Q Methodology

Abstract

Q methodology is a mixed blessing. No doubt about it. Any method which has such an openly qualiquantological heritage (see Stenner and Stainton Rogers (2004) for a fuller explanation of this disgraceful neologism) risks being singled out and victimized. This is, after all, a method which has its roots in the psychological laboratories of Charles Spearman and Cyril Burt – laboratories which throughout the 1920s and 1930s were responsible for the invention and refinement of the psychometric techniques that still characterize the discipline today (often to the detriment of qualitative techniques). Yet, if that were not shameful enough, here it is rearing its frankly ugly head (nearly a century later) in the pages of a handbook of qualitative research methods. You see? We warned you. So how did it end up here? That is a good question and we are glad you asked.