“Qualitative research is a form of social inquiry that focuses on the way people interpret and make sense of their experiences and the world in which they live” (Holloway & Wheeler 2002). An ethnographic approach was necessary for this study because in order to understand the hierarchies and the implications it had on the environment, analysis through observation and interviews formed the best evidence. As Holloway and Wheeler argued, qualitative research is important in order to interpret people’s interactions and understand why they interact and experience things in the way they do. In this new research, climbers of all backgrounds were studied in the University of California Sandy Barbara Rock Gym on campus. This rock gym provides a place …show more content…
I always wrote my experience and observation as soon as I left the area, and gathered sufficient evidence for basis of my argument. Through the use of coding, I was able to identify themes and descriptive idea’s in order to study emerging theories in the rock gym. This type of analysis allowed my data to become “grounded theory” data. Gibbs (2007), defines this grounded theory approach as allowing central ideas and theories to “‘arise’ out of the data,” as opposed to “testing the theories specified beforehand” (Gibbs 2007). Through the grounded theory approach, communication styles among different areas of the rock gym emerged, as well as differing personalities within these communication styles. Communication in the rock gym, I found, varied much differently from the outside world, as I had to become integrated into their environment before becoming even closely accepted and able to talk about certain climbing terms. Of course, every person’s personality differs, so not all interactions among each climber concluded the same result, but in general, climbers have distinct personality traits that allow them to become socialized into that environment, feeling accepted and part of the