Qualitative Data Analysis - Coding Flashcards
What is coding?
Coding in its most basic form is the simple operation of identifying segments of meaning in your data and labelling them with a code.
Mention some advantages of coding
Acquire deep, comprehensive, and thorough insights into your data
Make the data easily accessible and retrievable
Sorting and structuring your data
Ensuring transparency in respect of how your conclusions are linked to your data.
Ensuring validity
o minimize confirmatory bias by searching for contradictory evidence in the empirical material.
Giving a voice to one’s participants
What are the different approaches to coding qualitative data?
Inductive coding
deductive coding
Blended Approach/abduction
What is inductive coding?
Researchers develop codes from the data by using phrases or terms used by the participants themselves, rather than using the theoretical vocabulary of the researcher.
In this way the codes stay close to the data, mirroring what is actually in them, rather than the ideas and prior understandings of the researcher.
Ultimately you may want to end up with a list of 50-70 initial codes. These codes can be submitted to a second cycle of coding in which higher-level categories are created from the initial code list.
As you move forward in the coding process, you may want to draw on some of the existing theory and concepts that are related to your phenomenon. This helps you anchor the study in the literature and provides further support for the findings.
In an inductive approach, the first coding cycle uses informant-centric terms, whereas the second coding cycle becomes more researcher-centric.
When is an inductive coding approach useful?
The inductive approach is relevant when doing an exploratory study or when no theoretical concepts are available to help grasp the phenomenon being studied.
What is deductive coding?
A pre-defined list of codes is created in a coding frame before you start coding your data.
This helps focus the coding on those issues that are known to be important in the existing literature, and it is often related to theory testing or theory refinement.
It is also a helpful if the aim of the study is to generalize analytically across cases.
Generally, the codes in deductive coding are theoretical concepts drawn from the existing literature.
In a deductive coding approach, the number of codes will typically be relatively limited.
What is blended coding (abduction)?
a combination of inductive and deductive coding is the most commonly used approach, what is sometimes referred to as a blended approach or abduction
To get started, it is a good idea to concentrate on one of the two approaches, as they have different strengths and weaknesses.
Starting inductively ensures closeness or “giving voice” to the data, with the possibility of unfolding theory later.
Deductive approaches ensure structure and theoretical relevance from the start, while enabling a closer inductive exploration of the deductive codes in later coding cycles.
The notion of abduction captures this combination of inductive and deductive elements and suggests a cycling back and forth between data and theory’
What is cycles of coding?
It is helpful to see coding as occurring in two or more cycles. Different code types are commonly used in these two coding cycles.
In the first coding cycle two types of codes are often of particular importance: descriptive codes and attribute codes.
A second cycle of coding entails “classifying, prioritizing, integrating, synthesizing, abstracting and conceptualizing, and theory building”
The trick is to look for an overarching structure or process that can be understood at a theoretical level
This also implies identifying concepts inspired by the relevant theoretical framework.
What are descriptive codes?
Descriptive codes are assigned to segments of data based on what the segment “is about”.
Segments of data are thus summarized using a label that indicates the meaning of the segment of data in relation to the overall research topic.
What are attribute codes?
Attribute codes are basic information assigned to larger segments of data, typically to the units in which the data were originally collected such as interviews, sites of observation, data sets for a given example.
At the individual level it might thus be useful to assign attribute codes for age, gender, experience or other attributes that are of relevance in the given study.
At an organizational level, there are similar generic or specific attributes such as industry, size etc. that can be considered potential sources of insights into the phenomenon.
What is analytical memos?
Analytical memos is the researcher’s ongoing reflections during coding concerning the codes, the phenomenon, the informants, and their interrelations.
What are some critics on coding?
Some argue that coding splits the data into disjointed elements, so the holistic element central to qualitative analysis is thus being lost.
Some criticisms are directed at the subjective nature of the coding process because judgements about which codes to develop are subjective to the coder.
Decontextualization
Researchers should be careful not to mistake qualitative coding for a mechanical quick fix neatly and swiftly decontextualizing the data. -> It should not replace elaborate detailed descriptions, elaboration of contexts, specific examples, or the inclusion and discussion of contradictory results.
What is thematic analysis?
A method for systematically identifying, analyzing, and reporting patterns of meaning (themes) across a dataset.
thematic analysis means researchers need not subscribe to the implicit theoretical commitments of grounded theory if they do not wish to produce a fully worked-up grounded-theory analysis.
What paradigm does thematic analysis typically follow?
Thematic analysis can be an essentialist or realist method, which reports experiences, meanings, and the reality of participants, or it can be a constructionist method, which examines the ways in which events, realities, meanings, experiences and so on are the effects of a range of discourses operating within society.
o It can also be sitting between the two poles of essentialism and constructionism.
What are two primary ways in thematic analysis to identify themes?
in an inductive way or in a theoretical or deductive way.
