Qualitative Analysis Using MAXQDA

The Five-Level QDA™ Method

Nicholas H. Woolf, Christina Silver

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781351976411
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Psychology
• Subtopic: Research & Methodology in Psychology
• Index: Psychology

Software is cut-and-dried – every button you press has a predictable effect – but qualitative analysis is open-ended and unfolds in unpredictable ways. This contradiction is best resolved by separating analytic strategies – what you plan to do – from software tactics – how you plan to do it. Expert MAXQDA users have unconsciously learned to do this. The Five-Level QDA® method unpacks the process so that you can learn it consciously and efficiently.

The first part of the book explains how the contradiction between analytic strategies and software tactics is reconciled by "translating" between them. The second part provides both an in-depth description of how MAXQDA works and comprehensive instruction in the five steps of "translation". These steps are illustrated with examples from a variety of research projects. The third part contains real-world qualitative research projects from a variety of disciplines, methodologies, and kinds of qualitative analysis, all illustrated in MAXQDA using the Five-Level QDA method. The book is accompanied by three sets of video demonstrations on the Companion Website.

The functionality and interface design of MAXQDA for Windows and Mac are identical. The Five-Level QDA method learned from this book is therefore the same whether you are working on a Mac or Windows computer.

The Five-Level QDA method is based on the authors' combined 40 years of experience teaching MAXQDA and other software packages used as platforms for conducting qualitative analysis. After many years observing their students' challenges they developed the Five-Level QDA method to describe the process that long-time MAXQDA experts unconsciously adopt. The Five-Level QDA method is independent of software program or methodology, and the principles apply to any type of qualitative project.

Please see the following URL to access the accompanying materials for this book: https://www.qdaservices.co.uk/five-level-qda

Part I
The Principles of the Five-Level QDA Method

Mastering the Five-Level QDA method means first learning the principles before hands-on use of the software. Part I contains all the principles. Chapter 1 lays the groundwork with the central principle: the contradiction between strategies and tactics when using MAXQDA to conduct qualitative analysis and the alternative ways to reconcile the contradiction. Chapters 2 and 3 flesh out each of the five levels. Chapter 2 deals with the first two levels of strategy: the objectives of a research project and the analytic plan to fulfill it. Chapter 3 deals with translating those strategies into the tactics of software operations.

1
Strategies and Tactics

This chapter describes the principles behind our approach to harnessing MAXQDA powerfully. The central issue is the contradiction between the nature of qualitative analysis and the nature of software used to conduct the analysis. The way these contradictions are reconciled determines the approach to harnessing the software. Experienced researchers have learned to reconcile these contradictions unconsciously, but our intention is to make this transparent in order to facilitate learning. In this chapter we compare three possible approaches to reconciling the contradiction in order to highlight the reasons why this book takes the approach that it does.

A word about the illustrations used in this chapter. Because of the need to discuss the principles before we can demonstrate or provide hands-on instruction in MAXQDA, we use analogies in this chapter that have nothing to do with qualitative research, but instead refer to everyday experiences we can all relate to. The variety of qualitative methodologies is so great that a single example of research would risk misleading you if you are using a different approach, and it would be cumbersome to offer multiple illustrations at this early stage. Bear with us—we will soon get on to using illustrations from real-world research projects.

The Contradictions Between Strategies and Tactics

This section describes how the nature of qualitative analysis is contradictory to the nature of software. Recognizing this contradiction is the first step in learning to harness MAXQDA powerfully.

Over many years of teaching we have tried to get to the bottom of what holds people up from quickly learning to harness MAXQDA powerfully. Our conclusion lies in the difference between strategies and tactics. They are often confused with one another or thought of as two ways to say the same thing. Understanding the relationship between strategies and tactics is the key to harnessing MAXQDA powerfully.

In any endeavor, strategies refer to what you plan to do, and tactics refer to how you plan to do it. It makes sense to first be clear about what you plan to do and then to be clear about how you plan to do it, but often people start with the tactics and hope for the best. A good example is pruning a fruit tree, which requires finding the right tool and then cutting the branches. If the only tools in the shed are a tree lopper and some shears, you may choose the shears and start cutting, but give up when you reach branches that are too thick near the trunk. Next year the results may be disappointing if you were hoping to encourage healthy growth and maximize the number of large, juicy apples. You then decide to read up on how an apple tree should be pruned—the strategies—rather than just start cutting again—the tactics—and you discover there are very different pruning strategies for apple trees of different varieties, ages, and states of health. Sometimes you might cut back whole branches, trim the length of others, or remove shoots, and so on. Once the strategies have been decided, the best tool can be selected for each task, whether saw, shears, or small clippers, and no task is particularly difficult because the tactics fit the strategies. The moral is that strategies and tactics are different in nature, and the tactics are made to fit the strategies, not the other way around.

In qualitative research the strategies—what you plan to do—are matters like deciding the purpose of the study, determining what kind of data will be required, and choosing methods for analyzing the data. Each of these areas calls for tactics to be considered and put into effect, but the strategies are largely independent of whether the tactics are going to be highlighter pens, general-purpose software like Microsoft Word or Excel, or special-purpose software like MAXQDA. Our contention is that when using software to conduct a qualitative analysis, the underlying nature of the strategies is contradictory to the underlying nature of the tactics to fulfill them.

The high-stakes area of computer security, such as for online banking, provides an example of contradictory strategies and tactics Successfully encrypting your password and financial information as it moves around the Internet so that it is safe from prying eyes requires the computer to generate random numbers. This is what needs to happen—the strategy. However, computers are deterministic, meaning that they can only follow rules and procedures, referred to as algorithms, which always give the same answer to the same question. Computers cannot function in a truly random way and cannot generate truly random numbers. They can only generate pseudo-random numbers that have an underlying pattern, even though this is not discernible by the average person or computer program. So the tactics available do not fit the needs of the strategy.

How do computer security people deal with this contradiction between the nature of what they want to do and the nature of the software with which they want to do it? First, they are consciously aware of the issue and do not ignore it. Second, they have decided that for most uses the encryption provided by even pseudo-random numbers provides adequate security. They do not need to find a way to generate truly random numbers. They have reconciled the contradiction between the need for random numbers and the nonrandom nature of computers with a conscious compromise: pseudo-random numbers are good enough (Rubin, 2011).

A similar situation arises when using software in qualitative research, and we are certainly not the first to wonder how software can be used successfully for such an open-ended process as qualitative analysis (e.g., Gilbert, Jackson, & di Gregorio, 2014; Tesch, 1990). Everything about a computer program has been predetermined by its developers to work in the same standard way, regardless of the purpose a researcher has in mind for using the software. Choosing an option from a menu or clicking on a button always has the same predetermined effect, and it is natural to assume that the features of the software are independent and are intended to be used one at a time for their most apparent purpose: in other words, that there must be a correct way to use the software in every analysis. In fact many researchers who are experienced with MAXQDA come to our workshops to ensure that they are using the software “correctly.” But most kinds of qualitative analysis do not proceed in a predetermined way, following the same steps in the same sequence, and so MAXQDA is not used in remotely the same way in every project, and certainly not in a “correct” way.

Qualitative projects are, to varying degrees, iterative and emergent, with unique strategies evolving from moment to moment as the analysis unfolds. Iterative refers to the continual reconsideration of what is being done in light of what has just been done and what is anticipated to come next so that the individual parts of a qualitative analysis develop together as a whole. In an emergent system the whole is more than the sum of the parts, but the qualities of the whole are not predictable from the parts (Kauffman, 1995). The results or findings of a whole qualitative research project therefore emerge as the parts develop in an iterative manner. Although many qualitative research projects are only somewhat iterative or emergent, many are highly so, and in later chapters the case illustrations of more or less iterative and emergent types of projects will make these qualities come to life.

The contradictions between the predetermined and step-by-step processes of software, which we refer to simply as cut and dried, and the iterative and emergent processes of qualitative analysis that we refer to simply as emergent are illustrated in Figure 1.1. Box 1.1 provides a deeper look into the relationship between cut-and-dried and emergent processes.

Contradictory strategies and tactics suggest various possible solutions. Imagine you are an architect with a set of building blocks that come in standard shapes and sizes—perhaps square bricks and rectangular bricks with tongues and grooves that fit together in predetermined ways. Some construction projects in this imaginary world might call for exactly these shaped bricks stacked up in various ways just as the tongues and grooves provide for. But many projects might not. They might include circular designs or call for bricks that stack together differently from how the predetermined tongues and grooves connect. An expert architect would find a way to make the standard bricks work; she would overcome the apparent inconsistency between the angular shape of the bricks and the circular designs. A novice architect is more likely to decide that a circular building is impossible to design with these bricks, or she may refuse to use bricks at all, as they are simply the wrong shape. Remember these architects: we’ll come back to them.

Figure 1.1 The contradictory nature of qualitative analysis and computer software

In qualitative analysis such contradictions between strategies and tactics are in no way a barrier to harnessing MAXQDA powerfully. Most qualitative researchers neither want nor expect the cut-and-dried operations of the program—the tactics—to play a role in the emergent strategies of the analysis or to contribute to the interpretive process. It is commonly said that in qualitative

Box 1.1 A Deeper Look: Cut-and-Dried Versus Emergent Processes

One way to think about the contrast between the cut-and-dried nature of computer software and the emergent nature of qualitative data analysis is by considering the contrast between well-structured and ill-structured activities more generally. These two kinds of activities are at opposite ends of a spectrum and can be considered contradictory. Taking an intentional approach to reconciling the contradiction is the rationale for the Five-Level QDA method.

Well-Structured Activities

A structure is an arrangement of the parts of something. Everything—a building, a problem to be solved, a society, a qualitative analysis—has a structure. One characteristic of structure common to all these examples is the degree of structure that something has. Churchman (1971) proposed two main classes of problems or activities: well structured and ill structured. In well-structured activities everything is known: there are clear goals, a single correct outcome or purpose, and clear criteria for knowing when the activity is successful or complete. It is a matter of going through a process or a series of steps to complete the activity. Chess is a good example. It is challenging to play well, but everything about it is well structured: how each piece moves, a single result, and a single way of knowing who has won—by the capture of the opposing king. It is therefore amenable to being represented by algorithms, or step-by-step procedures, which explains why computers do it so well.

Computer software is an example of a well-structured domain. Every aspect about using it is definite and always works in the same way (unless there is a bug in the program, but that is a different matter). For example, if you wish to copy and paste in Microsoft Word, selecting some text and pressing the Copy button will always reliably copy those lines of text. Pressing the Paste button at a different location will always reliably paste in the exact same lines. Operating computer software is a step-by-step activity predetermined by the software developer, like following a recipe. And like chess, it is not necessarily easy to learn or use. But each act of using it is a well-structured activity.

Most important is the mind-set involved in using software. Cognitive psychologists have proposed that we create schema—mental templates—whenever we do an activity so that next time we meet a similar set of circumstances we have a preorganized set of expectations and blank mental slots alrea...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• CONTENTS
• EXTENDED CONTENTS
• List of Figures
• List of Tables
• List of Boxes
• Acknowledgments
• Case Contributors
• Orientation
• PART I The Principles of the Five-Level QDA Method
• PART II The Five-Level QDA Method in Practice
• PART III Case Illustrations
• Appendices
• Index