On March 2nd, 2023, Dr. Michelle Nelson’s Qualitative Research Methods in Advertising class visited Armory Hall to come and see the department’s facility used for focus groups. Equipped with technology to facilitate focus groups for various research for students and faculty, this room comes equipped with multiple video cameras and audio equipment that captures every moment of a discussion in detail.

The class practiced being focus group moderators and participants, all under the guidance and critique of Dr. Michelle Nelson. The topic of the day was streaming and advertising, which had been the theme of the semester for the class. Throughout the spring, these 1st year Master’s students have been working on exploratory research regarding how people felt about the growing trend of advertising implementation into streaming services, in which they interviewed various participants and subsequently transcribed, coded, and analyzed the interviews for themes. These mock focus groups gave these Master’s students a different perspective into how this kind of research could be done in a more group discussion focused setting.

The Master’s students had a great time learning about focus groups in a more applicable setting, with some having aspirations to explore qualitative methods more in their own research going forward.