Sally Thorne, RN, PhD, FAAN, FCAHS
University of British Columbia School of Nursing @salthorne
Grounded Theory Sociology
Phenomenology Philosophy
Ethnography Anthropology
Processual
Evolving
Flexible
Infinitely Adaptive
Knowing the Patient
Patterns and Processes that Inform
Clinical Reasoning
Infinite Variation of Pattern
Pattern Recognition
Theoretical Knowledge
Empirical Knowledge
Health science community
Social scientist colleagues
Grant reviewers/journal editors
12
Phenomenology Nursing
Bracketing Preconceptions
Building on DisciplinaryKnowledge
Essential Nature of Lived Phenomena
Human & Contextual Variation
Pure Description Interpretation & Explanation
Grounded Theory Nursing
SymbolicInteraction
Assumptions not Predicated on Interactional
Material
Basic Social Processes
No Presumption of Underlying
Mechanisms
Individual Account as Access to Fundamental
Explanation for Social Behavior
Individual Account as Window into Possibilities in Shared Aspects
Ethnography Nursing
CulturalImmersion
Seeing Familiar Culture in New Ways
Interconnectedness of Whole Cultures
No Preconception of Shared Cultural Understandings
ChallengeSubjective
Understandings with Behavioral
Observation
Invite Interpretation& Explanation
Funding body requirements (e.g. predetermined sample and design; assumptions of relevance)
Social science norms (e.g. theoretical frameworks; saturation)
Journal manuscript length (depth & richness)
Confusion over role of theory
Essentializing claims
Abdication of generalization
Overuse of metaphoric representations
18
Derived from NURSING epistemology
Borrows the best of technique from conventional (social science method) without taking along the theoretical the baggage
Uses theory as a tool, not as the ultimate purpose
The core structure of
nursing thought as
philosophical underpinning
• Creativity in the use of data sources and
inquiry approaches
• Knowledge translation built into the initial
design
• Orientation toward a body of more
relevant and useable qualitatively derived
knowledge
Optimal
Directions
Formal
Evidence
Patient
Values &
Expectations
Clinical
Wisdom
25
What is known? How is it known?
Tabula Rasa?
Being an Interpretive Descriptionist
Doing Interpretive Description
___
✓ Using an Interpretive Description approach to…
✓Drawing on Interpretive Description
methodology informed by….
✓Adapting a … approach through the use of
Interpretive Description methodology
What is the essential structure of….?
What is the lived experience of….?
What are the basic social processes of….?
How do …. describe/explain/understand/make
sense of their experiences with….?
What can be learned from….?
28
and
What it
Obscures
Individual subjective perspective/experience
Beyond Interviews:◦ Non-empirical literature
◦ Documentary sources
◦ Participant observation
◦ Expert opinion
30
Pieces to patterns
◦ The tradition of coding
◦ Alternatives to coding
From patterns to relationships
◦ Knowing your data
◦ Applying technique
◦ Documenting analytic thinking
Coding
Themes, patterns, categories
Taxonomies vs findings
What do we find that we expected to find and what was unexpected
What common ideas come up in all or most cases?
What similarities and differences can we see between cases?
What story is emerging from these accounts that needs telling?
Itemized collection of “things”(themes, categories, subcategories)
vs
Coherent narrative
34
Sandelowski, M. (2007). Words that should be seen
but not written. Research in Nursing & Health, 30,
129–130.
Formulating Findings for the Application Context
• That which science misses/ misunderstands
• That which defies quantification
• That which behaves in ways that cannot be regularized
• That which changes outside the context of its natural complexity
Understanding
intended
audience from
the outset
Thorne, S. (2016). Interpretive Description: Qualitative
Research for Applied Practice (2nd edn.). New York: Routledge.
Thorne, S., Stephens, J. & Truant, T. (2016). Building
qualitative study design using nursing's disciplinary
epistemology. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 72(2), 451-460.
Thorne, S., Reimer Kirkham, S., & O’Flynn-Magee, K. (2004).
The analytic challenge in interpretive description. International
Journal of Qualitative Methods, 3(1), 1-11.
Thorne, S., Reimer Kirkham, S. & MacDonald-Emes, J. (1997).
Interpretive description: A non-categorical qualitative
alternative for developing nursing knowledge. Research in
Nursing & Health,20(2), 169-177.
45
Sally Thorne, UBC School of Nursing
@salthorne
IIQM Archived MasterClass Webinarshttps://www.ualberta.ca/international-institute-for-qualitative-methodology/webinars/master-class-webinar/archived-webinars.html
IIQM Blog
https://www.ualberta.ca/international-institute-for-qualitative-methodology/index.html
46