Grounded Theory

Question 1

AO1/Description

Answer 1

• Grounded theory remember is an inductive method (meaning you don’t start off with a theory, your theory comes from the data you see). So the whole point is to take qualitative detail and create theories from it.
• Analysis of qualitative data (whether its interviews, news papers, diary entries etc etc)
• Creates theories via inductive methods (creating a theory based on what people have said)…so not hypothesis testing
• ‘Open’ code your data noting down important things as you come across them (and write memos about how the concepts might link together)…basically look for themes
• Selective coding comes next where you think you’ve got a theory coming together and so you start looking for examples of it

Question 2

AO3: Strengths

Answer 2

• Allows for in-depth qualitative data which gives more detail
• Encourages researcher to derive themes and theories rather than impose their pre-selected ones (improving validity again)
• Able to test inter-rater reliability by having two observers code the same data

Question 3

AO3: Weaknesses

Answer 3

• Interpretation/Subjectivity is a problem- other people would pick different themes
• It is time consuming and requires skill to pick out representative themes
• May have low inter-rater reliability if two observers identify different themes
• Not scientific- not testing hypotheses