QUALITATIVE DATA ANALYSIS

A/Professor Denis McLaughlin

School of Educational Leadership

QUALITATIVE DATA ANALYSISYou have a book of readings with relevant extracts from the following books.

They must be read1. Dey, I (1993) Qualitative data analysis, London: Routledge2. Miles, M & Huberman, A (1984). Qualitative data analysis, Newbury park:

Sage3. Miles, M & Huberman, A (1994). Qualitative data analysis : An expanded

source book (2nd edition), Thousand Oakes: Sage4. Coffey, A. & Atkinson, P.(1996).Making sense of qualitative data,

Thousand Oaes: Sage5. Marshall, C. & Rossman, G. (1989).Designing qualitative research.

Newbury Park: Sage6. Tesch, R. (1990). Qualitative research, New York: Falmer Press7. Creswell, J. (1998). Qualitative inquiry and research design, Thousand

Oaks: Sage8. Creswell, J. (2002). Analyzing and interpreting qualitative data (pp256-

283). In J Creswell, Educational research, Thousand Oaks: Sage 9. Maykut, P. & Morehouse, R. (1994) Qualitative data analysis: using the

constant comparative method , In P. Maykut & R. Morehouse, Beginning qualitative research, London Falmer Press

RESEARCH STRATEGY IDENTIFICATIONRESEARCH PROBLEM

RESEARCH PURPOSE

RESEARCH QUESTIONS

ISSUES TO BE EXPLORED

APPROPRIATE TECHNIQUES

OVERVIEW OF QUALITATIVE ANALYSIS

Data Collection

Data display

Data reduction

Conclusions: drawing / verifying

(Miles & Huberman, 1984; 1994)

INTERACTIVE PROCESS OF DATA ANALYSIS

Data collection

Data display

Reflection on Data

Data Coding

Generation of Themes

Story interpretation

Research Conclusions

SIMULTANEOUSITERATIVE

Data distillation (reduction

QUALITATIVE ANALYSIS (Dey, 1993)

describing

ClassifyingConnecting

Qualitative analysis as an iterative spiralDey, 1993

DATA ANALYSIS PROCEDURES

In this section of your Design chapter mention the following characteristics of the process

Data analysis is an eclectic process (Tesch,1990)

1. Occurs simultaneously and iterative with data collection, data interpretation and report writing (Creswell, 2002; Miles & Huberman, 1984)

2. Is based on the on data reduction and interpretation -decontextualisation & recontextualisation (Marshall & Rossman, 1989; Tesch, 1990)

2. Data Analysis Procedures

3. Represents information in matrices-displays of information , spatial format that presents information systematically to reader

3. (Miles and Huberman, 1984)

A I page example of this must be placed in this chapter eventually • Display categories by informants, sites and other …• Tables of tabular information showing relationships among

categories of information

4. Identifies the coding procedure to be used to reduce information to themes / categories (Read Tesch, 1990, pp142-145).

Categorisation and Themes

1. Constant comparative content analysis

2. Themes generated from the literature review

3. Themes embedded in instrument questions

4. Themes embedded in research questions

5. Combination of any of above

DATA ORGANISATION(Miles & Huberman, 1994)

DEVELOP MATRICES : VISUAL IMAGES OF INFORMATION

Comparison tables –themes, participants, sites Heirarchical trees visually representing themes &

their relations Figures in boxes to indicate the processes, time

sequence, evolution of themes Organising the data by type interviews, observations, documents

Organising by participants or sites combinations

See Michael Dredge’s Power point at the end of this sequence on this issue

DATA ANALYSIS

MANUALLESS THAN 500 PAGES OF TRANSCRIPTS OR FIELD NOTESWANT TO “FEEL” CLOSE TO DATACANNOT AFFORD TO HAVE ALL INTERVIEWS TRANSCRIBED(4 HRS TO TRANSCRIBE 1 HR TAPE INTERVIEW)

COMPUTERMORE THAN 500 PAGES OF DATACAN AFFORD PROGRAM AND TRANSCRIBERATLAS.tiQSR N5 (NUD8IST 5.0)NVivoEthnographWinMAXHyperResearch

CODING DATA (see Tesch, pp142 -145)

1. Get sense of whole: read all carefully

2. Pick one document “what is its underlying meaning” write thoughts themes in margin

3. Do this for several informants; Cluster together similar topics; arrange topics into major topics, unique topics, left overs

4. Revisit data with topics; Abbreviate the topics as codes; Re-analyse. Do new codes emerge?

5. Turn topics into themes

6. Reduce number of themes by grouping similar themes

7. Diagrammatize the basics of the numbers 5 & 6

8. Finalise abbreviations- alphabetise codes

9. Perform preliminary analysis on material belonging to each theme

10. If necessary, recode existing data

Always include in your design chapter a page of text (exhibit 4.x) illustrating the how you code the text

Read text data

Divide text into segments of information

Code segments

Reduce Codes

Collapse codes into themes

Many pages of texts

Many segments of texts

30 – 40 codes

Codes reduced to 20

Codes reduced to 5 -7 themes

CODING PROCESS (Creswell, 2002)

(Matrix example)

Description of Data Analysis (Matrix example)

Initial data analysis

Major and minor topics

Theme 1 Theme 2 Theme 3 Theme 4

Final interpretation

In your analysis chapter you would present a diagram such as this at the beginning but with actual contextual material to illustrate the flow of your analysis. You would “flag” this overview in your Design chapter and refer specifically to it

Stage 1Data collection, displayreflection

Stage 2 Data coding & distillation

Stage 3

Generation of key themes

Stage 4Story report & conclusions

Data Collection Techniques

Stages for Data Collection (Matrix example)

Exploratory Phase

Step 1a: Initial Exploratory Survey – Conducted in 19981st Visit to PNG; Meet various stakeholders – SSSP graduates, personnel from tertiary institutions, NDOE, parents etc

Step 1b: Analyze responses for trends and patterns

Step 2: Select stratified sample from step 1 according to predetermined criteria for individual interviews recipients in employmentrecipients at universitiesrecipients at vocational institutions

IndividualIn-depth InterviewsFocus Groups

Step 3: Interview selected sample

Step 4: Focus groups at universities and colleges

Step 5: Analyse data collected in step 3 and 4

Step 6: Interview selected officials, personnel from tertiary institutions, employers, parents & guardians

Documentary

&Final analysis

Step 7: Analyse official interviews

Step 8: Analyse interviews of secondary sources

Step 9: Document analysis

Step 10 Final analysis