Content Analysis Flashcards
What is content analysis
An indirect observation of behaviour by examining an artefact (such as an interview, magazine, article or dairy), and identifying themes or categories in these artefacts.
What are the stages of carrying out a content analysis
- Firstly deciding what behaviour needs to be sampled, but you wont watch the humans directly you will identify the artefact you would sample.
- Then you develop a coding system, in which you will create your behavioural categories.
- You then go through the artefact and the coding system and tally up every time that the behaviour appears.
What is thematic analysis
It’s a type of content analysis that produces qualitative data, and it involves the identification of themes (these are more descriptive then the coding strategies).
Strength of content analysis
unobstructed method, as the researcher isn’t interacting with people, and the researcher cant then influence the behaviour of the people being studied.
High external validity, as the research can be generalised to the outside of the research setting, this gives us a more meaningful insight to human behaviour
Limitaion if content analysis
Time consuming in comparison to other research methods, this could lead to researchers using a smaller sample of artefacts to make it more manageable, but this will reduce the extent to which the findings can be generalised.
