Coding Assignment Part 1

I went through the transcripts of nine different focus groups on HIV prevention program for the

transgender population. The data responses include various ideas on how the HIV prevention

program could be improved. It is detailed and includes multiple ideas which could be obtained

as a data. It specifies the identity and race of the participants which helps us group the data

better and analyze it according to the participants’ identification. It also has a large number of

focus groups, so the transcript overall is rich in data sources.

There could be multiple themes that can be derived from the data presented. First would be

the analysis according to the identification of the participants. Since there are 8 participants

who identify as transgender MTF, the theme could be obtained from those participants.

Another would be according to the race they identify as. They have diverse race and analyzing

the data according to the race and ethnicity would be interesting. Another theme to be derived

is the safe space that almost all the groups were talking about. They talked about safe space in

form of hotlines, central numbers, prevention center and clean place to go to. Some other

themes could be opportunities for HIV testing, education, decentralization of prevention

programs, transgender identification, transgender-specific services rather than HIV focused,

advocacy and prostitution.

There are various group differences in the themes presented across the data. The differences

between the difficulties and ideas of MTF and FTM participants would be interesting to explore.

Also, the differences in ideas based on your ethnicity, income, and primary language would

provide a rich data.

The data has some limitations. One of the glaring limitation is the lack of enough focus groups

for FTM participants. Out of 9 only one group identify FTM. Another limitation was that the

transcript lacks the probing that could have gone deeper into some if the ideas the focus groups

presented. For example, groups 4, 5 and 7 have very little data as compared to other groups,

where it would have been better to receive more information from group 5 who were the only

bilingual Spanish population.

Overall, the data is rich and with proper coding, multiple themes could be identified with what

is presented.