-->So, the point is that I have to show how my study will be able to provide valuable answers that previous studies could not, did not, or only hinted at. The key is that this information has to be seen to be valuable, for example in clearing up confusion or showing complexity and multidimensionality where previously less developed answers were drawn.

There are still steps to be taken to get me to method. But it is now much clearer what my purposes are and, as a result, what kinds of methodology might be necessary in order to meet these aims.

And it is a lot easier to hint at broader links to the grand level, to foreshadow these for future research. Like, some of the assumptions from previous researchers about the negative nature of AP's perceptions of the role of genetics in their family mirror the assumptions about the nefarious uses of genetics at the societal level. Some of the discussed negative outcomes of certain kinds of genetic thinking (e.g., genetic determinism) are presumed to entail certain negative outcomes on the societal level; Analogous kinds of genetic narrative of adoptive parents might have negative family outcomes.

But also, some scholars have started to question whether or not "accuracy" in the public's genetic knowledge is necessary for positive outcomes, and have suggested that "looser" accounts of genetics can serve specific purposes--like making something huge and incomprehensible (e.g., "25% risk of developing a genetic condition by a certain age if both parents are carriers for the condition") more manageable cognitively and emotionally (e.g., "X runs in our family"). So similarly, there may be various genetic narratives that may be related to positive outcomes.

Now the madness is starting to look less so. And starting at the point of the pyramid means I'm less likely to bite off more than I can chew...

M2M: Re-inverting the Pyramid (Part 1)

Still moving to method (slowly...)

As I said last time, my first inclination when writing a paper is to start with the grand picture: like an inverted pyramid, with the broadest, most encompassing ideas at the top. And this is a perfectly legitimate way to craft an argument, by starting with the overarching ideas and concepts and moving ever more narrow to your point. But, I think for me it is not a very effective process. Or an efficient one. I am too easily lost in the thickness of ideas, too distracted by big sparkly concepts. But I'm going to sketch them out here anyway.

Why? (Good, lordie, why, can't you see your own proposal first draft countdown, counting down down down, why o why o why on earth waste time with this why why why???? )

For one, because these ideas interest me, and maybe--though they are not all a part of my dissertation proposal--many are a part of my 6- to 10-year research program. So, it might be useful to at least document them. For another, I think if I don't get these thoughts out some kind of way, they will be forever lurking in the corners of my head, jealously and spitefully distracting me from my true work.

Plus, maybe this illustration will b