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Virtual Special Issue on “Mixed Methods Designs, Integration, and Visual Practices in Educational Research”

Educational researchers are increasingly turning to mixed methods research to account for complexity in research contexts and phenomena (Shannon-Baker, 2017). Education was the top field (n = 41, 33%) among empirical papers published in the first 10 years (2007–2016) of the Journal of Mixed Methods Research (Molina-Azorin & Fetters, 2017). Educational research associations have special interest groups for mixed methods research (e.g., American Educational Research Association, European Association for Research on Learning and Instruction). This interest in mixed methods research and the wealth of available articles in the Journal of Mixed Methods Research presents a prime opportunity to collect impactful discussions about applying mixed methods research in educational contexts that can be useful not only for educational research but also for the mixed methods community. The purpose of this virtual special issue is to showcase the breadth of applications of mixed methods research in educational research published in the Journal of Mixed Methods Research as of early January 2022. The 19 articles chosen for this collection were based on education broadly defined and included both empirical and methodological articles. These studies were either based on schooling contexts (e.g., primary schools, colleges, professional development for school officials), studied educational constructs (e.g., learning processes, college recruitment and retention), or included students, teachers, or other educational officials as participants. Special attention was paid to select articles from the breadth of education subfields (e.g., higher education, educational psychology, teacher preparation, educational leadership). Articles included in previous virtual special issues were excluded. The goal of this editorial is to identify common practices educational researchers have used when applying mixed methods research among the articles chosen for this virtual special issue. These articles are organized into three thematic areas based on their common practices. When applying mixed methods research approaches, educational researchers: (1) align their research study design features with specific educational contexts, (2) apply unique forms of integration to merge or transform data, and (3) use visuals throughout the mixed methods research process. This