The Need to Rigorously Develop Common Quality Guidelines for Reporting Mixed Methods Research

Abstract

Quality in mixed methods research is a key topic in the field. A virtual special issue was published in this journal (Fàbregues et al., 2021), giving researchers a collection of articles providing practical guidance to evaluate the quality of mixed methods research studies. In the last 15 years, the scholarship on mixed methods research quality has seen three major developments: identifying core criteria for mixed methods research quality, contextualizing criteria for different disciplines and designs, and constructing criteria for use in systematic reviews. The developments are a marker of maturation of mixed methods as a field. Although the mixed methods literature about quality has grown at a steady, yet relatively slow pace, a unified and common set of quality criteria remains elusive. The purpose of this editorial is to summarize the developments related to quality, and as a starting point, to call upon the field to develop and adopt a set of common quality standards for reporting mixed methods research.