Approaches to Qualitative Research

• Phenomenology Both an approach to and a method of understanding the behavioral, emotive, and social meanings of lived experiences of individuals Emphasizes the individual's experiences, beliefs, and perceptions.
• Ethnography Focuses on studying shared practices and belief systems (l.e., culture) of a group of people in their natural context over a prolonged period
• Case Study

  • Allows in depth investigation of complex issues within a specific context based on a small geographical area or a very limited number of individuals as the subjects of the study.
• Discourse/Conversation Analysis Studies naturally occurring discourse and extract shared meanings from such discourse; text is the object of analysis. It is divided into four (4) themes: discourse as a topic, discourse as a form of action, discourse is rhetorically organized, and language is constructive.
• Inductive Thematic Theory Primarily concerned with presenting the stories and experiences voiced by study participants as accurately and comprehensively as possible. Most common qualitative data analysis used in social, behavioral, and health sciences
• Grounded Theory A set of inductive data collection and analytic methods to construct theories grounded in the data themselves
• Narrative Analysis • Focuses on narratives (storytelling) as the source of data Research focus shifts from "what actually happened" to "tell me what happened"; relates not just lifespans, but also accounts episodes and interconnections among them.