Our research route among interviews and observation

I think the key element that allowed our group to get through the preliminary phase of the research without too many difficulties (the first two secondary researches, and the preliminary planning of the project), was our planning approach, which was set from the beginning in a clear way and with well distributed tasks.

On the other hand, I found some difficulties especially while writing the first “secondary research”. Because as previously specified by the teacher, despite the inexperience and the generality of the task, she wanted us to deal with this challenge in the best possible way. Afterwards, however, thanks to coordination and the choice of a mutually agreed upon topic to write about, we proceeded with the second secondary research fluently.

In terms of our approach to the project, in order to formulate our primary research, we selected and assigned different tasks to each of us to gather as much information as possible, from a quantitatively and qualitatively point of view.

We are collecting this data by going around the city doing interviews with locals, students, and even NOVA staff on the current topic of climate change. In addition to interviews, as a method of data collection we are also applying direct observation of people’s behaviours related to the topic, such as what kind of products they use for cooking, what items they buy and consume.

Obviously, the purpose of this primary research isn’t just to collect as much information as possible, but also to enrich our knowledge. Primarily through face-to-face interviews it will be possible to promote multicultural comparison, learning the habits, lifestyle and approaches of Portuguese people to climate change.