Qualitative Data Analysis

Question 1

What is thematic analysis?

Answer 1

Involves identifying ideas within the data. Themes will often emerge whilst coding the data.

Question 2

Explain the process of thematic analysis.

Answer 2

Use an artefact e.g. newspaper article, scripts, film, conversation
Identify themes / patterns within artefact
Use codes to identify the themes
Tally each time the code appears - change qualitative data into quantitative data

Question 3

Thematic analysis can be done both inductively and deductively. Explain these terms.

Answer 3

Inductively = no preconceived ideas- ideas develop during analysis. UNBIASED
themes emerge from data without researcher imposing their own ideas.

Deductively = go in with preset ideas
researcher specifies the themes they look for before analysing the data

Question 4

Give an advantage of qualitative analysis / research.

Answer 4

Flexible.
Researcher is closely involved, so is able to find issues that are often missed.
Allows for contradictions/ambiguities in data, which is a reflection of social reality.

Question 5

Give a disadvantage of qualitative analysis / research.

Answer 5

Expensive and time-consuming, so don’t generally draw samples from large-scale data sets.
Subjective nature- problem with reliability and validity.
Can’t replicate qualitative studies- can’t replicate contexts, situations, events, interactions etc.
Can’t generalise to a wider context than the one studied.
Analysis is difficult- interpretation requires expert knowledge of the area.