Yeboah Beatrice Agyemang

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• Document Sampling
• The sampling procedure for this modest study was quite simple
• Using the Wiley-
• Blackwell search engine at the Journal’s home page, searches were undertaken in article titles,1full text/abstracts, keywords, and then All Fields, using the following keywords: homeeconomics (ist), leadership, philosophy, profession(ism, al), competencies (ent), conceptual(ization), reflective, future directions, image, name, and then each of these words paired withhome economics
• This sampling process was undertaken three times by the author in 2008,separated by a span of several weeks
• When the category of All Fields was included, over 1200 hits were generated (All Fieldsincludes the reference lists in all articles in the Journal’s e-data base)
• The information for eachhit was scanned
• See Figure 1 for anillustration of a typical search result, withhyperlinks neutralized
• If the title wasconfined in a general sense to theconceptualization of the field or disciplineof home economics (per the keywords usedas search perimeters), the article was openedand read in a PDF format
• Using the Findfunction available in PDF files, the Journalarticle was again searched using the key search word(s) that generated the original hit
• Samplingsaturation eventually emerged, evidenced by the same articles appearing with subsequent andnarrower searches
• This process yielded 17 articles (see Table One), half generated in the firstthree years of the life of the Journal (1977-1979)
• One third of the articles appeared in the 1980s(32%), with only two in the 90s, and one in the 2000s, totaling 19% over 18 years
• After the mid-to late 80s, the focus on home economics declined markedly, and virtually disappeared after thename change in 2001
• Another pattern emerged at this stage of theresearch process that contributed to a change in theresearch design protocol, specifically the datacollection stage
• Before the name change in 2001,all contributions to the Journal about the field ofhome economics were in the genre of articles
• Thisprofile changed dramatically in the 2000s (after theremoval of the words home economics) to reviewsof home economics-related books (see Figure 2 and
• Table 1)
• This analysis did not address the Book
• Reviews (n=13) because they do not representoriginal contributions to the Journal, even thoughthey do pertain to original contributions to thediscipline in general
• Figure 2
• WHAT IS HOME ECONOMICS?
• International Journal of Consumer Studies
• Volume 2, Issue 1, Date: March 1978, Pages: 79-84
• RODERICK BENNETT
• Abstract | References | Full Text: PDF (300K)
• Figure 1 - Typical Search Result
• IJCS is housed under the Business, Economics, Finance and Accounting section,1then under Marketing and Sales athttp://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/120118369/grouphome/home.html
• Table One - Profile of articles (n=17) and book reviews (n=13) in IJCS related to conceptualizing home economics(1977-2008), N=30
• Date Author Title Vol/Issue/Pages (n=8)Robert Balyiss A note on T.H
• Huxley and the Society of Arts 1 (1), 21-25
• Rosemarie von
• Schweitzer
• From the economic writings of Aristotle to homeeconomics in the German Federal Republic today(1), 41-50
• Kathleen Hastrop Bridging the gap - the role of the professional home, profiles the rich repository of thinking about home economics shared in IJCS, thereby making itmore visible and accessible for colleagues in the field
• Data Collection and Analysis
• Once the sample frame of 17 articles was collected, a basic, qualitative content analysiswas conducted
• A content analysis is not an ordinary reading of documents
• It entails readingdocuments to identify and analyze the presence, meanings and relationships of ideas, conceptsand patterns, and then make inferences about these messages, the writer(s), the audience, andeven the culture and time of which they are a part
• Content analyses help researchers understandthe text, and explain the context of the events described in the text
• Also, a content analysis isuseful for studying changes over time
• Repeated readings of the documents help the researcherdiscover patterns and relationships within the data that the naked eye would not easily discern
• Italso contributes to reliability, which enriches the validity of the findings (Krippendorff, 2004)
• Another benefit of content analysis is that it reveals what is not in the text, significant becausewhat is missing can be as telling as what is present (Carney, 1972), appreciating that the scholarshould strive to not overreach the results (Peil, 1982)
• This analysis embraced an iterative approach
• Taking direction from Miles and Huberman(1994), the analyst let the themes emerge progressively during data collection
• This approach waspossible due to a research design comprising multiple readings, and intricate cross referencing, ofthe documents
• To undertake the analysis, the articles were each read separately, in chronologicalorder, highlighting salient points
• Second, the 17 articles were physically bound together to forma whole collection
• Upon reading them for a second time, the author began to identify commonthreads leading to initial theme ideas
• Upon a third and final reading, the author began writing upthe results
• As was necessary, individual articles were consulted again if necessary to providefurther details
• Results and Analysis
• Presenting research results from qualitative content analysis is challenging
• Supervised team of Number staff members.