Qualitative Data Analysis: Grounded Theory, Content Analysis, and Thematic Analysis

You have pages and pages of transcripts. Now what? In lesson 17 of Research Basics, we go through three ways to analyze qualitative data. We start with Bhattacherjee's chapter on qualitative analysis. The book emphasizes sense making, but qualitative work can still explain: Strauss and Corbin define theory as a framework that can explain or predict. For grounded theory, we use Strauss and Corbin's own definitions of open, axial and selective coding. They call coding a dynamic and fluid process, and breaking it into steps an artificial but necessary way to learn the logic. This is their approach, not a compulsory sequence for everything called grounded theory. Theoretical saturation means no new properties, dimensions or relationships emerge, not a fixed number of interviews. We cover the book's caution about borrowed construct labels, constant comparison, content analysis with unitizing and coding, and its limits. The book notes the replication criticism, so report your procedure clearly. We also look at hermeneutic analysis. Then we turn to Braun and Clarke's thematic analysis: what counts as a theme, why “keyness” is not just about counts, why themes don't simply “emerge”, inductive versus theoretical and semantic versus latent themes, and the six recursive phases. Those phases include checking transcripts against the original recordings. We finish with the first pitfall: not actually analysing the data. Software can help organize the material, but we still have to check interpretations against the data and explain how we reached them. The diagrams are my own teaching illustrations of the sources' points. Try it yourself: take one short interview transcript or a few open-ended survey answers. Read it twice, then write five initial codes. What surprised you? Research Basics playlist    • Research Basics   Chapters 0:00 Introduction 0:34 Sources 1:29 What qualitative analysis is 2:12 Grounded theory 3:12 Three coding techniques 3:37 Open coding 4:31 Axial coding 4:59 Selective coding and saturation 5:46 Borrowed labels and constant comparison 6:36 Content analysis 7:25 Limitations 8:06 Hermeneutic analysis 8:30 Thematic analysis 9:13 What counts as a theme 10:09 Themes don't emerge 10:42 Two choices 11:20 Six phases 12:34 The first pitfall 13:06 Software 13:29 Recap 14:17 Your turn Sources Anol Bhattacherjee (2012). Social Science Research: Principles, Methods, and Practices. Chapter 13. https://digitalcommons.usf.edu/oa_tex... Textbook excerpts: CC BY-NC-SA 3.0. The excerpts are cropped, enlarged and highlighted; these excerpt adaptations are shared under the same license. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/... Anselm Strauss and Juliet Corbin (1998). Basics of Qualitative Research: Techniques and Procedures for Developing Grounded Theory (2nd ed.). Sage. Virginia Braun and Victoria Clarke (2006). Using Thematic Analysis in Psychology. Qualitative Research in Psychology, 3, 77–101. https://doi.org/10.1191/1478088706qp0... Illustrative footage from Pexels, not footage of a study: Karolina Grabowska (Kaboompics), https://www.pexels.com/video/a-person... cottonbro studio, https://www.pexels.com/video/a-man-re... https://www.pexels.com/license/