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Although problems of reliability and validity have been explored thoroughly by experimenters and other quantitative researchers, their treatment by ethnographers has been sporadic and haphazard. This article analyzes these constructs as defined and addressed by ethnographers. Issues of reliability and validity in ethnographic design are compared to their counterparts in experimental design. Threats to the credibility of ethnographic research are summarized and categorized from field study methodology. Strategies intended to enhance credibility are incorporated throughout the investigative process: study design, data collection, data analysis, and presentation of findings. Common approaches to resolving various categories of contamination are illustrated from the current literature in educational ethnography.

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Choices o f strategies for analyzing records or transcripts o f human behavior in everyday, naturalistic settings are affected by a variety of externalandinternal design constraints. Among the most common techniques identified are analytic induction, the constant comparative method, typological analysis, enumerative systems, a n d standardized observational protocols. Each of these is described and analyzed along multiple dimensions o f design considerations.