In the Fourth Edition of this bestselling book, John W Creswell and new co-author Cheryl N Poth explore the philosophical underpinnings, history and key elements of each of five qualitative inquiry traditions: narrative research, phenomenology, grounded theory, ethnography and case study - putting them side by side, so that we can see the differences. The authors relate research designs to each of the traditions of enquiry. They compare theoretical frameworks and ways to employ standards of quality, as well as strategies for writing introductions to studies, collecting data, analyzing data, writing a narrative and verifying results.
New in this edition:
- Updated materials on each tradition
- More on interpretive frameworks and ethics
- More visual depictions of the five approaches
- Two new topical articles in Chapter 5, reproduced in full in the appendices.
John W. Creswell, PhD, is a Professor of Family Medicine and Senior Research Scientist of
the Michigan Mixed Methods Program. He has authored numerous articles and 34 books on
mixed methods research, qualitative research, and research design. While at the University of
Nebraska–Lincoln, he held the Clifton Endowed Professor Chair, served as Director of the
Mixed Methods Research Office, co-founded SAGE’s Journal of Mixed Methods Research, and
was an Adjunct Professor of Family Medicine at the University of Michigan and a consultant to
the Veterans Administration Health Services Research Center in Ann Arbor, Michigan. He was
a Senior Fulbright Scholar to South Africa in 2008 and to Thailand in 2012. In 2011, he co-led
a National Institutes of Health working group on the “best practices of mixed methods research
in the health sciences,” served as a Visiting Professor at Harvard’s School of Public Health and
received an honorary doctorate from the University of Pretoria, South Africa. In 2014, he was
the founding President of the Mixed Methods International Research Association. In 2015, he
joined the staff of Family Medicine at the University of Michigan to Co-Direct the Michigan
Mixed Methods Program. In 2017, he coauthored the American Psychological Association
“standards” on qualitative and mixed methods research. The fourth edition of this book on
Qualitative Inquiry & Research Design won the 2018 McGuffey Longevity Award from the U.S.
Textbook & Academic Authors Association. During the COVID-19 pandemic, he gave virtual
keynote presentations to many countries from his office in Osaka, Japan. Updates on his work
can be found on his website at johnwcreswell.com.
Cheryl N. Poth, PhD, is a Professor in the Faculty of Education and faculty member of the
research-intensive Centre for Research and Applied Measurement and Evaluation at the
University of Alberta. In this role, she has developed and taught graduate-level research methods
and program evaluation courses in addition to supervising and mentoring students, faculty,
and local as well as global community members in qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods
research. She is the author of over 50 peer-reviewed journal articles, three books as well as
numerous book chapters. Her work has been recognized by the American Educational Research
Association with the Division D Significant Contributions to Research Methodology Award
in 2023 (with Peggy Shannon-Baker) and by the Textbook & Academic Authors Association
with the Most Promising New Textbook Award in 2020 and the McGuffey Longevity Award
for Qualitative Research book in 2018 (with John Creswell). She served as Editor of the SAGE
Handbook of Mixed Methods Research (2023) and as Guest Coeditor of several journal special
issues, including the International Journal of Qualitative Methods. In addition to more than
40 invited talks and 150 conference presentations, she has led research methods workshops
with diverse audiences on four continents. She served as an Advisory Board Member of the
International Institute of Qualitative Methodology (2014–2020); the President of the Mixed
Methods International Research Association (2017–2018); a Research Fellow at the University
of South Africa (2018–2020); a Helen Glass Scholar in the College of Nursing within the Rady
Faculty of Health Sciences at the University of Manitoba (2022); and as a MERIT Visiting
Professor in the Faculty of Health Sciences at McMaster University (2023–2025). In 2009, she
cofounded the interdisciplinary Alberta Clinical and Community-Based Evaluation Research
Team to advance innovative community–university research partnership supports for program
planning and impact assessments of service delivery for individuals with complex needs. She
serves as the Methodologist on several cross-disciplinary research teams and has led federally,
provincially, and locally funded research projects. She is an Associate Editor of the Journal of
Mixed Methods Research and is an editorial board member of several journals. Updates on her
work can be found on her website at https://sites.google.com/ualberta.ca/cheryl-poth/.
