Esrc National Centre for Research Methods

ESRC National Centre for Research Methods

Assessment of the Training Needs in Research Methods in

the UK Professional Social Research Community

Rose Wiles, Nicholas Bardsley, Jackie Powell

University of Southampton

December 2008

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Acknowledgements

This work was carried out with the co-operation of the Social Research Association

who assisted us in distributing questionnaires and in providing information in relation

to various aspects of the project. We thank them for their support. The project,

however, was undertaken solely by the National Centre for Research Methods and

they are responsible for the findings presented here.

We would also like to thank the people who took the time to respond to our survey or

participate in an interview.

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Executive Summary

One of the aims of NCRM’s work is to assess the research methods training needs of

the UK social science community in order to inform both NCRM and the ESRC in the

strategic planning of their activities. Two assessments of training need have been

conducted. The first focused primarily on the perspectives of methodologists, key

academic stakeholders and representatives of learned societies (Beissel-Durrant and

Lang, 2004) and the second on the academic sector (Wiles et al., 2005). The work

being reported on here focuses on social researchers who work outside of academia.

Data were collected from three sources to investigate the training needs of

professional researchers: an online survey; qualitative interviews and an analysis of

job vacancies for social researchers. Data collection focused on the topics in which

research methods training were perceived to be needed, the levels of training (i.e.

introductory, intermediate or advanced) and the modes of training delivery. The

online survey was distributed to all members of the Social Research Association

(SRA). A total of 95 responses from researchers outside of academia were received, a

response rate of 11%. The...