Methodological Seminars
Start your analysis off on the right foot
The methodological seminars address the foundations of qualitative data analysis, approaches to coding qualitative data, techniques to seek patterns and identify relationships and the best strategies for presenting qualitative findings. They are useful for PhD students and for established researchers new to qualitative research who need a solid grounding in the concepts, practices and procedures underlying qualitative data analysis.
Seminars are either half-day or full-day and can be taught before, after or simultaneously with an NVivo course.
This seminar provides participants with a basic understanding of qualitative data analysis. By the end of the seminar, you will be able to:
- Define what qualitative data analysis is
- Understand the intertwined role of patterns and themes in QDA
- Formulate clear and actionable research questions
- Develop a solid purpose statement of your qualitative study
- Choose the right data collection method for your analysis
- Differentiate ontology from epistemology and their influence on methodology.
This seminar introduces participants to key concepts and approaches to coding qualitative data. By the end of the seminar, you will be able to:
- Define the role that coding plays in qualitative analysis
- Distinguish meaning units from coding units
- Choose the right segmentation criterion for your data
- Generate clear and meaningful codes when developing a coding scheme
- Apply descriptive, interpretive and pattern codes to your data
- Avoid the coding trap (and other common mistakes)
- Choose between a theme- or design-based coding scheme for your study.
This seminar proposes strategies to seek patterns and identify relationships in data. By the end of the seminar, you will be able to:
- Define the role that patterns play in transforming raw data into findings
- Seek patterns of cooccurrence, sequence and proximity in the data
- Take hard decisions about which patterns to keep from those to discard
- Describe how induction, deduction and abduction informed pattern seeking
- Differentiate between the six levels of inferences in qualitative research
- Decide which level of inference your study aims to
- Provide a transparent audit trail that ascertains the trustworthiness of your results.
This seminar provides participants with ideas – and key design tips – to present qualitative findings using visualisations to maximise the impact of your research. By the end of the seminar, you will be able to:
- Argue why raw data (quotes) do not constitute findings, but a support to these
- Describe the advantages of data visualisations
- Apply the criteria for selecting a visualisation for your study
- Apply the six properties of a good visualisation to your results
- Choose the right visualisation(s) for your findings
- Describe how different categories of findings suit different visualisation displays
- Learn when to use taxonomies, typologies, matrices, tables, models and diagrammes.
Courses taught at
As a freelance methodologist, I train social scientists and humanitarian practitioners in qualitative analysis, decolonising research and participatory methodologies. I coach research teams, teach doctoral-level courses in method schools and I consult for humanitarian aid agencies worldwide.
