Qualitative Analysis
Qualitative analysis is the analysis of qualitative data such as text data from interview transcripts.
Unlike quantitative analysis, which is statistics driven and largely independent of the researcher, qualitative analysis is heavily dependent on the researcher's analytic and
integrative skills and personal knowledge of the social context where the data is collected.
The emphasis in qualitative analysis is "sense making" or understanding a phenomenon, rather than predicting or explaining.
A creative and investigative mindset is needed for qualitative analysis, based on an ethically enlightened and participant-in-context attitude, and a set of analytic strategies.
One of these techniques for analyzing text data is grounded theory an inductive technique of interpreting recorded data about a social phenomenon to build theories about that phenomenon.
To ensure that the theory is based solely on observed evidence, the grounded theory approach requires that researchers suspend any preexisting theoretical expectations or biases before data analysis, and let the data dictate the formulation of the theory.
Strauss and Corbin (1998) describe three coding techniques for analyzing text data: open, axial, and selective.
Open coding is a process aimed at identifying concepts or key ideas that are hidden within textual data, which are potentially related to the phenomenon of interest.
Each concept is linked to specific portions of the text (coding unit) for later validation.
This coding technique is called "open" because the researcher is open to and actively seeking new concepts relevant to the phenomenon of interest.
Next, similar concepts are grouped into higher order categories.
Categorization can be done is phases, by combining concepts into subcategories, and then subcategories into higher order categories.
The dimension represents a value of a characteristic along a continuum.
The second phase of grounded theory is axial coding, where the categories and subcategories are assembled into causal relationships or hypotheses that can tentatively explain the phenomenon of interest.
The third and final phase of grounded theory is selective coding, which involves identifying a central category or a core variable and systematically and logically relating this central category to other categories.
Coding of new data and theory refinement continues until theoretical saturation is reached, i.e., when additional data does not yield any marginal change in the core categories or the relationships.
The "constant comparison" process implies continuous rearrangement, aggregation, and refinement of categories, relationships, and interpretations based on increasing depth of understanding, and an iterative interplay of four stages of activities:
(1) comparing
incidents/texts assigned to each category (to validate the category), (2) integrating categories
and their properties, (3) delimiting the theory (focusing on the core concepts and ignoring less
relevant concepts), and (4) writing theory (using techniques like memoing, storylining, and
diagramming that are discussed in the next chapter).
In story lining, categories and relationships are used to explicate and/or refine a story of the observed phenomenon.
Memoing is the process of using these memos to discover patterns and relationships between categories using two-by-two tables, diagrams, or figures, or other illustrative displays.
Concept mapping is a graphical representation of
concepts and relationships between those concepts (e.g., using boxes and arrows)
Content analysis is the systematic analysis of the content of a text (e.g., who says what,
to whom, why, and to what extent and with what effect) in a quantitative or qualitative manner.
First, when there are many texts to analyze (e.g., newspaper stories, financial reports, blog postings, online reviews, etc.), the researcher begins by sampling a selected set of texts from the population of texts for analysis.
Second, the researcher identifies and applies rules to divide each text into segments or "chunks" that can be treated as separate units of analysis.
This process is called unitizing.
Third, the researcher constructs and applies one or more concepts to each unitized text segment in a process called coding.
Finally, the coded data is: analyzed, often both quantitatively and qualitatively, to determine which themes occur most frequently, in what contexts, and how they are related to each other.
A simple type of content analysis is sentiment analysis is sentiment analysis a technique used to capture people's opinion or attitude toward an object, person, or phenomenon.
This analysis will help identify whether the sample as a whole
is positively or negatively disposed or neutral towards that candidate.
This model consists of five levels or phases in interpreting text: (1) convert recorded tapes into raw text data or transcripts for content analysis, (2) convert raw data into condensed protocols, (3) convert condensed protocols into a preliminary category system, (4) use the preliminary category system to generate coded protocols, and (5) analyze coded protocols to generate interpretations about the phenomenon of interest.
First, the coding process is restricted to the
information available in text form.
Second, sampling must be done carefully to avoid sampling bias.
Hermeneutic analysis is a special type of content analysis where the researcher tries to "interpret" the subjective meaning of a given text within its socio-historic context.
This method assumes that written texts narrate an author's experience within a socio-historic context and should be interpreted as such within that context.
More generally, hermeneutics is the study of interpretation and the theory and practice of interpretation.
In the 20th century, Heidegger suggested that a more direct, non-mediated, and authentic way of understanding social reality is to experience it, rather than simply observe it, and proposed philosophical hermeneutics, where the focus shifted from interpretation to existential understanding.