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Conducting Qualitative Data Analysis: Managing Dynamic Tensions Within, Part One, Ronald J. Chenail
Conducting Qualitative Data Analysis: Managing Dynamic Tensions Within, Part One, Ronald J. Chenail
The Qualitative Report
In the third of a series of “how-to” essays on conducting qualitative data analysis, Ron Chenail examines the dynamic tensions within the process of qualitative data analysis that qualitative researchers must manage in order to produce credible and creative results. These tensions include (a) the qualities of the data and the qualitative data analysis of these qualities, (b) errors of deficiency and exuberance, (c) tacit and public knowledge, (d) separation and connection, and (e) verticality and horizontality.
Conducting Qualitative Data Analysis: Reading Line-By-Line, But Analyzing By Meaningful Qualitative Units, Ronald J. Chenail
Conducting Qualitative Data Analysis: Reading Line-By-Line, But Analyzing By Meaningful Qualitative Units, Ronald J. Chenail
The Qualitative Report
In the first of a series of “how-to” essays on conducting qualitative data analysis, Ron Chenail points out the challenges of determining units to analyze qualitatively when dealing with text. He acknowledges that although we may read a document word-by-word or line-by-line, we need to adjust our focus when processing the text for purposes of conducting qualitative data analysis so we concentrate on meaningful, undivided entities or wholes as our units of analysis.
Conducting Qualitative Data Analysis: Qualitative Data Analysis As A Metaphoric Process, Ronald J. Chenail
Conducting Qualitative Data Analysis: Qualitative Data Analysis As A Metaphoric Process, Ronald J. Chenail
The Qualitative Report
In the second of a series of “how-to” essays on conducting qualitative data analysis, Ron Chenail argues the process can best be understood as a metaphoric process. From this orientation he suggests researchers follow Kenneth Burke’s notion of metaphor and see qualitative data analysis as the analyst systematically considering the “this-ness” of the data from the “that-ness” of the qualitative abstraction drawn about the data. To make this metaphoric pronouncement a convincing case to judges as to the veracity of the juxtaposition of the code to that which is coded, the analyst must employ a recursive process by showing the …
Member Checking: Can Benefits Be Gained Similar To Group Therapy?, Melissa Harper, Patricia Cole
Member Checking: Can Benefits Be Gained Similar To Group Therapy?, Melissa Harper, Patricia Cole
The Qualitative Report
Member checking continues to be an important quality control process in qualitative research as during the course of conducting a study, participants receive the opportunity to review their statements for accuracy and, in so doing; they may acquire a therapeutic benefit. The authors of this article suggest that this benefit is similar to some of the components of group therapy, especially in normalizing the phenomenon being experienced. Even if the participants never meet, they can feel a sense of relief that their feelings are validated and that they are not alone.
Stressful Life Events And Behavior Change: A Qualitative Examination Of African American Women's Participation In A Weight Loss Program, Tiffany L. Cox, Christie Zunker, Brooks C. Wingo, Wendy K. Jefferson, Jamy D. Ard
Stressful Life Events And Behavior Change: A Qualitative Examination Of African American Women's Participation In A Weight Loss Program, Tiffany L. Cox, Christie Zunker, Brooks C. Wingo, Wendy K. Jefferson, Jamy D. Ard
The Qualitative Report
We qualitatively assessed how life stressors affected African American women's participation in a weight reduction program. A sample of 9 women, who completed a behavioral lifestyle intervention, participated in individual, structured, in-depth interviews. Life stressors, ranging from personal illness to changes in employment status, had varied effects on participation. Some women coped with life stressors by using them as a motivational tool to improve their own health, while others reported limited ability to devote time to attend meetings or engage in the prescribed lifestyle changes due to life stressors. A critical key to improving weight loss outcomes for African American …
The Experiment-Based Knew-It-All-Along Effect In The Qualitative Light Of Narrativity, Marek Palasinski
The Experiment-Based Knew-It-All-Along Effect In The Qualitative Light Of Narrativity, Marek Palasinski
The Qualitative Report
In contrast to the extant quantitative studies on the hindsight effect, the present narrative analysis looks at it from a rare angle of talk-in-interaction. Fifty one-to-one interviews were done with five student groups, each of which was presented with a scenario ending with one factual outcome and three alternative outcomes that actually did not happen. Confirming the already proven role of the provided event outcome in overestimating the probability of its occurrence, this study expands the current understanding of the processes neglected by the research on the hindsight effect. It does so by highlighting the strategic use of vagueness, self-empowerment …
Utilizing A New Graphical Elicitation Technique To Collect Emotional Narratives Describing Disease Trajectories, Marianne K. Thygesen, Birthe D. Pedersen, Jakob Kragstrup, Lis Wagner, Ole Mogensen
Utilizing A New Graphical Elicitation Technique To Collect Emotional Narratives Describing Disease Trajectories, Marianne K. Thygesen, Birthe D. Pedersen, Jakob Kragstrup, Lis Wagner, Ole Mogensen
The Qualitative Report
Elicitation techniques in connection with semi-structured interviews are scantily used, but reported to be beneficial to research. We developed and tested a new visual technique to be utilized in the latter part of semi-structured interviews. It has proved to be feasible and beneficial to use, and it could possibly be used by others. This way of extending the interviews generates more data in a visual form, as well as in a verbal form, by supporting the participants in remembering nearly forgotten parts of their experiences and in expressing emotions associated with those significant experiences. As a contribution to qualitative research, …
A Reflexive Pragmatist Reading Of Alvesson's Interpreting Interviews, Brian T. Gearity
A Reflexive Pragmatist Reading Of Alvesson's Interpreting Interviews, Brian T. Gearity
The Qualitative Report
Remember those interviews you collected for that qualitative research study? How did you address issues of interviewee power, impression management and rationality? Was it "trustworthy"? Really? In Interpreting Interviews, Mats Alvesson summarizes the current state of thought on interviews as a tool for qualitative data collection and challenges this framework as simplistic and failing to account for its complexities as a social act. Alvesson argues for a critical consciousness and pragmatic approach to interviews. This review blurs genres from autoethnography and more traditional approaches while taking Alvesson's approach, reflexive pragmatism, to its logical consequences. As a whole, Interpreting Interviews is …
Qualitative Researchers In The Blogosphere: Using Blogs As Diaries And Data, Ronald J. Chenail
Qualitative Researchers In The Blogosphere: Using Blogs As Diaries And Data, Ronald J. Chenail
The Qualitative Report
Weblogs or blogs can provide qualitative researchers with a medium for expressing their thoughts and opinions on qualitative research methods and products as well as serving as the source of data for qualitative studies. Present examples serve as exemplary guides to the potential value of this virtual communication application.
Work Experiences Of People With Mental Illness In Malaysia: A Preliminary Qualitative Study, Su-Lyn Boo, Jaymee Loong, Wai-Sheng Ng
Work Experiences Of People With Mental Illness In Malaysia: A Preliminary Qualitative Study, Su-Lyn Boo, Jaymee Loong, Wai-Sheng Ng
The Qualitative Report
This is a preliminary qualitative study, using a basic interpretive approach, to investigate the work experiences of people with mental illness in Malaysia. Six females and four males (aged 30-70) from a residential home for the mentally ill participated in semi-structured interviews. Three inter-relating themes emerged, namely the experience of self at work, perception of work, and experience of others at work. All participants reported problems in either work or family relationships; most of which interfered with their work. In addition, findings suggest that the participants' self experience may be related to the extent of one's illness integration, experience of …
Interviewing The Investigator: Strategies For Addressing Instrumentation And Researcher Bias Concerns In Qualitative Research, Ronald J. Chenail
Interviewing The Investigator: Strategies For Addressing Instrumentation And Researcher Bias Concerns In Qualitative Research, Ronald J. Chenail
The Qualitative Report
Instrumentation rigor and bias management are major challenges for qualitative researchers employing interviewing as a data generation method in their studies. A usual procedure for testing the quality of an interview protocol and for identifying potential researcher biases is the pilot study in which investigators try out their proposed methods to see if the planned procedures perform as envisioned by the researcher. Sometimes piloting is not practical or possible so an "interviewing the investigator" technique can serve as a useful first step to create interview protocols that help to generate the information proposed and to assess potential researcher biases especially …
Utilizing Microsoft® Office To Produce And Present Recursive Frame Analysis Findings, Ronald J. Chenail, Maureen Duffy
Utilizing Microsoft® Office To Produce And Present Recursive Frame Analysis Findings, Ronald J. Chenail, Maureen Duffy
The Qualitative Report
Although researchers conducting qualitative descriptive studies, ethnographies, phenomenologies, grounded theory, and narrative inquiries commonly use computer-assisted qualitative data analysis software (CAQDAS) to manage their projects and analyses, investigators conducting discursive methodologies such as discourse or conversation analysis seem to find such software packages not as useful. In our work with Recursive Frame Analysis (RFA), a systemic approach to the analysis of text and talk, we have taken a slightly different route by utilizing Microsoft® Office applications to produce and present our RFA findings. In the paper we describe RFA, explain how we use Word and PowerPoint to carry out RFA's …
Using Qualitative Research To Identify And Address The Unique Needs Of Caregivers Of Persons With Alzheimer's Disease, Breanda K. Wheeler
Using Qualitative Research To Identify And Address The Unique Needs Of Caregivers Of Persons With Alzheimer's Disease, Breanda K. Wheeler
The Qualitative Report
This paper reviews articles describing qualitative research that explores the unique needs of caregivers of patients with Alzheimer's disease. Qualitative research methodologies used in these studies include hermeneutic phenomenology, descriptive studies with focus groups, and individual interviews. Researchers identified needs and concerns unique to caregivers of persons with Alzheimer's disease including the need for knowledge about the disease, care recipient and caregiver issues, resource needs, and coping post-nursing home placement. Suggestions for addressing the needs were given by study participants. Implications for nurses and other professionals working with caregivers of persons with Alzheimer's disease were addressed. The importance of qualitative …
Situating Narrative Construction Within Social Dynamics And Context To Create Complex Meaning: A Review Of The Book Analyzing Narrative Reality, Becky De Oliveira
Situating Narrative Construction Within Social Dynamics And Context To Create Complex Meaning: A Review Of The Book Analyzing Narrative Reality, Becky De Oliveira
The Qualitative Report
Analyzing Narrative Reality (Gubrium & Holstein, 2009) examines how stories are constructed for different purposes in a variety of social situations and aims to provide a framework for analysis "oriented both to the internal and especially to the external organization of stories" (p. 2). The authors are keen to create an understanding of how stories emerge and why they are constructed, confident that these factors are vital to creating good stories-"continuously unfolding accounts, whose extensions move in many directions" (p. 228) and that go beyond the boundaries of text. The book covers narrative reality, narrative work, narrative environments and narrative …
Using Message Boards To Conduct Online Focus Groups, David Deggs, Kenda Grover, Kit Kacirek
Using Message Boards To Conduct Online Focus Groups, David Deggs, Kenda Grover, Kit Kacirek
The Qualitative Report
Geographic dispersion of research subjects can make traditional face-to-face focus groups difficult if not impractical to conduct. Online focus groups have many advantages such as enabling researchers to save costs, allowing for more efficient collection of data, and allowing researchers to accommodate research subjects' schedules. However, online focus groups require greater skill on the part of the researcher and research subjects alike. This manuscript chronicles the process that we recently used to conduct an online focus group using a message board system with graduate students enrolled in an online degree program. We explain the processes that were followed in conducting …
Picture This: A Review Of Doing Visual Ethnography: Images, Media, And Representation In Research By Sarah Pink, Diana Riviera
Picture This: A Review Of Doing Visual Ethnography: Images, Media, And Representation In Research By Sarah Pink, Diana Riviera
The Qualitative Report
In Doing Visual Ethnography: Images, Media, and Representation in Research, Pink (2001) provides the reader with an explanation of an innovative and interesting ethnographic method. She presents two of her research studies as examples. One, of women and bullfighting in Spain, and the other, related to economic inequalities in Guinea Bissau, show the reader the different ways that visual tools can be utilized and manipulated when paired with ethnographic research. She mentions the appropriateness of using photography, video, and hypermedia and why these serve as convenient tools; she also emphasizes the factors that produce the justifiable use for visual ethnography.
A Hockey Night In Canada: An Imagined Conversation Between Theorists, Curtis Fogel
A Hockey Night In Canada: An Imagined Conversation Between Theorists, Curtis Fogel
The Qualitative Report
In this paper, various methodological issues surrounding the sociological study of sport are explored. Through an imagined dialogue between two graduate students at a hockey game, this work brings together three divergent approaches to social enquiry: Positivist Grounded Theory, Constructivist Grounded Theory, and Actor-Network Theory. This paper challenges conventional writing on method in two ways: (a) assembling three divergent approaches within a single work, and (b) employing a scripted narrative as a means of exploring methodological issues. Through this innovative approach, many of the overlaps and tensions between these theories/methods are captured. In so doing, numerous methodological questions about the …
Review Of Three Qualitative Studies Of Family Presence During Resuscitation, Bonnie Schmidt
Review Of Three Qualitative Studies Of Family Presence During Resuscitation, Bonnie Schmidt
The Qualitative Report
Despite recommendations to allow family presence during resuscitation, mixed attitudes and practices persist in clinical practice today. The findings of three recent qualitative research studies are presented in this review. These phenomenological studies explore the lived experience of family presence from different perspectives. Miller and Stiles (2009) describe the experiences of hospital nurses, Maxton (2008) focuses on parental perceptions, and Mcmahon-Parkes, Moule, Benger, and Albarran (2009) study the attitudes and beliefs of patients themselves. This article presents an analysis of these study findings and overall conclusions related to family presence during resuscitation.
Recommendations For Using The Case Study Method In International Business Research, Tiia Vissak
Recommendations For Using The Case Study Method In International Business Research, Tiia Vissak
The Qualitative Report
The case study method has not been as frequently used in international business (IB) research as quantitative methods. Moreover, it has been sometimes misused and quite often criticized. Still, it can be very useful for understanding such complex phenomena as the internationalization process or the management of multinational enterprises. Based on case study methodology literature and the author's personal experience from conducting case studies and reviewing case study articles, this paper proposes some ways for overcoming some of the critiques of the case study method and increasing its contribution to IB research.
The Search For An Explanation: Breast Cancer In The Context Of Genetic Inheritance, Christine Maheu
The Search For An Explanation: Breast Cancer In The Context Of Genetic Inheritance, Christine Maheu
The Qualitative Report
This case study is an in-depth examination of how Erika (a pseudonym) interpreted and understood her genetic test results for breast cancer susceptibility. Her experience is presented in the form of a biography, which was built from key passages retrieved from the semi structured interview the author conducted at Erikas home. The interview data showed that Erikas interpretation and understanding of her inconclusive test results were embedded in her own and her familys experiences with breast cancer. Her interpretation of her test results was influenced by perception of risk for future breast cancers for herself and her family, as well …
Creating Vocative Texts, Jennifer J. Nicol
Creating Vocative Texts, Jennifer J. Nicol
The Qualitative Report
Vocative texts are expressive poetic text s that strive to show rather than tell, that communicate felt knowledge, and that appeal to the senses. They are increasingly used by researchers to present qualitative findings, but little has been written about how to create such texts. To this end, excerpts from an inquiry into the experience and meaning of music listening in the context of chronic illness (Nicol, 2002) are presented and used to illustrate five elements associated with vocative texts (van Manen, 1997). Further student examples of vocative writing are also provided. The intent is to make a pragmatic contribution …
From The Outside Looking In: How An Awareness Of Difference Can Benefit The Qualitative Research Process, Claire Tinker, Natalie Armstron
From The Outside Looking In: How An Awareness Of Difference Can Benefit The Qualitative Research Process, Claire Tinker, Natalie Armstron
The Qualitative Report
While much has been written on the problems that can arise when interviewing respondents from a different social group, less attention has been paid to its potential benefits for the research process. In this paper we argue that, by being conscious of one’s outsider status , an interviewer can use it as a tool through which to elicit detailed and comprehensive accounts from respondents, and ensure rigorous and critic al analysis of the data produced.
Oral History As A Social Justice Project: Issues For The Qualitative Researcher, Valerie J. Janesick
Oral History As A Social Justice Project: Issues For The Qualitative Researcher, Valerie J. Janesick
The Qualitative Report
I am writing this to assist researchers in training and experienced researchers in understanding ways to view oral history as a social justice project. This paper will illuminate the importance of oral history in terms of enriching the knowledge base of qualitative research methods as well. Oral history provides us with an avenue of thick description, analysis, and interpretation of people’s lives through probing the past in order to understand the present .The postmodern appreciation of the study of people and their stories, those stories from persons generally on the outside or periphery of society, offer a unique opportunity to …
Developing Culturally Sensitive Skills In Health And Social Care With A Focus On Conducting Research With African Caribbean Communities In England, Gina Marie Awoko Higginbottom, Laura Serrant-Green
Developing Culturally Sensitive Skills In Health And Social Care With A Focus On Conducting Research With African Caribbean Communities In England, Gina Marie Awoko Higginbottom, Laura Serrant-Green
The Qualitative Report
Researchers may not feel equipped to conduct qualitative research with ethnic minority communities in England because they may lack of culturally sensitive research skills. The aim of this paper is to explore how researchers might integrate culturally sensitive research skills into their work. This paper draws on our own experiences of conducting research with African Caribbean communities in England, and from workshops we facilitated with researchers and community representatives. The purpose of the workshops was to establish the most pertinent issues in conducting research with ethnic minority communities in England. We gathered data from the participants and created themes based …
Systematic Metaphor Analysis As A Method Of Qualitative Research, Rudolph Schmitt
Systematic Metaphor Analysis As A Method Of Qualitative Research, Rudolph Schmitt
The Qualitative Report
George Lakoff and Mark Johnsons theory of metaphor (1980, 1999) provides a basis for describing everyday cognitive structures using linguistic models and thus, making it possible to uncover both individual and collective patterns of thought and action. Lakoff and Johnson have not, however, developed a workable system for carrying out qualitative research. This paper outlines the fundamentals of this approach and proposes a procedure for the reconstruction of metaphorical concepts. As is normally the case in qualitative research, such guidelines can only ever represent the interplay between the ability of the researcher to understand the sense of things and the …
Real Middle School Teachers, Rhoda C. Sommers
Real Middle School Teachers, Rhoda C. Sommers
The Qualitative Report
Effective middle school teachers are more than the sum total of their educational beliefs and practices. They are whole persons whose lives reflect receptivity to growth, treasured relationships, and the intertwining of their personal and professional lives. This article uses the children’s classic, The Velveteen Rabbit, as a metaphor to describe effective middle school teachers.
Confessions Of A (Somewhat) Reluctant Consultant: Or, What Happens When Academic Dreams Go "Poof", Lawrence Hammar
Confessions Of A (Somewhat) Reluctant Consultant: Or, What Happens When Academic Dreams Go "Poof", Lawrence Hammar
The Qualitative Report
This essay really is about a protracted and painful transition from academic and teacher to consultant and researcher, but first, I want to get a few things off my chest. If you can stand some wholly relevant whine at the outset, stay with me, but if not, just skip to the third section.