MAXQDA 2020

Manual
Contents
WELCOME .............................................................................................................. 3
GETTING STARTED GUIDE: GO FOR IT! .................................................................... 4
01 - THE WORKSPACE .......................................................................................... 22
02 - IMPORTING DATA .......................................................................................... 79
03 - VIEWING AND EDITING DATA ...................................................................... 160
04 - CODES ......................................................................................................... 172
05 - CODING ....................................................................................................... 195
06 - CREATIVE CODING ...................................................................................... 246
07 - TRANSCRIPTION ........................................................................................... 254
08 - MEMOS ....................................................................................................... 267
09 - LINKS ........................................................................................................... 299
10 - TEXT SEARCH .............................................................................................. 308
11 - SEGMENT RETRIEVAL ................................................................................... 326
12 - VISUAL TOOLS ............................................................................................. 367
13 - VISUAL TOOLS (CONCEPT MAPS) ................................................................. 406
14 - PARAPHRASING ........................................................................................... 474
15 - SUMMARIZING ............................................................................................ 490
16 - COMPARING CASES & GROUPS ................................................................... 502
17 - VARIABLES ................................................................................................... 507
18 - MIXED METHODS ........................................................................................ 526
19 - ANALYZING VIDEOS ..................................................................................... 564
20 - ANALYZING FOCUS GROUP DATA ............................................................... 586
21 - ANALYZING TWEETS AND SURVEYS ............................................................ 599
22 - FREQUENCIES .............................................................................................. 616
23 - REPORT & EXPORT ....................................................................................... 644
24 - TEAMWORK ................................................................................................ 667
25 - MAXAPP ...................................................................................................... 699
TECHNICAL DATA AND INFORMATION ............................................................... 736
Welcome
MAXQDA 2020 is a high-performance program for professional, social science-
oriented data analysis – ideal not only for researchers but also for students and
teachers at universities and secondary schools. MAXQDA is used in a variety of
disciplines: the social sciences, education, health sciences, the humanities, economics,
marketing, and many others. In short, MAXQDA is the ideal software package for the
effective management and systematic evaluation of texts, documents and all kinds of
media data. Get to know the software package in the MAXQDA manual.

MAXQDA is the result of more than 30 years of continuous development that began
with MAX for DOS in 1989. MAXQDA 12 was groundbreaking as the world's first
QDA software that provided the same functionality for both Windows and Mac,
allowing you to switch effortlessly between the two platforms. We have continued on
this path of one combined software solution for Windows and Mac with MAXQDA
2020. The menu, icons, shortcuts and functions are nearly identical, eliminating the
need for two different user manuals.

This guide provides a detailed overview of the features of MAXQDA. The “Getting
Started Guide” offers a brief introduction. The manual explains each of MAXQDA's
functions rather than following the logic of learning to use the program. Further help
can be found on the website www.maxqda.com, which features online tutorials,
textbook references and information on the annual user conference in Berlin, the
“MAXQDA International Conference MQIC”.

In our continuous effort to improve and troubleshoot MAXQDA, we are always

interested in your feedback and suggestions. To send us your ideas simply email our
Customer Support or use the feedback function in MAXQDA.

Research is a journey. Travel it well!

Your MAXQDA team

Welcome 3
Getting Started Guide: Go for it!

Introduction
Welcome to the MAXQDA Getting Started Guide! As no one likes to read long
introductions and manuals, we tried to make this one as short as possible to help you
get started as quickly as possible. The guide will enable you to start your analysis and
make your own experiences with MAXQDA. We will focus on the actual usage of the
program, and not on the presentation of different analysis and research methods. If
you want to find out more about those, we have provided a list of useful publi-cations
in the chapter “Further literature”. As you may know, there is an endless number of
different qualitative methods. But most of them can be conducted with the help of
MAXQDA as they all follow the same basic structure as pictured in this illustration.

The vast majority of qualitative analysis methods work with categories. These can
either be created from within the data or based on prior knowledge of the data,
existing theories, or recent research results. Categories are often also named codes or
keywords, but whatever the name, they all have the function to organize and
systematize the data, often even working as analytical codes. Analytical codes are the
result of an analytical process that exceeds simply determining a topic, and this is what
we refer to as Codes in this guide. Coding data can take a long time, but don’t worry:
there are many different ways to make use of QDA (qualitative data analysis) software.
It’s not always necessary to code your data in order to analyze it with MAXQDA; you
can also use it simply for organizing your da-ta, or searching for words and word
combinations.

Getting Started Guide: Go for it! 4