Showing papers on "Grounded theory published in 1997"

Interpretive description: a noncategorical qualitative alternative for developing nursing knowledge.

Abstract: Despite nursing's enthusiastic endorsement of the applicability of qualitative research approaches to answering relevant clinical questions, many nurse researchers have been hesitant to depart from traditional qualitative research methods While various derivations of phenomenology, grounded theory, and ethnography have been popularized within qualitative nursing research, the methodological principles upon which these approaches are based reflect the foundations and objectives of disciplines whose aims are sometimes quite distinct from nursing's domain of inquiry Thus, as many nurse researchers have discovered, nursing's unique knowledge mandate may not always be well served by strict adherence to traditional methods as the "gold standard" for qualitative nursing research The authors present the point of view that a non-categorical description, drawing on principles grounded in nursing's epistemological mandate, may be an appropriate methodological alternative for credible research toward the development of nursing science They propose a coherent set of strategies for conceptual orientation, sampling, data construction, analysis, and reporting by which nurses can use an interpretive descriptive approach to develop knowledge about human health and illness experience phenomena without sacrificing the theoretical or methodological integrity that the traditional qualitative approaches provide

Focus on Qualitative Methods Interpretive Description: A Noncategorical Qualitative Alternative for Developing Nursing Knowledge

Abstract: Despite nursing's enthusiastic endorsement of the applicability of qualitative research approaches to answering relevant clinical questions, many nurse researchers have been hesi- tant to depart from traditional qualitative research methods. While various derivations of phe- nomenology, grounded theory, and ethnography have been popularized within qualitative nurs- ing research, the methodological principles upon which these approaches are based reflect the foundations and objectives of disciplines whose aims are sometimes quite distinct from nursing's domain of inquiry. Thus, as many nurse researchers have discovered, nursing's unique knowl- edge mandate may not always be well served by strict adherence to traditional methods as the "gold standard" for qualitative nursing research. The authors present the point of view that a non- categorical description, drawing on principles grounded in nursing's epistemological mandate, may be an appropriate methodological alternative for credible research toward the development of nursing science. They propose a coherent set of strategies for conceptual orientation, sam- pling, data construction, analysis, and reporting by which nurses can use an interpretive de- scriptive approach to develop knowledge about human health and illness experience phenome- na without sacrificing the theoretical or methodological integrity that the traditional qualitative approaches provide. q 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Res Nurs Health 20: 169-177, 1997

Constructing Opportunities for Contribution: Structuring Intertextual Coherence and “Problematizing” in Organizational Studies

Abstract: Examining a sample of journal articles, we develop a grounded theory of contribution that shows how organization studies theorists textually construct opportunities for making contributions to the ...

Patient-physician trust: an exploratory study.

Abstract: Background Patients' trust in their physicians has recently become a focus of concern, largely owing to the rise of managed care, yet the subject remains largely unstudied. We undertook a qualitative research study of patients' self-reported experiences with trust in a physician to gain further understanding of the components of trust in the context of the patient-physician relationship. Methods Twenty-nine patients participants, aged 26 to 72, were recruited from three diverse practice sites. Four focus groups, each lasting 1.5 to 2 hours, were conducted to explore patients' experiences with trust. Focus groups were audio-recorded, transcribed, and coded by four readers, using principles of grounded theory. Results The resulting consensus codes were grouped into seven categories of physician behavior, two of which related primarily to technical competence (thoroughness in evaluation and providing appropriate and effective treatment) and five of which were interpersonal (understanding patient's individual experience, expressing caring, communicating clearly and completely, building partnership/sharing power and honesty/respect for patient). Two additional categories were predisposing factors and structural/staffing factors. Each major category had multiple subcategories. Specific examples from each major category are provided. Conclusions These nine categories of physician behavior encompassed the trust experiences related by the 29 patients. These categories and the specific examples provided by patients provide insights into the process of trust formation and suggest ways in which physicians could be more effective in building and maintaining trust.

Why Media Matter: Toward a Richer Understanding of Consumers' Relationships with Advertising and Mass Media

Abstract: We propose that consumers' relationships to nonadvertising forms of mass media are an essential aspect of the perceived meanings they derive from advertisements. After presenting a multidisciplinary theoretical framework, we discuss the results of an in-depth grounded theory investigation that identifies three key interpretive relationships between consumers and mass media vehicles.

Becoming a mother — an analysis of women's experience of early motherhood

Abstract: This paper presents the results of a qualitative study conducted by midwife researchers into women's experience of new motherhood. Data were collected using focus groups involving 55 first-time mothers and analysed using grounded theory method. The analysis produced six categories: 'realizing', 'unready', 'drained', 'aloneness', 'loss' and 'working it out'. The core category, 'becoming a mother', integrates all other categories and encapsulates the process of change experienced by women. Also explained are factors mediating the often distressing experience of becoming a mother. The analysis provides a conceptualization of early motherhood enabling the development of strategies for midwives, nurses and other helping women negotiate this challenge.

Critical realism and realist research in human geography: a method or a philosophy in search of a method?

Abstract: Recent philosophical debates in human geography tend to misappropriate critical realism as a method per se. Drawing upon an extensive review of the realist philosophy and method in social science, this article argues that critical realism is a philosophy in search of a method. It first delves into recent debates about critical realism within the wider geographical discourse. It then suggests three useful guidelines in executing realist research in human geography: iterative abstraction, qualified grounded theory method and methodological triangulation. The article ends with a detailed empirical example for the readers to work through of the ways in which realist research can be practised in human geography.

Back to the Drawing Board: Revisiting Grounded Theory and the Everyday Accountant's and Manager's Reality

Abstract: Restates the case for accounting and management research from a grounded theory perspective, and advocates its informed and more frequent application. Examines the intellectual foundations and key tenets of grounded theory in the context of researchers’ theoretical assumptions and methodological characteristics, discussed in relation to Laughlin’s (1995) classification schema. Pays particular attention to grounded theory assumptions and methods in relation to other interpretive paradigms such as symbolic interactionism, ethnomethodology and hermeneutics. Describes the basic principles and methods of grounded theory research, and presents potential applications to the accounting and management research arenas. Argues that rigorous grounded theory research can offer the accounting and management literatures unique understandings that provide additional perspectives to those already being offered by major schools of thought, and discusses implications of grounded theory for informing contemporary professional practice.

Theory Building in Qualitative Research and Computer Programs for the Management of Textual Data

Abstract: This article refers to recent debates about the potential methodological costs and benefits of computer use in qualitative research and about the relationship between methodological approaches (eg....

Methodological themes: Back to the drawing board: revisiting grounded theory and the everyday accountant’s and manager’s reality

Abstract: Restates the case for accounting and management research from a grounded theory perspective, and advocates its informed and more frequent application. Examines the intellectual foundations and key tenets of grounded theory in the context of researchers’ theoretical assumptions and methodological characteristics, discussed in relation to Laughlin’s (1995) classification schema. Pays particular attention to grounded theory assumptions and methods in relation to other interpretive paradigms such as symbolic interactionism, ethnomethodology and hermeneutics. Describes the basic principles and methods of grounded theory research, and presents potential applications to the accounting and management research arenas. Argues that rigorous grounded theory research can offer the accounting and management literatures unique understandings that provide additional perspectives to those already being offered by major schools of thought, and discusses implications of grounded theory for informing contemporary professional practice.

Persistence, Connection, and Passion: A Qualitative Study of the Career Development of Highly Achieving African American-Black and White Women.

Abstract: This article describes a qualitative study of the career development of 18 prominent, highly achieving African American-Black and White women in the United States across 8 occupational fields. Grounded theory methodology (B. G. Glaser & A. L. Strauss, 1967; A. L. Strauss & J. Corbin, 1990) was used to generate a theory of the career development of participants that was grounded in their experiences, as related in semistructured, in-depth interviews. The theoretical model generated from the data included 5 major components: (a) a core story consisting of participants' work behaviors and attitudes, which is enacted within (b) sociocultural, (c) personal background, and (d) current contextual conditions and leads to particular career (e) actions and consequences. The emergent model and illustrative quotations from participants are presented, and the implications of the study and the theoretical model for both research and practice are discussed.

A Theory-Building Investigation of the School-to-Work Transition

Abstract: This study sought to enhance an understanding of the school-to-work transition for work-bound high school students. The objective was to identify individual and contextual factors relevant to the school-to-work transition. The authors obtained interview data from a diverse sample of 45 employed young men and women (aged 18-29) who have been in this transition during the past 10 years. Using a grounded theory approach, a coding system was developed with quantitative and qualitative indexes. The authors used job satisfaction and occupational choice congruence as subjective and objective means of capturing an adaptive school-to-work transition. Initial correlational analyses were conducted with quantitatively derived variables to provide a framework for qualitative analyses. Qualitative analyses of participant narratives revealed several individual and contextual factors that characterize the adaptive school-to-work transition. The article concludes with a discussion of the implications of these findings for...

Nurses' and resident physicians' perceptions of the process of collaboration in an MICU

Abstract: Ten intensive care unit nurses and 10 medical resident physicians were interviewed to compare their perceptions of the process of nurse-physician collaboration. The grounded theory method for concept development recommended by Strauss and Corbin (1990) was used. The core of the process of collaboration for both groups was working together. Two major antecedent conditions were found: being available, which included being in the right place, having time, and having appropriate knowledge; and being receptive, which included being interested in collaboration and having respect and trust for the other profession. The major outcomes of working together were described as improving patient care, feeling better in the job, and controlling costs. The findings of the study pull together disparate concepts associated with collaborative practice and provide direction for future research.

Grounded theory method, Part I: Within the five moments of qualitative research.

Abstract: While discussing how the grounded theory method has been situated during the five moments of qualitative research history, a detailed analysis is offered of the differences between the classic mode of the method and Strauss and Corbin's reformulation of the method. Such differences include: philosophical perspectives, paradigm of inquiry, intended product, theoretical underpinnings, procedural steps and claims of rigour. Reasons for Strauss and Corbin's elaboration of the method are suggested, within an historical context.

Theory Building in Qualitative Research and Computer Programs for the Management of Textual Data

Abstract: This article refers to recent debates about the potential methodological costs and benefits of computer use in qualitative research and about the relationship between methodological approaches (eg. 'Grounded Theory') on the one hand and computer-aided methods of qualitative research on the other. It is argued that the connection between certain computer-aided strategies and methodological approaches is far more loose than is often assumed. Furthermore, the danger of methodological biases and distortion arising from the use of certain software packages is overemphasized in current discussions, as far as basic tasks of textual data management ('coding and retrieval') usually performed by this software are concerned. However, with the development of more advanced and complex coding and retrieval techniques, which are regarded by some authors as tools for 'theory building' in qualitative research, methodological confusion may arise if basic prerequisites of qualitative theory building are not taken into consideration. Therefore, certain aspects of qualitative theory building which are relevant for computer aided methods of textual data management are discussed in the paper.

Understanding grounded theory: principles and evaluation.

Abstract: Grounded theory was developed initially by Glaser and Strauss as a means to enable the 'systematic discovery of theory from the data of social research' and was first presented in The Discovery of Grounded Theory'( 1 ). The methodology was developed in response to the overwhelming belief held by positivist thinkers that qualitative research was unscientific because it rejected controlled experiments and appeared to embrace interpretation.

Grounding Visual Sociology Research in Shooting Scripts

Abstract: This essay presents a method for integrating visual representations of social and cultural realities into sociological analysis. It unites strategies of documentary photography with those of grounded theory-based field research and demonstrates the consonant interactionist and interrogatory stance of the visual sociologist. The documentary photographic method of using “shooting scripts” to structure the visual field project is shown to have a complementary relationship to a grounded theory method, and both, together, offer the visual sociologist a structured way of initiating and sustaining photographic field work.

"Becoming a mother'--developing a new theory of early motherhood.

Abstract: This paper explains the methods used in a grounded theory analysis of the experience of 55 first-time mothers in Australia, presented in the first of this series of two papers. The categories identified in the research are realising, readiness, drained, aloneness, loss and working it out, encompassed in the core category becoming a mother. Specifically, this paper extends the analysis and explains the application of a 'paradigm model' and the identification of a Basic Social Process (BSP). The paper links the analysis to the literature on early motherhood from nursing, midwifery, feminist, and sociological research. A substantive theory is proposed to explain women's experience in becoming mothers that demonstrates how, when responsive to the needs of those researched, a grounded theory analysis can provide a framework for nursing and midwifery care.

Time Versus Market Orientation in Product Concept Development: Empirically-Based Theory Generation

Abstract: In collaboration with industry partners, a normative model of the product concept decision process was developed, supported with tools and techniques, and codified as a decision support process for product development teams. This process Concept Engineering was then introduced into a number of product development teams in different companies. A comparative analysis of actual product concept development activities, with and without the use of Concept Engineering, was conducted. All of the observed teams viewed time to market as a critical measure of their success. However, the development processes differed significantly depending on whether relatively more emphasis was placed on time or market considerations. Key variables associated with the product concept development decision process and time-to-market dynamics were identified and a theory of the concept development process was developed using the inductive system diagram technique, a research methodology developed in the course of this work. We believe this work contributes to the operations management literature in three ways. First, it introduces a very detailed, structured decision process for product concept development, enhancing the literature on Quality Function Deployment QFD. Second, it presents a theory of product concept development that can improve understanding of success and failure in product concept development. Third, this work develops new methodology Inductive Systems Diagrams for field work in operations management. This methodology marries the grounded theory methods familiar to sociologists with causal-loop modeling familiar to systems dynamicists, yielding a rigorous tool for systematically collecting, organizing, and distilling large amounts of field-based data.

The nature of social support as experienced by women treated for breast cancer

Abstract: This paper deals with one aspect of a major study, namely the meaning of social support, a concept loosely used in research and by practitioners. Grounded theory was adapted and discourse analysis used to retrospectively analyse data collected for a previous study exploring health visitors' support of patients with breast cancer. Patients' diagrams of their social networks illustrated their perceptions of support and strain. Respondents indicated that they faced six threats to their identities associated with the breast cancer experience and perceived social support to be actions/attitudes from formal or informal sources which maintained or assisted changes to their established identities. Social support maintained identities for many respondents who wanted to 'get back to normal' in their relationships and in their work. Women also needed support to accept identity changes, for example, adapting to an uncertain future. This paper focuses on the effects of informal support on identity. Respondents identified seven main types of informal support from various sources. Larger social networks were more likely to provide the different types of support needed. However, social intimacy of close relationships maintained important aspects of women's identities and were indeed part of their identities. Respondents' social contacts sometimes perceived breast cancer as threatening to their own identities and were consequently unsupportive. Informal support was vital for respondents coping with breast cancer. Nurses should help patients maintain and create their own informal support during illness.

From limbo to legitimacy: a theoretical model of the transition to the primary care nurse practitioner role.

Abstract: The initial transitional year of professional practice is thought to provide the critical foundation on which new professionals build their expertise. The purpose of this study was to describe the experiences of new nurse practitioner graduates during their first year of primary care practice. Thirty-five persons were interviewed alone or in focus groups at approximately 1, 6, and 12 months after graduation. Grounded theory methodology guided the data collection and analysis. A theoretical model was constructed that represents the transition to the primary care nurse practitioner role. This model consists of a process called From Limbo to Legitimacy, which encompasses four major categories: Laying the Foundation, Launching, Meeting the Challenge, and Broadening the Perspective. Each category contains a set of subcategories that detail the multiple aspects of the experience. This model highlights both the distress and the accomplishments of the initial year of advanced practice.

The micropolitical orientation of facilitative school principals and its effects on teachers’ sense of empowerment

Abstract: Describes the everyday micropolitical facilitative strategies and personal characteristics of exemplary school principals who have influenced and enhanced teachers’ sense of empowerment. The data discussed here were drawn from a qualitative study of teachers in 11 schools affiliated with Glickman’s League of Professional Schools in Georgia. An open‐ended questionnaire designed by the researchers, according to general guidelines for grounded theory inquiry, provided teachers with the opportunity to identify and describe in detail characteristics of principals that enhanced their sense of empowerment. Inductive analyses of the data generated a description of facilitative leadership that includes seven major “facilitative” strategies and one set of facilitative personal characteristics that enhanced teacher empowerment. Focuses on the strategies and characteristics teachers identified as facilitative principal leadership. Discusses findings in terms of the relevant empirical and theoretical literature.

Influence of text structure on learning counterintuitive physics concepts

Abstract: The purpose of this study was to explore the influences of text structure on students' conceptual change. Case studies were conducted of three sections of physics (Physical World, Physics, and Honors Physics) for 8 months of an academic year. Qualitative data (including observation field notes, interviews, videotapes, audiotapes, and questionnaires) were analyzed from the perspective of grounded theory by constant comparison through the framework of social constructivism. Results showed that individuals used refutational text to change their alternative conceptions, find support for their scientific preconceptions, gain the language necessary to discuss their ideas, and acquire new concepts. We also found instances, however, when students ignored the text and persisted with their alternative conception, or when students found support for their nonscientific ideas from refutational text. In these cases, we found that either the refutation was not direct enough to be effective, or students' reading strategies were insufficient to facilitate conceptual change. In investigating the power of refutational text, we found that refutational text does cause cognitive conflict. We also discovered that while cognitive conflict may be necessary for conceptual change to occur, it is not sufficient. Although refutational text is effective on the average for groups of students, it will need to be supplemented by discussion for individuals. J Res Sci Teach 34: 701–719, 1997.

Generating grounded theory from qualitative data: the application of inductive methods in tourism and hospitality management research

Abstract: Based on a doctoral experience of using Grounded Theory to research processes of hotel brand internationalisation, this article explains and critically evaluates how researchers can utilise the method to best effect within tourism and hospitality management settings. The fundamental characteristics underlying qualitative research are outlined prior to a fuller explication of the method's essential characteristics and analytical processes. The authors' current approach to the method is then discussed. Finally, issues based upon theoretical sensitivity, theoretical contamination, access limitations and analytic level are appraised and addressed. The paper concludes by arguing the method's relevancy to the field. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Exploring analyst-client communication: using grounded theory techniques to investigate interaction in informal requirements gathering

Abstract: This paper describes a case study in client-analyst interaction during the requirements gathering phase. The focus of this work is a discussion of interactional tactics used by analysts and clients to facilitate shared understanding and agreement and how this may impact on conceptualization of information systems. The paper also describes in detail methodological issues encountered when analysing conversational data and how these issues were resolved by application of grounded theory techniques allied with other qualitative techniques. Finally, the paper gives some suggestions as to how the findings could assist current practice in systems analysis, particularly with regard to how systems analysts might better structure their interactions.