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Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences

The Case For Computational Competence And Transversal Skills: Using Digital Tools And Spaces For Qualitative Research, Elizabeth M. Pope, António Pedro Costa Oct 2023

The Case For Computational Competence And Transversal Skills: Using Digital Tools And Spaces For Qualitative Research, Elizabeth M. Pope, António Pedro Costa

The Qualitative Report

When digital tools or spaces are involved in the design and implementation of qualitative research projects, the researcher is faced with the need to develop another type of competence, computational. Digital tools and spaces are growing avenues which facilitate data collection and analysis in new ways, such as through online surveys, videoconferencing platforms, social media sites, and qualitative data analysis software (QDAS). To utilize these tools, researchers need both computational competence and transversal skills. These skills allow the researcher (or research team) to transfer their knowledge of designing and implementing qualitative research to the digital realm, assuring trustworthiness and ethical …


The Craft Of Using Nvivo12 To Analyze Open-Ended Questions: An Approach To Mixed Methods Analysis, Jane Elliott Jun 2022

The Craft Of Using Nvivo12 To Analyze Open-Ended Questions: An Approach To Mixed Methods Analysis, Jane Elliott

The Qualitative Report

The aim of this paper is to explore and explicate a method for using NVivo12 to analyze the responses to open-ended questions in surveys. It focuses on the features of NVivo12 that facilitate this particular type of mixed-methods research. Open-ended questions are used within surveys across a wide variety of disciplines and provide opportunities for participants to provide their own perspectives on a topic of interest. However, they can be challenging to analyze; if the survey has a large sample size, a very considerable corpus of text will be generated, yet the text associated with any single individual is likely …


Reflecting On Caqdas And Ethics, Catarina Brandão, António Pedro Costa Dec 2020

Reflecting On Caqdas And Ethics, Catarina Brandão, António Pedro Costa

The Qualitative Report

As the use of Computer-assisted Qualitative Data Analysis Software (CAQDAS) becomes recurrent in qualitative research, researchers who use this methodological approach need to consider how ethical issues present themselves when we use these types of tools. In this introductory text to the Special Issue of The Qualitative Report, we identify and discuss some of the ethical aspects that we believe are interconnected with CAQDAS. By doing so, we hope to contribute to the reflection on these aspects and the definition of a praxis regarding ethical procedures when using a CAQDAS.


Enhancing Trustworthiness Of Qualitative Findings: Using Leximancer For Qualitative Data Analysis Triangulation, Laura L. Lemon, Jameson Hayes Mar 2020

Enhancing Trustworthiness Of Qualitative Findings: Using Leximancer For Qualitative Data Analysis Triangulation, Laura L. Lemon, Jameson Hayes

The Qualitative Report

This paper offers an approach to enhancing trustworthiness of qualitative findings through data analysis triangulation using Leximancer, a text mining software that uses co-occurrence to conduct semantic and relational analyses of text corpuses to identify concepts, themes, and how they relate to one another. This study explores the usefulness of Leximancer for triangulation by examining 309 pages of previously analyzed interview data that resulted in a conceptual model. Findings show Leximancer to be an ideal tool for refining a priori conceptual models. The Leximancer analysis provided missing nuance from the a priori model, depicting the value of and connection between …


Using Affinity Networks To Scaffold Community Collaboration: A Methodological Technique To Support The Use Of Qualitative Data In Community-Based Research, Catharine Biddle, Ian Mette Jun 2019

Using Affinity Networks To Scaffold Community Collaboration: A Methodological Technique To Support The Use Of Qualitative Data In Community-Based Research, Catharine Biddle, Ian Mette

The Qualitative Report

Cooperation is increasingly required to craft solutions to complex problems in our society, while the role of cultivated, academic expertise is being challenged as a model for solving social problems. Participatory or community-based approaches are often suggested as a solution to this dichotomy; however, few analytic methods are purposefully engineered to support this work. Affinity networks combine interviewing with data visualization to produce data analysis that can be easily fed back into collaboratives with community partners. This article provides a step by step introduction to producing affinity networks using Computer Assisted Qualitative Data Analysis Software, as well as suggestions for …


Technology Ethics In Qualitative Research: How To Be, António Pedro Costa, António Moreira Apr 2019

Technology Ethics In Qualitative Research: How To Be, António Pedro Costa, António Moreira

The Qualitative Report

This introductory note stems from the organization of a special edition of articles from the World Conference on Qualitative Research. Some researchers put forth criticisms about using software in qualitative data analysis, such as losing control in the coding process and leading researchers to use a particular method of analysis according to tool characteristics. Moreover, a number of the scientists believe that the advantages of using specific tools in data analysis are numerous, such as the analysis of an enormous amounts of data, but doing research involves personal or institutional aspects that enter the field of ethics. In the case …


Thinking About The Coding Process In Qualitative Data Analysis, Victoria Elliott Nov 2018

Thinking About The Coding Process In Qualitative Data Analysis, Victoria Elliott

The Qualitative Report

Coding is a ubiquitous part of the qualitative research process, but it is often under-considered in research methods training and literature. This article explores a number of questions about the coding process which are often raised by beginning researchers, in the light of the recommendations of methods textbooks and the factors which contribute to an answer to these questions. I argue for a conceptualisation of coding as a decision-making process, in which decisions about aspects of coding such as density, frequency, size of data pieces to be coded, are all made by individual researchers in line with their methodological background, …


Reflecting On The Future Of Qda Software: Special Issue Of The Qualitative Report, Trena Paulus, Jeanine C. Evers, Franciska De Jong Mar 2018

Reflecting On The Future Of Qda Software: Special Issue Of The Qualitative Report, Trena Paulus, Jeanine C. Evers, Franciska De Jong

The Qualitative Report

This article introduces the special issue of The Qualitative Report, which brings together five papers exploring the scope, depth, history and future of Qualitative Data Analysis software (QDAS), originally presented at a conference in Rotterdam in 2016. The selected papers provide insights into the history of the QDAS community and future developments of the software packages, uses of QDAS for tasks beyond text analysis, the promise of a common exchange format for researchers using different packages, and strategies for putting to rest, once and for all, persistent misconceptions about QDAS that continue to circulate in the literature and during …


Audiovisual Media Annotation Using Qualitative Data Analysis Software: A Comparative Analysis, Liliana Melgar Estrada, Marijn Koolen Mar 2018

Audiovisual Media Annotation Using Qualitative Data Analysis Software: A Comparative Analysis, Liliana Melgar Estrada, Marijn Koolen

The Qualitative Report

The variety of specialized tools designed to facilitate analysis of audio-visual (AV) media are useful not only to media scholars and oral historians but to other researchers as well. Both Qualitative Data Analysis Software (QDAS) packages and dedicated systems created for specific disciplines, such as linguistics, can be used for this purpose. Software proliferation challenges researchers to make informed choices about which package will be most useful for their project. This paper aims to present an information science perspective of the scholarly use of tools in qualitative research of audio-visual sources. It provides a baseline of affordances based on functionalities …


The History Of The Development And Propagation Of Qda Software, Urszula Wolski Phd Mar 2018

The History Of The Development And Propagation Of Qda Software, Urszula Wolski Phd

The Qualitative Report

In the 1980s researchers began to develop software for the analysis of qualitative data. Since then such computer packages have transformed the nature and practice of qualitative research. This paper identifies and examines the processes that led to the development of a QDAS community from the perspective of social worlds theory. Based on interviews with developers and propagators of qualitative data analysis software (QDAS), this paper discusses its history and development, illustrating how a community emerged from the intersection of two social worlds, the computing world and the social science world. It shows use of QDAS spread to the wider …


Using Nvivo™ For Literature Reviews: The Eight Step Pedagogy (N7+1), Maureen M. O'Neill Dr, Sarah R. Booth Mrs, Janeen Therese Lamb Phd Mar 2018

Using Nvivo™ For Literature Reviews: The Eight Step Pedagogy (N7+1), Maureen M. O'Neill Dr, Sarah R. Booth Mrs, Janeen Therese Lamb Phd

The Qualitative Report

While a literature review is a necessary milestone to be completed by all researchers in a timely and efficient manner, it is often one of the most difficult aspects of the research journey. Moreover, traditional approaches often leave novice researchers, to struggle with the conceptualisation of their literature review, now complicated by the overwhelming quantity of research available online. This paper presents a rationale the use of Qualitative Data Analysis Software (QDAS) programs for literature reviews. QDAS tools allow the researcher to explore large amounts of textual documents to see patterns. These programs are often overlooked by novice researchers due …


The Walking Dead Genealogy: Unsubstantiated Criticisms Of Qualitative Data Analysis Software (Qdas) And The Failure To Put Them To Rest, Kristi Jackson, Trena Paulus, Nicholas H. Woolf Mar 2018

The Walking Dead Genealogy: Unsubstantiated Criticisms Of Qualitative Data Analysis Software (Qdas) And The Failure To Put Them To Rest, Kristi Jackson, Trena Paulus, Nicholas H. Woolf

The Qualitative Report

The authors conduct an exposé on the deterministic denunciations of Qualitative Data Analysis Software (QDAS) and how citation errors keep these criticisms alive. They use a zombie metaphor to describe more than two decades of battling these seemingly mindless assessments of QDAS that keep coming –despite their decay – and simply will not die. Focusing exclusively on the criticism of separation/distancing, which alleges that the computer and the software interfere with the researcher’s familiarity with the data, the authors trace one current strand of this criticism through a literature genealogy. Three citation errors (half-truth, proxy, and hearsay) are identified to …


Cross-Check For Completeness: Exploring A Novel Use Of Leximancer In A Grounded Theory Study, Ian Harwood, Rod P. Gapp, Heather J. Stewart Jul 2015

Cross-Check For Completeness: Exploring A Novel Use Of Leximancer In A Grounded Theory Study, Ian Harwood, Rod P. Gapp, Heather J. Stewart

The Qualitative Report

This paper investigates the potential for Leximancer software to actively support the Grounded Theory (GT) analyst in assessing the “completeness” of their study. The case study takes an existing GT study and retrospectively analyzes the data with Leximancer. The Leximancer output showed encouraging similarities to the main themes emerging from the GT analysis; but not sufficiently at the selective coding level to justifiably claim a definitive cross-check for overall theoretical saturation. Whilst Leximancer is not found to be a substitute for the 'hard labor' of GT coding and theory development, it can provide a very useful, efficient and relatively impartial …


Connecting The Dots: A Review Of Traversing The Uncharted Arena Of Computer Assisted Qualitative Data Analysis Software: Mapping Out Qda Miner 4.1 As A First-Time User, Andrea Cuva Dec 2014

Connecting The Dots: A Review Of Traversing The Uncharted Arena Of Computer Assisted Qualitative Data Analysis Software: Mapping Out Qda Miner 4.1 As A First-Time User, Andrea Cuva

The Qualitative Report

A review of QDA Miner 4.1, a mixed method computer assisted data analysis software (CAQDAS), was conducted to determine how accommodating (if at all) the software was for beginning researchers and/or individuals less proficient with computers. Rather than maintaining the more traditional focus on the technical functionality of QDA Miner, this review was structured around the needs and interests of a beginning researcher. Although QDA Miner offers a variety of helpful resources, questions regarding how to structure initial project to ensure findings yield methodological accuracy remain.


Using Computer-Assisted Qualitative Data Analysis Software (Caqdas) To Re-Examine Traditionally Analyzed Data: Expanding Our Understanding Of The Data And Of Ourselves As Scholars, Linnea L. Rademaker, Elizabeth J. Grace, Stephen K. Curda May 2012

Using Computer-Assisted Qualitative Data Analysis Software (Caqdas) To Re-Examine Traditionally Analyzed Data: Expanding Our Understanding Of The Data And Of Ourselves As Scholars, Linnea L. Rademaker, Elizabeth J. Grace, Stephen K. Curda

The Qualitative Report

As diverse members of a college of education evaluation committee one of our charges is to support faculty as we document and improve our teaching. Our committee asked faculty to respond to three qualitative questions, documenting ways in which interdepartmental and cross-department conversations are used to promote reflective thinking about our practice. Three of us investigated the use of CAQDAS to provide an additional level of analysis and how we learned more about ourselves as scholars through this collaboration. Our findings include recommendations regarding the use of CAQDAS to support collaborative efforts by diverse scholars.