Which of the following is a qualitative data method that could be used to understand why members responded as they did?

• A. Surveys
• B. Focus groups
• C. Questionnaires
• D. Experiments

Answer: (B)

When you want to uncover the reasons behind how people answered, you need a method that captures beliefs, feelings, and the context of their thoughts. Focus groups provide this by bringing a small group together to discuss topics under a facilitator’s guidance. In this setting, participants explain their choices, react to others’ opinions, and build on each other’s ideas, yielding rich, descriptive data about why people feel the way they do. This interactive dialogue helps reveal motives, concerns, and experiences that explain the responses.

Surveys and questionnaires, by contrast, are designed to quantify what people think or how many hold a certain view, often in fixed, closed formats. They can provide breadth and measurable trends but typically don’t delve into the deeper reasoning in the same nuanced way. Experiments test specific hypotheses under controlled conditions and focus on causality, producing results that are numeric and not primarily exploratory about personal motivations.

So, focus groups are the qualitative method best suited for understanding why members responded as they did.