process - Quirkos Qualitative Research Blog

Automated transcription and some risks of machine interpretation

Automated transcription systems can be negatively affected by systematic cultural prejudice... it's important to understand that, just like us, these machine learning systems have learnt from our dominant global culture and society

Research interviews

How can I get them to talk? Talking naturally in qualitative research interviews

I once did some auto-ethnography in nightclubs. I didn't have difficulty getting people to share their stories with me even though we had to take turns shouting into each other's ear. So what is going on, what's getting in the way of talking and sharing?

analysis

What’s in the Black-Box of the Quirkos Qualitative Researcher Journeys Project?

When learning about qualitative research methodology, novice researchers want to see and use practical examples of how research was undertaken that go beyond the kind of overview found in research outputs

process

Researching apart, together: the power of working in tandem

I want to explain why I think this form of social co-working can be so helpful for work and research.

process

Examples of qualitative research data

Qualitative data can be in many more formats, so it's useful to see some examples of what qualitative data can look like, and to use for practice while you learn analysis and before you collect your own data

analysis

Managing qualitative coding systems

In this blog post, I'm going to try and persuade you to do something really boring. Develop a formal process to record your analysis journey, and the coding systems you have.

process

Codebooks for qualitative research

A codebook doesn’t include the extracts of data themselves, but a detailed description of the codes, how they should be used, their relationship to each other, what should be included and excluded in each code.

process

Qualitative research design (and planning)

When many people think of ‘research design’, they think of choosing methods or a methodology. But the design for a qualitative project should also consider existing research, epistemology, how you are going to recruit, and analyse the data from the methods you choose.

process

Writing up qualitative research

There are specific challenges to writing up research based on qualitative data: there is a lot of data to present, complex stories to tell and conclusions that took a long time to develop. But some simple guidelines can help structuring any kind of research output

process

Collaboration, Data Analysis and Ethics

Collaboration is a common feature of modern research life. Researchers may collaborate at every stage from seeking funding to disseminating findings. They might collaborate with other researchers, or managers, supervisors, participants, colleagues from other disciplines – anyone whose input seems likely to be useful, and who is willing to play along.

methods

Tips for conducting online interviews and focus groups for qualitative research

Lockdowns and social distancing due to COVID-19 are currently changing the way that qualitative researchers collect data, and likely to do so for some time. The semi-structured (or unstructured) interview or focus group are two of the most popular qualitative methods, but are usually conducted in face-to-face settings. And while

process

Reflexive journals in qualitative research

It is common practice for researcher to keep a journal or diary during the research process, regardless of discipline or methodology. These are sometimes called reflexive diaries, self-reflexive journals, research journals or research diaries. They are all basically the same thing – a written (or verbal) record written by the researcher

analysis

Should you use inter-rater reliability in qualitative coding?

In qualitative analysis it’s sometimes difficult to agree even with yourself. With complex data sets, and ‘wicked’ issues, there are times that a researcher coding qualitative data will not consistently code different sources to the same themes or codes in the same way. Often there many themes, rich and

coding

Qualitative Coding Systems and the Extended Mind

Sometimes it can seem that our bodies are doing things without us knowing about it. I would struggle to tell someone the PIN number for my bank card, but my fingers know it – they just automatically type the right sequence!

process

Starting out in Qualitative Analysis

When people are doing their first qualitative analysis project using software, it’s difficult to know where to begin. I get a lot of e-mails from people who want some advice in planning out what they will actually DO in the software, and how that will help them

process

Qualitative software and tools for ‘close reading’ in the Digital Humanities

The Digital Humanities movement is a growing paradigm that aims to explore the new possibilities created by the availability of huge archives of data, and powerful digital tools that can explore them rapidly. This allows researchers to explore, connect and interpret vast amounts of data in ways that were not

quirkos

How to use qualitative analysis software (QDAS) for data management

A research project is often a big logistical undertaking, qualitative or otherwise. Through literature reviews, developing research questions, grant applications and funding, ethics/IRBs [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institutional_review_board], managing co-researchers and supervisors, recruitment, collecting data from respondents, research journals, analysing data and writing up findings, there

process

Qualitative case study research

Context: that’s where case study research comes in. Here, you adopt a series of methodologies that are exploring the phenomenon you want to study in context (in vivo / in life) rather than in isolation (in vitro – in a glass tube).

quirkos

Teaching qualitative analysis software with Quirkos

It’s a new academic year, and many professors, lecturers and TAs will be reviewing their course materials and slides for this semester and beyond. Those teaching qualitative methods will also be looking at how to teach qualitative analysis, and wondering about including software as part of that process. While

methods

Quantitative vs. qualitative research

So this much is obvious: quantitative research uses numbers and statistics to draw conclusions about large populations. You count something that is countable, and process results across the sample. Qualitative methods are more elusive

process

Qualitative analysis software for monitoring and evaluation

Developing systems for the monitoring and evaluation of services, interventions and programmes (or programs to use the American English spelling) is a particular skill that requires great flexibility

qualitative analysis software

Using qualitative analysis software for literature reviews

You’ve probably heard of or even used a reference management software like EndNote, Mendeley or the free and open-source Zotero. However, while these tools are great for doing your references at the end of a project and integrating with Word

analysis

Integrating policy analysis into your qualitative research

It’s easy to get seduced by the excitement of primary data collection, and plan your qualitative research around methods that give you rich data from face-to-face contact with participants

analysis

Preparing data sources for qualitative analysis

Qualitative software used to need you to format text files in very specific ways before they could be imported. These days the software is much more capable and means you can import nearly any kind of text data in any kind of formatting, which allows for a lot more flexibility.

analysis

Balance and rigour in qualitative analysis frameworks

Training researchers to use qualitative software and helping people who get stuck with Quirkos, I get to see a lot of people’s coding frameworks. Most of the time they are great, often they are fine but have too many codes, but sometimes they just seem to lack a little balance.