5. D.Hafordpsychlotron.org.uk
Types of Content Analysis
Qualitative to Quantitative 1
Frequency Analysis - the number of times
certain words come up (e.g. number of
times that sexual references come up in
day-time television)
•pick categories (e.g.
roundness)
•count frequency of
occurrence for each
category
9. D.Hafordpsychlotron.org.uk
• Read transcript several times
• Identify emergent themes
• Order and organise themes into clusters
• Table of themes
• Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis
(IPS)
Types of Content Analysis
Qualitative to Qualitative
10. D.Hafordpsychlotron.org.uk
Interpretative Phenomenological
Analysis (IPS)
Papa doesn’t like me to talk to the air
Papa says people just talk to people
Papa says I ought to talk to him
What is the matter with you
Category - Father’s disapproval
“Well! You are welcome, too,’ Dibs exclaimed. “And now I will open the window so fresh air
can come in.” (Opens Window) “Come in, air! Come on in and be with us.” (He grinned at me)
“Papa doesn’t like me to talk to the air, but in here I will if I feel like it.”
In here if you feel like it okay” I remarked.
“Papa says people just talk to people. Papa says I ought to talk to him, but I don’t. I listen
to him, but I don’t talk to him. No, often I do not answer him. It upsets him very much.”
“Good morning” he says to me. I don’t look at him. I don’t answer him. “What is the matter
with you” he says “I know you can talk” But I don’t say anything. I don’t look at him. He
gets so upset!’ (Dibs laughs)
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Evaluation
What is good about using content analysis
vrs just doing a questionnaire or
psychometric test?
• Individual Differences
•Great to study emotions and motivation
• Can establish what caused the
behaviour
• Can study rare behaviours in detail (for
example, Dibs)
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Evaluation
Why should we not use content analysis?
• Not Scientific (I.e. its hard to
statistically prove anything)
•Can’t really generalise
• Reliability - how one person views the
report/data may be different from
someone else
•Validity - the language is ambiguous and
may be misinterpreted.
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For Example
•Took subjects from Western Australia
•Did an in-depth qualitative study
•Used content analysis to identify themes
•Results showed a wide range of feelings about changes
in the environment, but overall there was a
demonstrable relationship between environment and
feelings of family and emotional regulation.
The study by Rogan et al on the effect of changing
environment on human experience. (2005)
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Homework … yeah!
Review evaluation and try and apply to current
studies (use worksheet)
The first advantage of using content analysis is Individual
Differences
This is an advantage because using content analysis allows us
to show that each individual feels differently about an issue
For example, in the study by Rogan on the influence of
environmental change on human experience, she found that
different groups of people in the community felt differently about
the impact of environmental degradation
.
•Idea
•Explanation
•Example
