Factors Influencing Rural Migration Decisions in Scotland: An Analysis of the Evidence

ANNEX B - METHODOLOGY

Data Gathering

A literature review was selected as the most appropriate method to meet the broad aims and objectives of this project. This involved a transparent approach, whereby the search terms were made explicit and all the references gathered were listed. The search terms used are shown in Table 3 below.

Table 5

Rural migration Scotland
Rural migration remote Scotland
Rural migration island/s Scotland
Rural migration Scotland, characteristics
Rural migration Scotland, factors
Rural migration Scotland, decision/s
Rural migration Scotland, decision making/ers
Rural migration Scotland, motivation/s
Rural migration Scotland, push factor/s
Rural migration Scotland, pull factor/s
Rural migration Scotland, return/ing
Rural migration Scotland, staying
Rural migration Scotland, age
Rural migration Scotland, gender
Rural migration Scotland, young people
Rural migration Scotland, youth
Rural migration Scotland, teenagers
Rural migration Scotland, graduates
Rural migration Scotland, higher education
Rural migration Scotland, study
Rural migration Scotland, student/s
Rural migration Scotland, early career / early career stage
Rural migration Scotland, employment
Rural migration Scotland, job/s
Rural migration Scotland, older people
Rural migration Scotland, old people
Rural migration Scotland, elderly
Rural migration Scotland, retirement
Rural migration Scotland, retirees
Rural migration Scotland, women
Rural migration Scotland, female
Rural migration Scotland, girls
Rural migration Scotland, men
Rural migration Scotland, boys
Rural migration Scotland, LGBT
Rural migration Scotland, lesbian
Rural migration Scotland, gay
Rural migration Scotland, bisexual
Rural migration Scotland, transsexual
Rural migration Scotland, homosexual
Rural migration Scotland, house buyer/s
Rural migration Scotland, returning
Rural migration Scotland non returners
Rural migration Scotland, family/ies
Rural migration Scotland, young family/ies
Rural migration Scotland, tenant/s
Rural migration Scotland, rent
Rural migration Scotland, house sharing
Rural migration Scotland, housing
Rural migration Scotland, home owner/s
Rural migration Scotland, minority group/s
Rural migration Scotland, Polish
Rural migration Scotland, economic migrant/s
Rural migration Scotland, A8
Rural migration Scotland, in migrants
Rural migration Scotland, migrants
Rural migration Scotland, Iglicska
Rural migration Scotland, eastern Europe
Rural migration Scotland, Europe
Rural migration Scotland, international
Rural migration Scotland, immigrant/s
Rural migration Scotland, independence
Rural migration Scotland, opportunity/ies
Rural migration Scotland, culture
Rural migration Scotland, perception/s
Rural migration Scotland, wellbeing
Rural migration Scotland, leisure
Rural migration Scotland, services
Rural migration Scotland, inheriting property
Rural migration Scotland, end of career
Rural migration Scotland, social group/s
Rural migration Scotland, special needs
Rural migration Scotland, physical disabilities
Rural migration Scotland, learning disabilities
Rural migration Scotland, mental health

The search was restricted to journal articles published after 1999, to help ensure that findings and suggestions were relevant to the current policy context. However, as an initial scoping study was undertaken on all journal articles published since 1995, some highly significant studies published between 1995 and 1998 have been included in this report. However, these have only been included where they were thought to add particular value - ie: where the issues are still highly relevant to policy makers and where no comparable study has been published since.

Various search engines were used in this review, including Google and Google Scholar, and website-specific searches were also run on the Scottish Government website. The Social Science Citation Index on the Web of Science were also used, along with the databases offered by Idox and ASSIA. To make these searches easier, the Scottish Government's Knowledge and Evidence Portal on Saltire was used, which saved time by allowing us to search more than one database at once.

In order to pick up relevant work in progress, or published material that might not be picked up by the search engine, analysts within the Scottish Government were alerted to the study and asked to give suggestionsn for appropriate reading material.

The literature gathered was then filtered using a set of criteria for the inclusion or exclusion of data sources. The selected sources were then analysed using a four stage process, the details of which are outlined below.

Analysis

All data that met the proposed Criteria For Inclusion (please see Appendix) was analysed using the following four stage process:

• The data was first analysed in table form, using each of the four factors mentioned in the Aims and Objectives section as a column heading. This made it easy to review and summarise the content of each article, as well as compare studies. In these tables, all the data was carefully referenced to avoid confusion at a later stage and provide information for the annotated bibliography.
• Each study/report's suggestions for policy was then recorded in tabular form. Again, everything was carefully referenced here.
• The overarching themes from the evidence base were then extracted. Where a large number of themes emerged, these were grouped into broader categories. Where possible, associative analysis was undertaken to link these themes and/or sub-themes to particular population groups and/or regions.
• Lastly, any gaps in the research were highlighted in order to help steer future research and make readers' more aware of this study's limitations.

During the analysis, good co-operation was maintained with senior analytical colleagues in order to ensure a high quality of research output. Moreover, strong lines of communication were maintained with policy colleagues in order to ensure that the analysis was appropriate to their needs.

Reliability

The evidence base used in this review was largely made up of small-scale, qualitative research studies, which reflected the experiences of residents living in specific areas of rural Scotland, rather than offering a statistically representative picture of rural Scotland as a whole. The available literature was therefore very much grounded in study respondents' experiences, perspectives, memories and even (occasionally) post-rationalisations. These are highly subjective, being dependent on respondents' personal circumstances, as well as the study's particular geographical remit. As a result, the following review focuses on key individual experiences of rural migration, rather than trying to pick out nation-wide trends in terms of inward and outward migration. Moreover, this means that it has also not been possible to rank migrants' motivations for moving, nor single out the key driving forces on a regional or national scale. In short, this review aims to provide insight rather than undisputable facts about the issues concerning rural migration in Scotland.

Due to these limitations of the evidence base, this report aims to provide insight rather than undisputable facts about the issues concerning rural migration in Scotland. This insight comes from the participants' perceptions and memories of their own experiences, which cannot usually verified by 'hard' facts (for example, statistics). There may, therefore, be a future research need to explore whether such perceptions are grounded in fact.

Nevertheless, the reliability of this study has been enhanced by the following actions:

• excluding any information sources published before 1999, so as to provide only the most up to date, relevant information;
• only including sources that discuss Scottish migration, as opposed to general migration trends for the UK as a whole;
• noting the context of each source when it is used to support a point (for example, the study's size and geographical remit, how recently it was undertaken)
• clarifying when a source did not deal with migration specifically but took a broader look at rural issues - this was sometimes felt to be important to add more detail to the issues that arose in the literature on migration;
• noting when studies have used a statistically representative sample, so that their findings may be generalised more broadly;
• noting when issues or suggestions have been mentioned by two or more sources, so that the reader can get an idea of how widespread they are likely to be;
• only including research articles, as opposed to articles from the popular press that also touch upon this subject area; and
• only including studies that have used a methodology appropriate to their aims, and that have not generalised their findings beyond the sample (unless statistical methods were used).

Meanwhile, the insight provided by this study has been enhanced by:

• using a wide range of search terms, closely linked to the policy requirements, which can be found in Table 3;
• selecting qualitative studies based on how closely their aims link to those of this project, and how comprehensively their methodologies have addressed these;
• using examples of successful initiatives wherever possible;
• excluding articles from the popular press that are not based on social research methodologies, but rather conjecture and opinion.

However, the limitations of this study do need to be realised. Firstly, it has not been possible to measure or rank migrants' motivations as 'clearly there are great difficulties both in measuring migrant motivations and indeed in even proposing the concept that any one dominant motivation can meaningfully be singled out in studies of this kind, given that most researchers view migration as the outcome of socially and temporally embedded values' (9) ³³. Secondly, most of the findings reported here are based on surveys, interviews and focus groups with participants and therefore reflect their opinions, memories and (possibly sometimes) post-rationalisation, rather than 'hard' facts about rural migration. And thirdly, not all the findings used the same definition of 'rural', and only a few used the Scottish Government's Urban-Rural Classification, or distinguished between remote and accessible rural areas. This may represent a future research need.

One final issue concerning the reliability of this review is the fact that not all the points made in the literature were explicitly mentioned in relation to specific age groups. As a result, they sometimes had to be attributed to the most appropriate age groups as part of the analysis process. This process, however, took into account the sampling frame and overall context of each study, and so is believed to have been done as reliably as possible.