Development of Research Instruments

Qualitative analysis 1
PHENOMENOLOGICAL ANALYSIS

Learning outcome:
On completing the tasks associated with this workshop, the successful student will gain
experience in carrying out interpretative phenomenological analysis

What can we say about the life-world of this person on the basis of an interview about
why she smokes?

Task description

Stage 1 of analysis: Read through the text

Stage 2 of analysis: Identify key words. Put them in the (1st) margin

Stage 3 of analysis: identify ‘themes’ in the (2nd) margin that serve to group the meanings of the
key words together

Stage 4 of analysis: Clustering of themes (in the table at the bottom) – construct ‘superordinate
themes’

This is an exercise in capturing the interviewee’s experience (through the lens of your
interpretation).

So: Ask yourselves: (a) do the themes and superordinate themes you identify capture something
of the speaker’s subjective life-world? (b) is there agreement in your group in the way you have
organized the material? (c) How might you test the validity of your thematic organization?

‘Smoking and me’ – an Interview

1. Highlight key words 2. put key words in margin 3. suggest themes

1. Int: Can you say a bit about how you started

2. smoking.
3. Speaker:: I started smoking when I was about 22.
4. And the reason that made me start smoking was
5. that I’d split up with a long-term boyfriend of mine,
6. and I wanted to do something different to how I’d
7. behaved before. And it kind of took off from that.
8. And also I thought I’m old enough now, because I
9. wasn’t a teenager any more, I thought I was old
10. enough not to get addicted to smoking, which was a
11. bit of a foolish, arrogant sort of a assumption. But I
12. just assumed that I wasn’t, because I wasn’t sort of
13. fifteen or whatever and I wasn’t doing it for any kind
14. of obvious trying to grow up purposes, I just
15. assumed that I wouldn’t be continue to smoke.

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16. Int: And why do you smoke now, then?
17. Speaker: Well, partly my lifestyle at university
18. facilitates smoking quite heavily.
19. Int: Yeah?
20. Speaker:: I mean I live with seven other people and
21. everybody smokes all the time. And also I think if
22. you drink a lot, smoking sort of goes hand in hand
23. with that. So in order to stop smoking I think a lot of
24. aspects of my lifestyle would have to change.
25. Really.
26. Int: Right. Yeah.
27. Speaker:. Including cutting down on drinking,
cutting
28. down on my social life, things like that. I think it’s all
29. part and parcel really.
30. Int: So would you say smoking is an important part
of
31. your life?
32. Speaker:: Erm. I don’t know whether ‘important’ is
the
33. word. I think it’s a prevalent part of my life at the
34. moment. I don’t I don’t necessarily associate it with
35. importance. And I try to cut down on smoking.
36. Int. Yeah?
37. Speaker:. It tends to be on the weekends when I
38. smoke vast amounts. When I’m socializing more
39. than I do weekdays.
40. Int: Right. Right. So would you like to give up?
41. Speaker:: [pause] Yeah. I would. I’d like to think I
42. wasn’t addicted to it really. But I’ve really sort of
43. decided that I am. ( ) I assume that it would be
44. quite easy but because at the moment I don’t
45. particularly want to. But yeah I would like to give up,
46. especially when I got - because I’m 25 now and
47. when I got a bit older, definitely, especially when I
48. want to start thinking about having kids and stuff,
49. and that’ll be a definite no-no. But I assume that
50. that’s gonna come sort of hand in hand with like I
51. said before about the changing in lifestyle. You
52. know, I think it’s a phase, really. I don’t know, I
53. haven’t tested whether I could give up.
54. Int: Oh, you haven’t.
55. Speaker:Not really.
56. Int Right. But why do you say you’re addicted then?
57. What makes you feel you’re addicted?
58. Speaker:Well, if I don’t smoke for a couple of days -
59. which I’ve sort of tried, which wasn’t really an
60. attempt to give up, it was sort of ( ) financial
61. reasons or cos I’d overdone it so much at the
62. weekend it made me feel really sick - that I sort of
63. do sort of quite fancy a cigarette, and will then
64. have, you know, a couple. So there is that urge

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65. there to smoke. But I mean it’s not as strong as the
66. people I live with. That’s the other thing as well, I
67. think I compare a bit, because I smoke Silk Cut,
68. which I assume to be quite sort of bland and stuff.
69. Even though I know if you put your hand over the
70. holes perforations in the filter then they’re just as
71. strong as - Everyone I know smokes either rollies or
72. Benson & Hedges, more sort of hard-core cigarette.
73. So I think, relatively as well I think, Oh well ( ) it’s
74. not as strong as what they’re smoking. So that’s
75. sort of another think that…
76. Int So you think they’re more addicted than you?
77. Speaker: Oh I know they are, yeah, cos they
started
78. smoking when they were younger, and they smoke
79. sort of 20 a day, whereas I’ll smoke ten. Maybe 20
80. if I’m if it’s the weekend or if I’m staying up really
81. late or whatever, But I think relatively yeah ( )
82. []
83. Speaker:. I tend to binge-smoke. I tend to - if I’m
84. sitting in a pub and I’ve got ten cigarettes I’ll chain
85. them. And I think that partly is because I need to go
86. up to a higher brand, I’m not getting as much
87. nicotine out of the cheaper cigarettes. But also, you
88. know, they’ll smoke more slowly and more
89. consistently over a period of time, whereas I’ll just
90. have a packet of cigarettes and just go for it and
91. then run out and just stop.
92. Int: They sound like two different ways of smoking,
93. don’t they. But you’re saying that you regard both of
94. them as a form of addiction, yeah?
95. Speaker:: Mmm. I think as well I used it - I’ve taken
to
96. using smoking as a bit of a prop. I think if you’re
97. feeling a bit (pause) awkward or you’re not quite
98. sure what to do with yourself (you have) a cigarette
99. to kind of create that barrier. And I do firmly believe
100. in that, I mean I do tend to use props quite a
lot
101. anyway, I think. If I feel Cos I tend to feel
102. uncomfortable a lot anyway quite easily. So
if I feel
103. a bit sort of out of place then I’ll do
something to
104. kind of distract myself. And smoking’s
become
105. quite a (big) part of that. So I mean I’m sort
of using
106. it in that way as well. I think maybe that’s
what ( )
107. binge chain-smoking that I do ( ) as well.
But I’m not
108. too sure about that.
109. []
110. Speaker: [ ] But after a couple of days I do
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 start
111. thinking ‘yeah, I fancy a cigarette’, sort of
get that
112. physical urge for one.
113. Int: Yeah? So that was your sort of erm
measure if
114. you like of being addicted, that you had a
you had a
115. great urge able a couple of days to ( )
116. Speaker: Mm. Yeah. But I mean this notion
of giving
117. up, I mean people in my house have tried to
give
118. up and because we all set each other off in
lots of
119. different ways, someone will have a
cigarette and it
120. will just be like ‘oh well,’ you know. So I
don’t think
121. I’m living in the environment that giving up is
very
122. good for. I don’t think I’d actually be able to
do it ( )
123. Int: One more thing about addiction, then.
Would you
124. say it’s comparable with - I mean you
compared it
125. to alcohol, but would you say it’s
comparable with
126. addiction to other things? I mean is it a real
127. addiction or is it a sort of psychological kind
of
128. thing? Or do you think I’m making a false
129. distinction?
130. Speaker:. Well I don’t know, you see,
because I
131. certainly - I mean I haven’t really come to
terms
132. with being a smoker as such. I don’t
consider
133. myself a smoker. The cues that smokers do
that I
134. don’t do, like true smokers will always have
their
135. cigarettes with them and a lighter. I notice
that
136. people I live with do that. And I don’t do
that. I’ll
137. often leave my cigarettes about the place,
I’ll hand
138. them out like confetti. You know, so I think I
do
139. think you could probably create a distinction
140. between psychologically addicted and being
141. physically addicted. Cos I think perhaps I
mean
142. when I’ve got a packet of cigarettes and I
will
143. smoke them all the way through, in certain
144. situations like in a pub. Whereas if I’m just
sitting in
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 145. a front room and there’s not many people
around,
146. and I don’t, you know, I’m not drinking or
anything
147. then I’ll just have one or two maybe and
then just
148. have them over a lot slower period of time.
So I
149. think there’s there is a psychological
connection there.

Cluster (superordinate) themes – her experience of smoking

THEME CLUSTER

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Commentary

What might one say about the interviewee’s experience of smoking, drawing upon the themes identified in
the analysis?