Ch 12. Content Analysis Flashcards
Documents” can be any source of data that:
- Can be “read”
- Was not produced specifically for the purposes of social research
(e.g., letters, diaries, autobiographies, websites, photographs)
Scott’s (1990) criteria for assessing quality of documents (EXAM) (4)
- Authenticity: Genuine and of unquestionable origin. Did the author actually write the piece?
- Credibility: Free from error or distortion, factually accurate. Is the report factual? Does it reflect the true feelings of the author?
- Representativeness: Typical of what it is supposed to represent. Do the documents accurately reflect people of different classes and genders?
- Meaning: Clear and comprehensible. May be somewhat elusive (find/describe)
Examples of Personal Documents
Diaries
Letters
Autobiographies
Visual objects
Photographs can be (3)
Used to illustrate points
Sources of data
Used as prompts to get people to talk
Scott (1990) maintains that family photographs are of three types:
Idealization: formally posed
Natural portrayal: candid, not posed
Demystification: revealing, atypical portrayal
Photographs available may not be typical of the event or episode depicted. Consider?
What is not photographed may be very significant.
What are examples of government documents?
census information, voting records, official reports
Are government documents credible?
Biases can occur based on organizational structure/hierarchy which may lead to a distortion of data. It may also not be representativeness.
Mass Media Outputs: things to consider about authenticity and credibility?
authorship may be hard to ascertain.
May represent particular interest groups and must do so to keep an audience.
Context is important to consider
Subjects and themes that are analyzed include both
manifest and latent content.
example: the subject of “women in politics” and whether gender stereotypes are invoked/implied.
Two key concerns with coding:
- designing a coding schedule
- designing a coding manual
Potential Pitfalls in Devising Coding Schemes
- categorizing must be mutually exclusive
- categories must be exhaustive
- instructions must be clear
- unit of analysis must be clear
- pilot test will reduce risks of error
- reliability of coding is important (inter and intra-coder reliability)
- Researcher decides what themes are to be extracted and how the presence of a theme is established
- Themes are recurrent topics mentioned in a text or in a recording
- Themes could be anticipated or emergent in the text
Qualitative content analysis looks for underlying themes present in a unit of analysis
Differs from quantitative content analysis in that the researcher is constantly revising the themes or categories as the data are examined
Emphasizes the context in which the documents were generated
Follows a recursive and reflexive movement between concept development-sampling-data, collection-data, coding-data, and analysis interpretation
Ethnographic Content Analysis
science of signs
Semiotics
something that stands for something else, such as a yellow traffic light
Sign
text interpretation
hermeneutics
(hermeneutics) The meaning of a text involves author’s …
…circumstances and context in which the text was constructed. The author’s worldview is important for deriving meaning.
Things like pauses and sounds have meaning that depend on the context in which they exist
Indexicality
Detailed analysis of the structure of talk
Conversation Analysis
Conversation Analysis has what kind of understanding and ontology?
contextual understanding and a constructionist ontology
How is conversation analysis linked to quantitative research tradition:
- Fine-grained detailed analysis of talk
- Structure of talk analyzed
- Positivist orientation on replicability
- Context means just the words said before a response
Characteristics of how talk is organized
turn-taking & adjacency pairs (how the talk moves between parties (ex. question/answer)
Discourse Analysis is “anti-realist” which means:
No objective reality waiting to be found, no objective account of social world is possible
Discourse analysis tends toward a constructionist orientation:
- Priority to accounts by actual participants
- Recognizes that many different accounts are possible
- Oriented to action (Considers strategies employed by actors to achieve their objectives in communication)
Gill (2000) identified four themes in discourse analysis (potential essay question):
- Discourse is a topic in itself
- Language is constructive
- Discourse is a form of action
- Discourse is rhetorically organized
Strategies of Discourse Analysis:
- quantification rhetoric (using facts to support the argument)
- using variation in numbers to highlight contrast
- attention to specific details
- attention to rhetorical detail
Exposes the political nature of the examined texts, considers the issues of power hierarchies, structural inequalities, and historical political struggles. Social justice focus.
Critical discourse analysis
Very transparent in its quantitative form, and therefore easily replicated
Allows for longitudinal analysis
Unobtrusive method
Flexible: It can be used with several kinds of unstructured information
Overcomes social barriers to researcher access
Advantages of Content Analysis
Limitations due to the texts analyzed (e.g., authenticity, credibility, representativeness)
Usually some inter-coder and intra-coder unreliability
Potential for invalid conjecture, especially in discussions of latent meanings (problems of interpretation)
Difficult to answer “Why?” questions using this method
Emphasis on measurement may make it atheoretical in nature
Disadvantages of Content Analysis
