Validation by expert judgements: two cases of qualitative research in Applied Linguistics

Abstract

The aim of this article is to discuss the implications which occurred as a result of an evaluation which was based on the input of expert judgment concerning examples of its implementation in qualitative investigations in the field of Applied Linguistics to language teaching. Two research directions were followed in an academic setting, each of which used different instruments due to the specific characteristics of each area of study. The aim of the first study is to evaluate students' oral expression in L2 and necessitated the evaluation of the items and descriptors of the questionnaire used for the study. While the second study examined the pragmatic strategies used for the written interaction of multilingual learners and had to evaluate the equivalence of the instructions to product similar texts in different languages. After the evaluations of the experts, it is concluded that although they bring new perspectives and useful interpretations for the reformulation of the instrument for collecting information, the qualitative character of both investigations grants them, in some cases, a high degree of subjectivity to their responses.