As an observational methodology, ethnography provides specific benefits in research on medical topics that other qualitative approaches cannot. Medicine is practiced in a broader context and involves multiple players, a fact that cannot be fully captured by surveys and studio or telephone interviews.
As medical products face tougher competition and pharmaceutical clients need a more thorough understanding of the customer, versus just product features/benefits, they are turning to ethnography research more frequently.
While ethnography has become more valued over the past several years, before moving ahead with a project of this type it is important to first consider the research problem at hand as well as the methodology’s particular strengths and weaknesses. Like other research methods, ethnography certainly has its place and can produce extraordinarily rich results. If employed improperly, however, this methodology can be frustrating and expensive: It can produce plenty of “interesting” findings without producing actionable research results.
In an article authored for The Journal of Medical Marketing, Donna Kelly, Ph.D., Executive Vice President, and Michael Gibbons, Ph.D., Consultant, GfK V2, explore the history and theory of ethnography. They also detail their own experience with ethnography in the pharmaceutical marketing research industry and offer recommendations for the types of research problems that are best suited for ethnography, such as understanding exactly how products and information are used in their natural settings, differentiating products based on more psychological drivers, and needing to build familiarity with a new therapeutic area.
To download the article, Ethnography: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, please click here.
