Evaluating Mixed Methods Research Integration Quality in Three Top Journals of Higher Education

Mixed methods research (MMR) has been adopted in a variety of disciplines, including health science, social studies, psychology, early childhood, and business. More recently, higher education researchers adopted this methodology, but with limited evaluation on the quality of published mixed methods research. To enhance researchers’ understanding of using MMR, we developed a 4-dimension codebook and reviewed 14 recently published mixed methods research articles that were published in 3 top journals in higher education. We found that researchers used 3 effective strategies to approach integration: (a) using a mixed methods research question to guide the mixed methods (MM) design, (b) using effective mixed methods sampling strategies to collect different types of data for the purpose of integration, and (c) using mixing techniques to interpret results for optimal maximum integration. Apart from the 3 effective integration strategies, a few insufficiencies have been singled out: (a) infrequent use of MM terminologies in the article title, (b) limited familiarity with MM data mixing strategies, and (c) non-optimal reporting of MM results. At the end, we synthesized the useful integration strategies and developed a checklist for higher education researchers to design high-quality mixed methods research studies.