Qualitative Research Using R

This book highlights the rise of the Strauss-Corbin-Gioia (SCG) methodology as an important paradigm in qualitative research in the social sciences, and demonstrates how the SCG methodology can be operationalized and enhanced using RQDA. It also provides a technical and methodological review of RQDA as a new CAQDAS tool. Covering various techniques, it offers methodological guidance on how to connect CAQDAS tool with accepted paradigms, particularly the SCG methodology, to produce high- quality qualitative research and includes step-by-step instructions on using RQDA under the SCG qualitative research paradigm. Lastly, it comprehensively discusses methodological issues in qualitative research. This book is useful for qualitative scholars, PhD/postdoctoral students and students taking qualitative methodology courses in the broader social sciences, and those who are familiar with programming languages and wish to cross over to qualitative data analysis. "At long last! We now have a qualitative data-analysis approach that enhances the use of a systematic methodology for conducting qualitative research. Chandra and Shang should be applauded for making our research lives a lot easier. And to top it all off, it’s free." Dennis Gioia, Robert & Judith Auritt Klein Professor of Management, Smeal College of Business at Penn State University, USA “While we have a growing library of books on qualitative data analysis, this new volume provides a much needed new perspective. By combining a sophisticated understanding of qualitative research with an impressive command of R, the authors provide an important new toolkit for qualitative researchers that will improve the depth and rigor of their data analysis. And given that R is open source and freely available, their approach solves the all too common problem of access that arises from the prohibitive cost of more traditional qualitative data analysis software. Students and seasoned researchers alike should take note!” Nelson Phillips, Abu Dhabi Chamber Chair in Strategy and Innovation, Imperial College Business School, United Kingdom "This helpful book does what it sets out to do: offers a guide for systematizing and building a trail of evidence by integrating RQDA with the Gioia approach to analyzing inductive data. The authors provide easy-to-follow yet detailed instructions underpinned by sound logic, explanations and examples. The book makes me want to go back to my old data and start over!" Nicole Coviello, Lazaridis Research Professor, Wilfrid Laurier University, Canada "Qualitative Research Using R: A Systematic Approach guides aspiring researchers through the process of conducting a qualitative study with the assistance of the R programming language. It is the only textbook that offers “click‐by-click” instruction in how to use RQDA software to carry out analysis. This book will undoubtedly serve as a useful resource for those interested in learning more about R as applied to qualitative or mixed methods data analysis. Helpful as well is the six‐step procedure for carrying out a grounded‐theory type study (the “Gioia approach”) with the support of RQDA software, making it a comprehensive resource for those interested in innovative qualitative methods and uses of CAQDAS tools." Trena M. Paulus, Professor of Education, University of Georgia, USA

Using lively examples and friendly tips gleaned from his own and other researchers' experiences, and a warm, reflective writing style, Harry F Wolcott offers readers suggestions for writing up qualitative research.

This lively, practical text presents a fresh and comprehensive approach to doing qualitative research. The book offers a unique balance of theory and clear-cut choices for customizing every phase of a qualitative study. A scholarly mix of classic and contemporary studies from multiple disciplines provides compelling, field-based examples of the full range of qualitative approaches. Readers learn about adaptive ways of designing studies, collecting data, analyzing data, and reporting findings. Key aspects of the researcher's craft are addressed, such as fieldwork options, the five phases of data analysis (with and without using computer-based software), and how to incorporate the researcher's “declarative” and “reflective” selves into a final report. Ideal for graduate-level courses, the text includes:* Discussions of ethnography, grounded theory, phenomenology, feminist research, and other approaches.* Instructions for creating a study bank to get a new study started.* End-of-chapter exercises and a semester-long, field-based project.* Quick study boxes, research vignettes, sample studies, and a glossary.* Previews for sections within chapters, and chapter recaps.* Discussion of the place of qualitative research among other social science methods, including mixed methods research.

This book is a comprehensive guide to qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) using R. Using Boolean algebra to implement principles of comparison used by scholars engaged in the qualitative study of macro social phenomena, QCA acts as a bridge between the quantitative and the qualitative traditions. The QCA package for R, created by the author, facilitates QCA within a graphical user interface. This book provides the most current information on the latest version of the QCA package, which combines written commands with a cross-platform interface. Beginning with a brief introduction to the concept of QCA, this book moves from theory to calibration, from analysis to factorization, and hits on all the key areas of QCA in between. Chapters one through three are introductory, familiarizing the reader with R, the QCA package, and elementary set theory. The next few chapters introduce important applications of the package beginning with calibration, analysis of necessity, analysis of sufficiency, parameters of fit, negation and factorization, and the construction of Venn diagrams. The book concludes with extensions to the classical package, including temporal applications and panel data. Providing a practical introduction to an increasingly important research tool for the social sciences, this book will be indispensable for students, scholars, and practitioners interested in conducting qualitative research in political science, sociology, business and management, and evaluation studies.

Social science theory often builds on sets and their relations. Correlation-based methods of scientific enquiry, however, use linear algebra and are unsuited to analyzing set relations. The development of Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) by Charles Ragin has given social scientists a formal tool for identifying set-theoretic connections based on Boolean algebra. As a result, interest in this method has markedly risen among social scientists in recent years. This book offers the first complete introduction on how to perform QCA in the R software environment for statistical computing and graphics with the QCA package. Developed as a comprehensive solution, QCA provides an unprecedented scope of functionality for analyzing crisp, multi-value and fuzzy sets. The reader is not required to have knowledge of R, but the book assumes an understanding of the fundamentals of QCA. Using examples from published work, the authors demonstrate how to make the most of QCA’s wide-ranging capabilities for the reader’s own purposes. Although mainly written for political scientists, this book is also of interest to scholars from other disciplines in the social sciences such as sociology, business, management, organization, anthropology, education and health.

This book tackles the challenges of how to make sense of qualitative data. It offers students and researchers a hands-on guide to the practicalities of coding, comparing data, and using computer-assisted qualitative data analysis. Lastly, Gibbs shows you how to bring it all together, so you can see the steps of qualitative analysis, understand the central place of coding, ensure analytic quality and write effectively to present your results.

In Doing Good Qualitative Research, Jennifer Cyr and Sara Wallace Goodman bring together over forty experts to provide one of the first comprehensive introductions to using qualitative methods across the social sciences, from start to finish. Each chapter introduces the theoretical considerations and best practices involved in the application of qualitative data collection and analysis. Additionally, contributors provide first-person accounts of methodology in action, address the expected and unexpected challenges associated with conducting qualitative research, and demonstrate the real-world applications of academic debates.

The wide range of approaches to data analysis in qualitative research can seem daunting even for experienced researchers. This handbook is the first to provide a state-of-the art overview of the whole field of QDA; from general analytic strategies used in qualitative research, to approaches specific to particular types of qualitative data, including talk, text, sounds, images and virtual data. The handbook includes chapters on traditional analytic strategies such as grounded theory, content analysis, hermeneutics, phenomenology and narrative analysis, as well as coverage of newer trends like mixed methods, reanalysis and meta-analysis. Practical aspects such as sampling, transcription, working collaboratively, writing and implementation are given close attention, as are theory and theorization, reflexivity, and ethics. Written by a team of experts in qualitative research from around the world, this handbook is an essential compendium for all qualitative researchers and students across the social sciences.