Sabir Ali Nastran

sabirnastran@gmail.com
December 15, 2009

QUALITATIVE RESEARCH
The goal of research under the phenomenological doctrine is the
development of theories through explanatory methods rather than
through the creation of generalizations. The qualitative approach is a
way to gain insights through discovering meanings by improving our
comprehension of the whole. Qualitative research explores the
richness, depth, and complexity of phenomena. Qualitative research,
broadly defined, means "any kind of research that produces findings
not arrived at by means of statistical procedures or other means of
quantification".
Claims
• Inquiry from the inside
• An attempt to take account of differences between people
• Aimed at flexibility and lack of structure, in order to allow theory
and concepts to proceed in tandem
• The results are said to be, thorough theoretical generalization,
deep, rich and meaningful.
• Inductive – where propositions may develop not only from
practice, or literature review, but also from ideas themselves
• An approach to the study of the social world, which seeks to
describe and analyze the culture and behavior of humans and
their groups from the point view of those being studied
Research tactics and bases
Action research Strictly phenomenological
Case studies Have scope
Ethnographic Strictly phenomenological
Field experiments Have scope
Focus groups mostly phenomenological
Future research have scope
In-depth surveys mostly phenomenological
Participant observer Strictly phenomenological
Scenario research mostly phenomenological

Qualitative research is conducted through an intense and/or prolonged

contact with a field or life situation. These situations are typically
predictable or normal, reflective of the everyday life of individuals,
groups, societies, and organizations. In some senses, all data are
qualitative; they refer to issues relating to people, objects, and
situations. One major feature is that they focus on naturally occurring,
ordinary events in natural settings, so that there is a view on what real
life is like. Another feature of qualitative data is their richness and
holism, with strong potential for revealing complexity. Such data
provide rich descriptions that are vivid, nested in a real life context,
and have a ring of truth. Furthermore, the fact that such qualitative
data are typically collected over a sustained period makes it powerful
for studying any process. Also thee inherent flexibility of qualitative
studies (data collection times and methods can be varied as a study
proceeds) gives further confidence that what has been going on is
really understood. Qualitative data, with their emphasis on people’s
lived experience are fundamentally well suited for locating their
meaning people place on the events, processes and structures of their
lives; their perceptions assumptions, prejudgments, presuppositions
and for connecting these meanings to the social world around them.
There are three other claims for the power of qualitative data. They
have often been advocated as the best strategy for discovery,
exploring a new area, developing hypotheses. In addition their strong
potential for testing hypotheses is underlined on seeing whether
specific predictions hold up. Further, qualitative data are useful when
one needs to supplement, validate, explain, illuminate, or reinterpret
quantitative data gathered from the same setting.

Strengths
Data-gathering methods seen
more natural than artificial.
Ability to look at change
processes over time.
Weaknesses
Data collection can be tedious
and require more resources.
Analysis and interpretation of
data may be more difficult.

Ability to understand people’s Harder to control the pace,

meaning. progress, and end-points of
research process.
Ability to adjust to new issues Policy makers may give low
and ideas as they emerge. credibility to results from
qualitative approach.
Contribute to theory generation

Basic Beliefs:
• The world is socially constructed and subjective;
• Observer is part of what is observed;
 • Science is driven by human interests.
Researcher should:
• Focus on meanings;
• Try to understand what is happening;
• Look at the totality of each situation;
• Develop ideas through induction from data.

Preferred Research methods:

• Using multiple methods to establish different views of the
phenomena;
• Small samples investigated in depth or over time.
The main steps in qualitative research
 General research question(s)
 Selecting relevant site(s) and subjects
 Collection of relevant data
 Interpretation of data
 Conceptual and theoretical work
• Tighter specification of the research questions
• Collection of further data
 Writing up findings/conclusions

Overview
General framework
Seek to explore phenomena. Instruments use more flexible,
iterative style of eliciting and categorizing responses to questions.
Use semi-structured methods such as in-depth interviews, focus
groups, and participant observation
Analytical objectives
To describe variation
To describe and explain relationships
To describe individual experiences
To describe group norms
Question format
Open-ended
Data format
Textual (obtained from audiotapes, videotapes, and field notes)
Flexibility in study design
Some aspects of the study are flexible (for example, the addition,
exclusion, or wording of particular interview questions). Participant
responses affect how and which questions researchers ask next.
 Study design is iterative, that is, data collection and research
questions are adjusted according to what is learned.

Phenomenology
It describes the structures of experience as they present themselves to
consciousness, without recourse to theory, deduction, or assumptions
from other disciplines.
The discipline of phenomenology is defined by its domain of study,
its methods, and its main results.
Phenomenology studies structures of conscious experience as
experienced from the first-person point of view, along with relevant
conditions of experience. The central structure of an experience is its
intentionality, the way it is directed through its content or meaning
toward a certain object in the world.
To begin an elementary exercise in phenomenology, consider some
typical experiences one might have in everyday life, characterized in
the first person:
I am thinking that phenomenology differs from psychology.
I intend to finish my writing by noon.
I walk carefully around the broken glass on the sidewalk.
I am searching for the words to make my point in conversation.
The subject term “I” indicates the first-person structure of the
experience: the intentionality proceeds from the subject. Furthermore,
as we reflect on how these phenomena work, we turn to the analysis
of relevant conditions that enable our experiences to occur as they do,
and to represent or intend as they do. Phenomenology then leads into
analyses of conditions of the possibility of intentionality, conditions
involving motor skills and habits, background social practices, and
often language, with its special place in human affairs.

Phenomenological Philosophy

Phenomenologists believe that knowledge and understanding are

embedded in our everyday world. In other words, they do not believe
knowledge can be quantified or reduced to numbers or statistics.
Phenomenologists believe that truth and understanding of life can
emerge from people's life experiences. Although phenomenologists
share this belief, they have developed more than one approach to gain
understanding of human knowledge.
Before the seventeenth century, religion or nature often provided the
basis for man's understanding of the world. Rene Descartes, however,
articulated a split between man's mental being and his physical being.
This viewpoint served as an impetus to link all knowledge to the realm
of science. Scientists of that time heralded the scientific method,
objectivity, and a fixed, orderly reality as the sole approach to
knowledge discovery. Many early philosophers, however, found the
scientific method too reductionistic, objective, and mechanistic;
therefore, they advanced phenomenology as a preferred method to
discover the meaning of life experiences.
The father of phenomenology frequently is cited as Edmund Husserl.
Husserl was a German philosopher as well as a mathematician. The
works of Husserl, as well as those of Martin Heidegger, are cited in
many nursing studies as the framework for the research approach and
methods. Even though both philosophers are considered
phenomenologists, their approaches to research and understanding life
experiences differ.

Phenomenological Methodology
Methodology links a particular philosophy to the appropriate research
methods and bridges philosophical notions to practical and applicable
research strategies. Husserl, for example, purported that essences
serve as the ultimate structure of consciousness. He contended that
bracketing (ie, setting aside preconceived notions) enables one to
objectively describe the phenomena under study. Mathematics
influenced Husserl's thinking, and thus, he sought a logical method to
gain understanding of the experience of human consciousness.
If I, for example, wanted to understand childhood, Husserl's approach
would assume I would bracket everything I know about being the
mother of two children. According to Husserl, bracketing would enable
me to identify the essences of childhood free of my prior experiences
of being a child or mothering two children. Bracketing assumes people
can separate their personal knowledge from their life experiences.
Husserl's junior colleague, Martin Heidegger, reconceived many
phenomenological perspectives. Heidegger offered an alternate
worldview from Husserl's beliefs regarding bracketing. He believed that
as human beings, our meanings are codeveloped through the
experience of being born human, our collective life experiences, our
background, and the world in which we live. Heidegger acknowledged
that gender, culture, history, and related life experiences prohibit an
objective viewpoint yet enable people to experience shared practices
and common meanings. He did not believe it was possible to bracket
our assumptions of the world, but rather that through authentic
reflection, we might become aware of many of our assumptions.
Heideggerian phenomenology can be defined as a way to interpret
experiences of shared meanings and practices embedded in specific
contexts.

Phenomenological Method
Many methods have been used in phenomenological research.
Frequently, inductive or qualitative methods involve transcribing
material (usually interview transcripts), coding data into themes, and
drawing conclusions regarding the phenomena based on these themes.
It is incumbent upon researchers to seek methods that fit with the
philosophy and methodology of their research question and to chose
methods congruent with the research topic and assumptions.
As qualitative researchers, phenomenologists must follow an organized
approach to answering their research question. First, the researcher
must develop the question. Next, he or she must devise a sampling
plan to ensure the appropriate subjects are available and willing to
answer questions. Information or data can be obtained by
observations, interviews, or written descriptions. Data then are
analyzed using a process of coding and categorizing the information.
Finally, the findings are confirmed by others to ensure the credibility of
the conclusions.
Phenomenological and associated approaches can be applied to single
cases or to serendipitous or deliberately selected samples. While
single-case studies are able to identify issues which illustrate
discrepancies and system failures - and to illuminate or draw attention
to ‘different’ situations - positive inferences are less easy to make
without a small sample of participants. In multiple participant
research, the strength of inference which can be made increases
rapidly once factors start to recur with more than one participant. In
this respect it is important to distinguish between statistical and
qualitative validity: phenomenological research can be robust in
indicating the presence of factors and their effects in individual cases,
but must be tentative in suggesting their extent in relation to the
population from which the participants or cases were drawn.
A variety of methods can be used in phenomenologically-based
research, including interviews, conversations, participant observation,
action research, focus meetings and analysis of personal texts. If there
is a general principle involved it is that of minimum structure and
maximum depth, in practice constrained by time and opportunities to
strike a balance between keeping a focus on the research issues and
avoiding undue influence by the researcher.

Hermeneutics
The modern discipline of hermeneutics emerged as a response to the
questions raised by the Reformation debate about the authentic
meaning of the Biblical text and by the Enlightenment questions about
epistemology and philology. The Reformers challenged the Roman
Catholic understanding that the text could only be interpreted through
the lens of tradition and that its true meaning was not immediately
evident to the individual reader. They asserted that truth was
accessible to the contemporary reader and that the basis for faith and
doctrine could be developed without reference to tradition.
Hermeneutics involves more than merely reading and understanding
the language of the text. He proposed three levels of interpretation:
• the hermeneutic of the letter (grammatical interpretation);
• the hermeneutic of the sense (the matter addressed within the
text);
• the hermeneutic of the spirit (both the spirit of the age in which
the document was written and the individuality or 'genius' of the
author).
Hermeneutics requires an understanding of the world-view of the
author and his/her community and of the particular 'controlling idea'
embodied in the text. It is an attempt to re-create, as far as possible,
the original intention of the author liberates from the contamination of
traditional interpretations and contemporary culture.
In his concept of the 'hermeneutical circle', Schleiermacher grappled
with the complex issues of how humans understand. They understand,
he claimed, by comparing the object of inquiry with what they already
know, thus learning is analogical in character. But they cannot fully
understand a finite object (a sentence or a statement) unless they
relate it to the whole context in which it exists (the intention or idea of
the author). It is this dialectical movement between text and context,
part and whole, that constitutes the 'hermeneutical circle'.
Schleiermacher's purpose in the practice of hermeneutics was not so
much to seek understanding as to 'avoid misunderstanding',
misunderstanding being the default outcome when interpreting a text.
It means that the text had to be understood as the author would have
intended it, and this required rigorous literary and historical analysis.
However the author's intention could not be fully conveyed through
the medium of language and therefore the interpreter had to, as far as
possible; understand the mind of the author. All those disciplines
which interpret expressions of man's inner life, whether the
expressions be gestures, historical actions, codified law, art works or
literature, use hermeneutics research. All of these expressions of life
are open to inquiry as to their meaning but the methods used differ
from objective scientific investigation.
Each individual had a 'world-view' which is shaped, not only in the
intellect, but in the whole of life which includes feeling and will as well
as thinking. The texts humans produced, whether written or artistic,
are expressions of that world-view, and the task of hermeneutics is to
Paul Ricoeur suggested a different approach; that the text needs to
stand alone as an objective reality since the mind of the author is
inaccessible to the reader. So, by inviting the participants to identify
key words and phrases and to produce individual and group
statements of meaning, they participate, not only in providing data for
interpretation, but by participating inter-subjectively with each other in
the interpretation of the experience. Of course the meanings derived in
this process still do not claim to be absolute or universal because of
the limitations of language.
A final word about the methodology of hermeneutics relates to what is
called a 'hermeneutic of suspicion' that approaches a text asking the
question about what is missing and what is false, recognizing the
human capacity to interpret the same material in a variety of ways.
Ricoeur recognised that the desire for objectivity creates a distance
between the reader and the text, particularly if some false
assumptions or understandings are recognised in the world-view of the
author. However he wanted to preserve the sense that the truth in a
text can still be discerned provided the methodology used is able to
identify and clear away whatever arises from a false consciousness of
the author. In the process of interpretation, one must also take into
account the world-view of the interpreter and recognize that it has
limitations and errors, as does the author's.

Content Analysis: Finding the Essence

Content analysis is about essence, capturing the essence...what is
the perfume, the flavor, the nature of the phenomenon.
As one goes further along the research paradigm spectrum, from
quantitative to qualitative assumptions, then the researcher tends to
immerse him/her self experientially in the holistic nature of the
phenomenon. In content analysis, there is immersion in text, and
one can use a variety of approaches to analysis. It may be that via
deep, personal reading and thinking about textual data that a
researcher can develop authentic and well-polished
conceptualizations and understanding. But it may also be that using
more structured, analytical techniques, involving:
• sorting • naming themes
• categorizing • counting