Attuning to the social world: ethnography in health professions education research

This chapter focuses on three contemporary types of ethnographies – focused ethnography, autoethnography and digital ethnography – providing insights into both their common ethnographic features and unique characteristics, and the ways in which they reveal the social and cultural organisation of everyday education practices. Focused ethnography has received recent attention in the health professions education research sphere, with a small number of publications explicitly referring to the use of this methodology. Autoethnography is still an emerging qualitative research methodology in health professions education. A study by Farrell and colleagues, constructed on feedback theories, applies autoethnography to highlight the nuances of using a goal-oriented feedback approach during brief encounters with learners. Digital ethnography has evolved alongside the rise of the Internet and the emergence of the many forms of social media that have created novel forms of social interaction.