Letters: Other Side of Focus Group Story

0

I would like to present a more balanced view of the qualitative research industry than was presented in your April 3 article “Is Your Focus Group Legit? Cheating Rampant.”

As indicated in the title and supported by the article text, your primary journalistic point is that qualitative research is not to be trusted. The truth is that there are some dishonest people in our industry, just as there are dishonest doctors, teachers and judges. Just as one can still get outstanding medical care, an excellent education and a fair trial, one can also get reliable qualitative research.

As with most areas of life, the good outweighs the bad, but the bad gets the publicity. There are many more good researchers and research participants trying to provide an excellent research opportunity than there are dishonest ones out to make a fast buck.

Since you chose to focus your article on the dishonesty in research, let me give you a few examples of how the qualitative research industry is taking the initiative to protect research integrity.

The Qualitative Research Consultant’s Association (QRCA) is the largest professional organization devoted to protecting the professionalism and ethics of the qualitative research industry. QRCA has joined forces with the Marketing Research Association (MRA) to produce industry standards for respondent recruiting and privacy issues. In fact, both boards of directors have recently approved identical standards of conduct for respondent identification to further reduce respondent dishonesty.

QRCA and MRA are also working on focus group facility database standards to ensure that respondents and databases are well managed to provide the highest in research integrity. Both organizations also provide a strong network of professionals so that companies that routinely cheat become known through informal networking.

Your article was based primarily on the story of one dishonest man. I hope that you will look a little deeper into the industry. You will find a thriving industry that is providing extremely reliable research into the products and services we all enjoy.

JIM BRYSON

President

Qualitative Research

Consultant’s Association

No posts to display