Qualitative Research In Health And Social Care

A qualitative research is the development study of ideas that assist in understanding social phenomena in natural, not experimental, settings, influencing and affirming definitions, expertise and opinions of the participants. (Pope & Mays, 1995)
Aspects of qualitative methods:
• Perceiving context: understanding how social, political, economic, environmental, cultural, and organizational factors affect health.
• Perceiving people: understanding how people think and are aware regarding their health and illness experiences.
• Perceiving interaction: understanding how the different participants engaged in public health activities communicate and interact with each other.
Data collected from a qualitative research are not always converted to numbers.

Both qualitative and quantitative analysis needs labeling and coding of all the data to be able to recognize differences and similarities. Even the responses collected from an unstructured qualitative interview could be copied into the computer to be coded, counted and analyzed. However, the qualitative research has no system for pre-coding, so the method used for identifying and labeling data must be developed in a way that best suits the research, which is called content

Deductive approach: This approach starts by using the research questions to group data and examine similarities and differences. This is done when time and resources are limited and sometimes is applicable when a qualitative research is a smaller component of a bigger quantitative study. A deductive approach is called a ‘top-down” approach as it works from the more general to the more specific: theory, then hypothesis, followed by observation, leading to confirmation.
2. Inductive approach: this approach is used when a qualitative research is a major part of the survey. In this approach, data collected is grouped in a developed framework and then it is investigated for relationships. The inductive approach is called “bottom up” approach as it works contrarily from the deductive approach, moving from particular observations to broader generalizations and theories: first an observation is made, then pattern between data are examined, leading to a tentative hypothesis and a theory.
Deduction strategy starts with a predicted pattern that is analyzed and tested against observations, while induction strategy starts with observations and searches to discover and detect a pattern from them. (Babbie,