Qualitative_data_analysis

Chapter 10
Splitting and splicing
The first thing we may do after creating and assigning categories to the data is
consider ways of refining or focusing our analysis. To do this, we can shift attention
from the ‘original’ data itself to the data as reconceptualized through the results of
our labours. By this point, we have reorganized our data (or at least some of it)
around a category set, which we may have created, modified and extended during
our preliminary analysis. In the process we have also ‘produced’ a (probably very
large) number of databits which have been assigned to one or more of the various
categories used in our analysis. Therefore we can now organize and analyse our data
in terms of the categories which we have developed. This shift in focus has been
described as a ‘recontextualization’ of the data (Tesch 1990), as it can now be
viewed in the context of our own categories rather than in its original context.
Depending upon the software we are using, in order to view the data in this new
context we may have to ‘retrieve’ the databits which we have assigned to a particular
category or categories. Most packages for analysing qualitative data involve a ‘code
and retrieve’ process whereby codes (i.e. abbreviations for categories) are initially
attached to bits of the data, and then these codes can be used to retrieve all the
databits to which they have been assigned. In packages where codes are simply
attached to the text, it is essential to retrieve the data in this way before we can have
a look at it. Some software, though, allows you access to all the databits assigned to
a particular category or categories without having to go through a retrieval process.
This is achieved by copying all the databits to a separate file or files during
categorization, so that as categories are assigned to the bits of data, the databits are
simultaneously reorganized under those categories. This obviates the need to retrieve
databits before we can examine the results of our categorization.
The format in which categories and databits are held is also likely to vary with the
software we use. We may, for instance, put all the databits assigned to a category or
categories together into a single file, or store each databit separately under its
assigned category or categories and use the computer’s search facilities to locate all
examples belonging to a specified category or categories. But whatever the particular
format, the important point is that we now want the computer to present our data