READ ME File For 'Dataset in support of the Southampton doctoral thesis : Understanding social capital and the role it plays in food security in Malawi'

Dataset DOI: 10.5258/SOTON/D2574 

ReadMe Author: AILISH CRAIG, University of Southampton 0000-0003-2780-9670

This dataset supports the thesis entitled 
AWARDED BY: University of Southampton
DATE OF AWARD: 2022

DESCRIPTION OF THE DATA
Qualitative fieldwork notes from focus group discussions (FGDs) in support of Chapter 5 of thesis titled "Bonding, bridging and linking social capital combinations for food access; A gendered case study exploring temporal differences in Southern Malawi." 

Collection 
Data was collected in the Southern Region of Malawi in 2022. 
Lead researcher and note taker: Ailish Craig
Facilitator, note taker and translator on rotation: Lucius Chilipo, Chakhumbila Khaila and Tadala Minyaliwa. 
No audio recordings were taken for logistical and sensitivity reasons. Detailed notes were instead taken. Ethical approval granted by the University of Southampton and Malawi National Commission of Science and Technology.

3 rural communities were selected using purposeful sampling and permission was granted by Chiefs. Chiefs were asked to select 10 adult men (5 active community members, 5less active and engaged community members) and 10 adult women (5 active community members, 5 less active and engaged community members). 
4 FGDs were conducted in each community (active female only, less active female only, active male only, less active male only). 

Content
The FGDs were conducted with a seasonal calendar at the start and ranking exercise at the end (available in the data notes). The research themes in this data were conducted based on questions around food security, social capital, temporal changes, gender and weather, to explore how social capital typologies are used to access food. The associated questionnaire is also available alongside data.

The data can be opened by Microsoft Word. 


This dataset contains:
This dataset contains typed notes of all 12 focus group discussions. Locations and names have been removed.


Date of data collection: January 2022

Information about geographic location of data collection: Machinga, Zomba and Phalombe Districts in the Southern Region of Malawi. Exact GPS location data has been removed.

Licence:
CC-BY

Related projects/Funders:
This work was funded by the Economic and Social Research Council through the South Coast Doctoral Training Partnership (grant number ES/P000673/1). 

Related publication:
The research paper that utilises this data has been submitted for publication in the Journal of Rural Studies with Craig,A. as lead author. 


Date that the file was created: 03, 2023