NVivo for Qualitative Research C Candace Chou

NVivo for Qualitative Research • C. Candace Chou, Ph. D • Department of Curriculum and Instruction • School of Education • University of St. Thomas • ccchou@stthomas. edu

Topics What it is What it doesn’t do What kinds of research have been done using NVivo? What kinds of research data are appropriate for Nvivo?

What it is A computer-based tool for qualitative data analysis Help researchers to seek new understanding of a situation, experience or process Manage and sort ”unstructured” data Code texts, find patterns,

What It Does and Doesn’t Do What it does Search and sort text Link, visualize & store data What it doesn’t do Teach research method Run statistical analysis Collect data or improve the quality of your data Code or interpret your data

Sample Projects Patterns of Online Interaction in distance education Perception of special education students Stereotypical images of minority groups in K-12 system Literature Review Summary of arguments, Themes, Own comments, Quotations

What do qualitative researchers want to do with data? What sort of questions? Theory-seeking, making-sense, pattern-finding. What sort of data exploration? Managing complexity, bringing in context, showing diversity. What sort of answers? Rigorously argued, vividly illustrated, exploring alternatives, justifying claims.

What are you trying to do? What sort of data? Observation, interviews, document analysis, literature review, field notes, transcripts, scanned documents What do you want to do with the data? how to manage it? how to store it? how to search it? code it? How?

Questions to Ask Before The Coding Process Theoretical Framework Hypotheses or Research Questions Coding scheme Creative coding (free nodes) Descriptive coding (known variables) Unit of Analysis

Working with documents Why code? creative coding records ideas from the data and links to where they came from descriptive coding records things you know about people, sites, cases etc. Save files as Rich Text format (RTF) or plain text Free download No time limit but can’t save any projects http: //www. qsr. com. au/Demo. Reg 1. asp

References Modified from Lyn Richards slides on “Computing Qualitative Research with QSR NUD*IST rev 4” Engel, C. (2003). Qualitative data analysis with Nvivo (http: //www. stanford. edu/~cengel/ANTRO/archives/000118. html)