Qualitative Data Analysis Approaches

Qualitative Data Analysis (Part 2)

Narrative Analysis

• Narrative study focuses on storytelling, prioritizing structure, chronology, and meaning in personal stories.
• Goal: Understand event sequences, turning points, and epiphanies.
• Key process:
  • Collecting, retelling, and structuring narratives.
  • Chronologically rewriting stories.
  • Analyzing context and settings.
  • Developing themes and meaning.
• Key Approaches:
  • Literary-oriented Narrative Analysis:
    • Plot structure analysis: Analyzes characters, setting, problem, actions, and resolution.
    • Three-dimensional space approach: Examines interaction, continuity, and situation.
  • Chronological Narrative Analysis:
    • Biographical analysis: Reconstructs life course by identifying key experiences and turning points.
    • Identifying patterns and meaning making: Examines similarities, differences, change, and coherence.

Riesman’s Four Analytical Strategies

• Thematic analysis: Identifies recurring themes and meanings.
• Structural analysis: Focuses on narrative form and linguistic features.
• Dialogical/performance analysis: Views storytelling as a collaborative act shaped by interactions.
• Visual analysis: Incorporates visual materials to complement narratives.

Phenomenological Approach

• Seeks to understand the essence of lived experience through personal accounts.
• Steps:
  1. Describe personal experiences (bracketing).
  2. List significant statements (horizonization).
  3. Group statements into themes.
  4. Create a textural description (what happened).
  5. Create a structural description (how the experience happened).
  6. Write a composite experience (the essence of the experience).

Grounded Theory

• Grounded theory involves building theory through data analysis.
• Steps:
  • Open coding: Identifying categories and subcategories.
  • Axial coding: Interconnecting categories.
    • Causal Conditions → What leads to the central phenomenon?
    • Central Phenomenon → The main issue being studied.
    • Strategies → How do individuals respond?
    • Context/Intervening Conditions → Factors affecting the strategies.
    • Consequences → What results from the strategies?
  • Selective coding: Building a theory.

Ethnography

• Description: Foundation, vividly presenting setting, people, and activities.
• Analysis: Identifying patterns and structuring data.
• Interpretation: Making meaning from data.

Case Study

• Description: Establishing the case and its settings.
• Analysis:
  • Categorical analysis
  • Direct interpretation
  • Pattern recognition
  • Cross-case analysis
• Interpretation: Drawing meaning from the case.