SEEING THE TREES AND MISSING THE FOREST: QUALITATIVE VERSUS QUANTITATIVE RESEARCH FINDINGS IN A MODEL TRANSPORTATION DEMAND MANAGEMENT PROGRAM EVALUATION

Abstract

Following the traditional procedural methodology of modern research using objective, quantitative designs for understanding and planning transportation systems, transportation researchers from a number of disciplines, including psychology, sociology, planning, engineering, organizational behavior, and others in 20 years of studies have sought to measure and understand the human factor and apply the results to planning and public policy formation. Such quantitative evaluations on whether a program achieved a statistically significant effect are frequently misleading and often of little value to decision makers. They neglect by design the relationship between what was desired and what was delivered, the relationship between official programmatic goals and the goals of the users, and the differences between the various stakeholders, each of whom has a unique interest in the program. Qualitative methods, as part of an overall evaluation design, thus have an important and overlooked place in transportation research. A conjoint, multi-method quantitative and qualitative study of a model transportation demand management program is described in which the favorable findings of the typical quantitative work are in conflict with the larger issues of importance to program users and nonuser stakeholders as discovered in the qualitative study.

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