Constructing Grounded Theory by Kathy Charmaz

Chapter 1: An invitation to Grounded Theory

The First chapters define Grounded theory, it tries to explain how organic and fluid grounded theory for qualitative analysis, which opens its multiple iterations by different people. This one is one of them which carries the initial ideology as it was built by Galser and Strauss.

Through an example of “Margie Arlen” story it explains how difficult and complicated it becomes to gather qualitative data and analyze it, further compare and create conceptual analysis. Grounded theory gives a path between collecting and analyzing data to construct theories ‘grounded’ in the data itselves. The guideline offers a set of general principles and heuristic devices rather than hard rules.

Grounded theory starts with data. These data are constructed through observations, interactions, and materials that we gather about the topic or setting. Then we begin to separate, sort, and synthesize these data through qualitative coding. Coding means that we attach labels to segments of data that depict what each segment is about. Coding distills data, sorts them, and gives us a handle for making comparisons with other segments of data. By making and coding numerous comparisons, analytic grasp of the data begins to take form. We write preliminary analytic notes called memos about codes and comparisons and any other ideas about data that occur to us. When inevitable questions arise and gaps in our categories appear, we seek data that answer these questions and may fill the gaps. The collected data and the categories become more theoretical because we engage in successive levels of analysis. This work culminates in a ‘grounded theory,’ or an abstract theoretical understanding of the studied experience.

Emergence of Grounded Theory

Historical Context

Barney G. Glaser and Anselm L. Strauss collaborated in (1965, 1967) a study of dying in hospitals, as they constructed their analyses of dying, they developed systematic methodological strategies that social scientists could adopt for studying many other topics and came up with Grounded theory.

Glaser and Strauss’s Challenge

Glaser and Strauss proposed that systematic qualitative analysis had its own logic and could generate theory. They intended to construct abstract theoretical explanations of social processes. They came up with the following defining components that grounded theory should have:

With this they aimed to move qualitative inquiry beyond descriptive studies into the realm of explanatory theoretical frameworks, thereby providing abstract, conceptual understandings of the studied phenomena. This became a powerful argument that legitimized qualitative research as a credible methodological approach in its own right rather than simply as a precursor for developing quantitative instruments.

Merging Divergent DIsciplinary Traditions

Grounded theory marries two contrasting-and competing-traditions in sociology as represented by each of its originators: Columbia University positivism and Chicago school pragmatism and field research. Most grounded theories are substantive theories because they address delimited problems in specific substantive areas. The logic of grounded theory can reach across substantive areas and into the realm of formal theory, which means generating abstract concepts and specifying relationships between them to understand problems in multiple substantive areas.

Developments in Grounded Theory

Glaser remained consistent with his earlier exegesis of the method and thus defined grounded theory as a method of discovery, treated categories as emergent from the data, relied on direct and, often, narrow empiricism, and analyzed a basic social process. Whereas Strauss moved the method toward verification. Strauss with Corbin’s made a version of grounded theory which favors their new technical procedures rather than emphasizing the comparative methods that distinguished earlier grounded theory strategies. Like any container into which different content can be poured, researchers can use basic grounded theory guidelines such as coding, memo-writing, and sampling for theory development, and comparative methods are, in many ways, neutral.

Constructing Grounded Theory

Grounded theory methods can be viewed as a set of principles and practices, not as prescriptions or packages. It emphasizes flexible guidelines, not methodological rules, recipes, and requirements. Grounded theory methods can complement other approaches to qualitative data analysis, rather than stand in opposition to them.

The research process is not always linear. Grounded theorists stop and write whenever ideas occur to them. Some of our best ideas may occur to us late in the process and may lure us back to the field to gain a deeper view. Quite often, we discover that our work suggests pursuing more than one analytic direction. It can be used with a variety of data collection methods. Grounded theory methods should be treated as tools rather than recipes to follow.

Chapter 2: Gathering Rich Data

Most of the time rich data gets beneath the surface of social and subjective life. One must have an inquiring mind, persistence, and innovative data-gathering approaches; it will open a complete new understanding of the whole situation with rich data.

Research begins with finding data. Gathering rich data will give solid material for building a significant analysis. Rich data are detailed, focused, and full. They reveal participants’ views, feelings, intentions, and actions as well as the contexts and structures of their lives. Obtaining rich data means seeking ‘thick’ description, such as writing extensive :fieldnotes of observations, collecting respondents’ written personal accounts, and/ or compiling detailed narratives. The kind of data depends on the research topic and access.

Thinking About Methods

Seeing through Methods

Methods extend and magnify our view of studied life and, thus, broaden and deepen what we learn of it and know about it. Grounded theory methods help in shaping and reshaping data collection and, therefore, refine the collected data. But one must see through the armament of methodological techniques and the reliance on mechanical procedures cause a keen eye, open mind, discerning ear, and steady hand can bring close to what one studies and is more important than developing methodological tools.

Even though methods are merely tools, some tools are more useful than others and they have consequences. So, one must choose methods that help answer research questions with ingenuity and incisiveness of research problems.Blumer’s depiction of sensitizing concepts, begins studies with certain research interests and a set of general concepts. These concepts give ideas to pursue and sensitize you to ask particular kinds of questions about your topic. ‘All is data’ everything one learns in the research setting(s) or about research topic can serve as data. However, data vary in quality. Guided interests, sensitizing concepts, and disciplinary perspectives often provide us with such points of departure for developing, rather than limiting, our ideas. One may happen to face a situation where qualitative data do not illuminate your initial research interests? Pertti Alasuutari (1995) shows how his research team tackled this problem:

“This process, in which we chewed over the main problems of our project and made false starts and rethought it all over again, is hardly an exceptional beginning for a research project. It’s just that researchers rarely report on all of this. However, an early failure to choose the right road does not have to mean you are ultimately trapped in a dead-end … Revise your strategy on the basis of that result and you might be able to move on to another result. In our case the false starts we made and the research ideas we had to discard as unrealistic in view of existing resources led to a better plan and clearer view of how the project should be carried out.”

Grounded theorists evaluate the fit between their initial research interests and their emerging data. We do not force preconceived ideas and theories directly upon our data. Rather, we follow leads that we define in the data, or design another way of collecting data to pursue our initial interests. Thus, started with research interests in time and self-concept but also pursued other topics that my respondents defined as crucial.

Tensions between data collection strategies and what constitutes ‘forcing’ are unresolved in grounded theory. What might stand as a viable means of gathering data to one grounded theorist could be defined as forcing the data into a preconceived framework by another. However, an open-ended interview guide to explore a topic is hardly of the same order as imposing received codes on collected data.

Reaching for Quality

The quality-and credibility-of study starts with the depth and scope of the data which make alot of difference. So one must plan to gather sufficient data to fit to the task and to give a complete picture of the topic as much as possible within the parameters of this task. Skimpy data may give a wonderful start but do not add up to a detailed study or a nuanced grounded theory. Small samples and limited data do not pose problems because grounded theory methods aim to develop conceptual categories and thus data collection is directed to illuminate properties of a category and relations between categories. Their reasoning can help you streamline data collection which is also called ‘smash and grab’ data collection strategy and to superficial analyses.

When can one say that certain data stands as rich and sufficient?Asking following question may help:

  1. Have I collected enough background data about persons, processes, and settings to have ready recall and to understand and portray the full range of contexts of the study?
  2. Have I gained detailed descriptions of a range of participants’ views and actions?
  3. Do the data reveal what lies beneath the surface?
  4. Are the data sufficient to reveal changes over time?
  5. Have I gathered data that enable me to develop analytic categories?
  6. What kinds of comparisons can I make between data? How do these comparisons generate and inform my ideas?

We demonstrate our respect for our interviewee by making concerted efforts to learn about their views and actions and to try to understand their lives from their perspectives. This approach means we must test our assumptions about the worlds we study, not unwittingly reproduce these assumptions. A careful interpretive understanding often marks classic qualitative studies and represents a stunning achievement.

Gathering Grounded Theory

Classic grounded theory emphasizes creating analyses of action and process. The grounded theory approach of simultaneous data collection and analysis which helps us to keep pursuing these emphases as we shape our data collection to inform our emerging analysis. Thouse one must start with the basic question to understand the social context with the questions like:

Although the answers may not be straightforward, reflect on what one is seeing and hearing. Depending on assessment, different questions as the following may help:

From whose point of view is a given process fundamental? From whose view is it marginal?

Definitions of ‘the’ basic social process in the setting differ according to various participants’ positions. They may provide an idealized picture wrapped in public relations rhetoric rather than one reflecting the realities people struggle with?

These problems may arise so one must go through the following process to construct the data:

Grounded Theory in Ethnography

Ethnography means recording the life of a particular group and thus entails sustained participation and observation in their milieu, community, or social world. Ethnographers seek detailed knowledge of the multiple dimensions of life within the studied milieu and aim to understand members’ taken-for-granted assumptions and rules. Research participants allow ethnographers to see their worlds and their actions within them. Quite possibly, an ethnographer may become more involved in the scene than anticipated. The ethnographer tries to master knowing it all. Mountains of unconnected data grow, but they do not say much.

But a grounded theory ethnography gives priority to the studied phenomenon or process-rather than to a description of a setting. Concentrating on a basic social process can help one to gain a more complete picture of the whole setting than the former approach common in basic ethnographic work.

A grounded theory emphasis on comparative method in ethnographic research to compare data with data from the beginning of the research, not after all the data are collected, compare data with emerging categories, and to demonstrate relations between concepts and categories.

This logic aids in overcoming several ethnographic problems like: accusations of uncritically adopting research participants’ views, lengthy unfocused forays into the field setting, superficial, random data collection, and reliance on stock disciplinary categories.

Following a few questions that may help from getting overwhelmed and see better view the events in the research setting.

Grounded theory studies often move around a social setting and look at phenomena from a variety of locations and standpoints. These methods generate a map of the object of study from the outside, but may not enter it.

Intensive interviewing

The Interview Conversion

Intensive interviewing is a directed conversation that permits in-depth exploration of a particular topic or experience, it is a useful method for interpretive inquiry. The in-depth nature of an intensive interview fosters eliciting each participant’s interpretation of his or her experience. Thus, the interviewer’s questions ask the participant to describe and reflect upon his or her experiences in ways that seldom occur in their everyday life. By creating open-ended, non-judgmental questions, encourage unanticipated statements and stories to emerge. But one must have a balance between making the interview open-ended and focusing on significant statements. The structure of an intensive interview may range from a loosely guided exploration of topics to semi-structured focused questions. Unlike ordinary conversation, an interviewer can shift the conversation and follow hunches. Intensive interviews helps the interviewer to:

Negotiation During the interview

An interview is contextual and negotiated. Whether participants recount their concerns without interruption or researchers request specific information, the result is a construction or reconstruction of a reality. Interview stories do not reproduce prior realities. Rather these stories provide accounts from particular points of view that serve specific purposes, including assumptions that one should follow tacit conversational rules during the interview.

During interviews different people demand or react in different way according to their sex, status,their mental social construct, etc. Like powerful people may take charge, turn the interview questions to address topics on their own terms, and control the timing, pacing and length of the interview. Both powerful and disempowered individuals may distrust their interviewers, professionals may recite public relations rhetoric rather than reveal personal views, much less a full account of their experiences, whereas for women, class, age, and/or race and ethnic differences may still influence how the interview proceeds. Nonetheless, women from diverse backgrounds often volunteer to be interviewed for a variety of sensitive topics. The quality of women’s responses may range widely when other people have silenced them about the interview topic. Male participants often prefer to talk with a woman about private experiences but may enjoy teaching a younger male interviewer about their work lives. Similarly, elderly participants might be quite willing to discuss sexuality in late life with a middle-aged or older interviewer but not with a young person.

Fitting Intensive Interviewing with Grounded Theory

Both grounded theory methods and intensive interviewing are open-ended yet directed, shaped yet emergent, and paced yet unrestricted. Grounded theory methods depend upon a similar type of flexibility as in-depth interviewing. In addition to picking up and pursuing themes in interviews, one looks for ideas through studying data and then returns to the field and gathers focused data to answer analytical questions to fill conceptual gaps. Thus, the combination of flexibility and control inherent in in-depth interviewing techniques fit grounded theory strategies for increasing the analytic incisiveness of the resultant analysis. Grounded theory even narrows the range of interview topics to gather specific data for developing theoretical frameworks as proceed with conducting the interviews.

Conducting Interviews

While conducting the interview, choose questions carefully and ask them slowly to foster the participant’s reflections. Interviewers use in-depth interviewing to explore, not to interrogate questions, also reflect on learning about participants’ views, experienced events, and actions. Direct questions to the collective practices first and, later, attend to the individual’s participation in them and views of them. Prefer to keep the interview informal and conversational; however, novices need more structure. Having an interview guide with well-planned open-ended questions and ready probes can increase your confidence and permit you to concentrate on what the person is saying. At worst, lines of questioning can slip into an interrogation. Both defeat the purpose of conducting an intensive interview. Participants sometimes tell painful stories during the interview that they never imagined telling that may or may not pertain to your study. In these case scenarios: First, remember that participants’ comfort level has higher priority than obtaining juicy data. Second, pay close attention as to when to probe. Often, while just listening, particularly when the participant appears to be re-experiencing feelings in the described incident. Third, try to understand the experience from the participant’s view and to validate its significance to this person. Fourth, slant ending questions toward positive responses to bring the interview to closure at a positive level. No interview should end abruptly after an interviewer has asked the most searching questions or when the participant is distressed. The rhythm and pace of the interview should bring the participant back to a normal conversational level before ending. There are different challengesthat an amature interviewer can face like forcing interview data by asking wrong questions or pacing and emphasising questions, one must keep reflexing about the nature of questions and whether they work for specific interviews by not letting our preconceived assumptions and perspective have any effect. Author through her experiences and examples, explains how one should not take a research participant’s language and meaning for granted as it can be beyond one’s understanding but understanding of this gives more texture to the research and dense understanding of the participant’s perspective.

Textual Analysis

Even though all the qualitative analysis deals with textual analysis in some research one can go through to an extent textual data consists of varied data like archival data in which researchers have no hand in shaping. Texts draw on particular discourse and provide accounts that record, explore, justify or foretell actions.

Elicited text

Elicited texts involve research participants in writing the data like subjective questionair, internet survey, etc. Research participants may not wish to share certain personal details like genetic history, work, personal failures, feelings, dreams,etc but might be willing to write about them anonymously.

Extant text

Among extant texts documents like government reports, autobiographies, public records, etc can be included. Extant text may compliment the ethnographic and interview methods. These datas may give initial ideas or evidence for hunches.

Studying texts

Any text must be situated in their context. To put a text in context by providing a description of it’s time, actor, and issues gives a good start. A close study to these texts with questions like by whom? For what and whose purpose? Its assumptions and who benefits from this text can give a better understanding of the text before using it in the research.

Chapter 3: Coding in grounded theory Practice

Coding means naming segments of data with labels that simultaneously categorizes, summarizes, and accounts for each piece of data, it is the first step in making analytical interpretations of the data by defining it. Coding takes the segments of data apart and names them in concise terms, and proposes an analytical handle to develop abstract ideas.

Grounded Theory Coding

Grounded theory consists of two phases: initial and focused coding. During initial coding we study fragments of data and incidents, it involves naming each word sentence or segment, while in focused coding we select what seems to be most useful initial code and test them against extensive data by sorting, synthesizing, integrating ,and organizing large amounts of related data. Throughout the process one compares data with data and data with codes.Unlike qualitative coding logic of grounded theory does not apply preconceived categories or codes to the data rather code emerges from the data and defines meaning within itself. Coding inspires us to examine hidden assumptions in one’s use of language as well as that of our participants.

Initial Coding

Initial coding should stick closely to the data and should be coded with words that reflect action. This method of coding curbs our tendencies to make conceptual leaps and to adopt extant theories before we have done the necessary analytic work. Speed and spontaneity help in initial coding to remain open to what material suggests and stay close to it. Codes should be short, simple, active and analytic.

Word-by-Word Coding

Word-by-word analysis forces one to attend to images and meanings. We may attend to the structure and flow of words, and how both affect the sense we make of them, as well as their specific content.

Line-by-Line Coding

Line-by-line coding means naming each line of your written data line-by-line, coding works particularly well with detailed data about fundamental empirical problems or processes whether these data consist of interviews, observations, documents, or ethnographies and autobiographies. Detailed observations of people, actions, and settings that reveal visibly telling and consequential scenes and actions lend themselves to line-by-line coding. Initial codes often range widely across a variety of topics which helps to separate data into categories and to see processes. Line-by-line coding frees one from becoming so immersed in respondents’ worldviews that accept them without question. Through coding each line of data, we one can gain insights about what kinds of data to collect next.

Coding Incident to Incident

In this one compare incident with incident, then as ideas take hold, compare incidents to conceptualization of incidents coded earlier. That way we identify properties of emerging concepts.

Detailed observations alone do not guarantee creating any insightful theoretical analysis although they may generate excellent description. The mode of analysis matters. Comparative methods help one to see and make sense of observations in new, analytic ways. Breaking through the ordinariness of routine events takes effort to gain analytic insights from observations of routine actions in ordinary settings, first compare and code similar events. Then define subtle patterns and significant processes. Later, comparing dissimilar events which may give further insights.

Using Comparative Methods

To establish analytic distinction one can use ‘constant comparative methods’ in which we can make comparisons at each level of analytic work. Our task is to make analytic sense of the material, which may be taken-for-granted understanding. Rather than seeing once perspectives as truth, try to see them as representing one view among many. There are multiple advantages of initial coding as it forces one to think about the material in new ways that may differ from research participants’ interpretations. Our analytic eye and disciplinary background lead us to look at their statements and actions in ways that may not have occurred to them but by studying the data, we may make fundamental processes explicit and render hidden assumptions visible.

In Vivo Codes

Grounded theorists generally refer to codes of participants’ special terms as ‘in vivo codes’. One must pay attention to language while coding. In vivo codes serve as symbolic markers of participants’ speech and meanings. Some in vivo codes simultaneously reflect condensed meanings of a general term and reveal an individual’s fresh perspective. These codes reflect assumptions, actions, and imperatives that frame action and studying these codes, allows us to develop a deeper understanding of what is happening and what it means.

Focused Coding

Focused coding means using most significant and/or frequent initial codes to sift through large amounts of data. It requires decisions about which initial codes make the most analytic sense to categorize data incisively and completely. Through focused coding, one can move across interviews and observations and compare people’s experiences, actions, and interpretations.

Axial Coding

Strauss and Corbin present a third type of coding, axial coding, to relate categories to subcategories. Axial coding specifies the properties and dimensions of a category and related categories to subcategories. It specifies the properties and dimensions of a category, and reassembles the data which have been fractured during initial coding to give coherence to the emerging analysis. At best, axial coding helps to clarify and to extend the analytic power of emerging ideas. At worst, it casts a technological overlay on the data-and perhaps on final analysis.

Reducing Problems in Coding

Author after explaining the concept of coding goes on to elaborate pitfalls of coding:

Chapter 4: Memo-writing

Memo-writing is the pivotal, intermediate step between data collection and writing drafts of papers. Memo-writing constitutes a crucial method in grounded theory as it prompts to analyze data and codes early in the research process. Putting things down on paper makes the work concrete and manageable-and exciting. Start by developing your focused codes.

Methods of Memo-writing

Memos rely on making them spontaneous, non-mechanical. These memos can be in informal, unofficial language for personal use. Memos spur to develop ideas in narrative form and fullness early in the analytic process. Memos will help to clarify and direct subsequent coding. Writing memos also prompts to elaborate processes, assumptions, and actions covered by your codes or categories. As grounded theorists look for patterns, even when focusing on a single case because it invokes respondents’ stories to illustrate points-rather than provide complete portrayals of their lives or even a full narrative of an experience. And bringing raw data right into the memo, preserve telling evidence, analytic ideas from the start. Providing ample verbatim material ‘grounds’ to abstract analysis and lays a foundation for making claims about it. Begin memo by tilting it. That’s easy because your codes give you titles to analyse look for the underlying and usually-unstated assumptions embedded in the category. Identify what you’re talking about - title your memo as specifically as possible. If you may sense that the words you choose do not quite capture the meaning. Flag them. Think about them. Refine them later. Write now! Try to show how and when the category develops and changes and why and for whom it has relevance in the field setting. Codes that subsume condensed meanings gives analytic mileage and carry conceptual weight at a loss about what to write, elaborate on most frequent codes. Keep collecting data, keep coding, and keep refining ideas through writing more and further developed memos. Much of memo-writing should be concerned with making comparisons.

Adopting Writers’ Strategies: Prewriting Exercises

Delving into memo-writing can be liberating and, it’s freedom poses a disquieting leap of faith and practice. Memo-writing demands to tolerate ambiguity. Prewriting exercises consist of strategies that writers use; they are not part of the methods associated with grounded theory. however, help you delve into writing grounded theory memos.

Clustering

Clustering is a shorthand prewriting technique which is a non-linear, visual, and flexible technique to understand and organize material. While clustering one gain control because it helps create an image of the piece before delving into writing about it.

Clustering process

Freewriting

Freewriting means putting pen to paper or fingers to keyboard and writing for eight minutes to begin, longer with practice. compose fresh material, unlearn past immobilizing habits, and write in a natural voice.

Freewriting process

While freewriting accepts anything that comes to mind. Once you are comfortable with freewriting, try a focused freewriting that addresses your data and categories. Focused free writes can keep you from becoming immobilized and may serve as a direct precursor to memo-writing.

Using Memos to Raise Focused Codes to Conceptual Categories

Categories explicate ideas, events, or processes in data. A category may subsume common themes and patterns in several codes. We must aim to make categories as conceptual as possible-with abstract power, general reach, analytic direction, and precise wording. As we raise a code to a category, we begin to write narrative statements in memos that define the category, explicate its properties and specify its conditions under which the category arises, is maintained, and changes. We can also describe its consequences and show how this category relates to other categories.

Chapter 5: Theoretical Sampling, Saturation, and Sorting

Theoretical sampling means elaborate and refined seeking of pertinent data to develop your emerging theory. One can conduct theoretical sampling by sampling to develop the properties of category(ies) until no new properties emerge.

Theoretical Sampling

Initial sampling provides a point of departure, not of theoretical elaboration and refinement. For initial sampling you establish sampling criteria for people, cases, situations, and! or settings before you enter the field. The purpose of theoretical sampling is to obtain data to help in explicating categories. When categories are full, they reflect qualities of respondents’ experiences and provide a useful analytic handle for understanding them(It is not about representing a population or increasing the statistical generalizability of results).

The Logic of Theoretical Sampling

Theoretical sampling involves starting with data, constructing tentative ideas about the data, and then examining these ideas through further empirical inquiry. Memo-writing leads directly to theoretical sampling. Theoretical sampling is strategic, specific, and systematic because we intend to use it to elaborate and refine our theoretical categories. Theoretical sampling is emergent. It follows constructing tentative categories and gives our work analytic depth and precision. Thus, engaging in theoretical sampling can encourage us to raise our theory to a forinal, more abstract level that cuts across different substantive areas.

Using Theoretical Sampling

Theoretical sampling is a strategy to narrow our focus on emerging categories and as a technique to develop and refine them it helps to check, qualify, and elaborate the boundaries of your categories and to specify the relations among categories. Conduct theoretical sampling after you have already defined and tentatively conceptualized relevant ideas that indicate areas to probe with more data.

Saturating Theoretical Categories

Categories are ‘saturated’ when gathering fresh data no longer sparks new theoretical insights, nor reveals new properties of your core theoretical categories(many qualitative researchers often confuse saturation with repetition of described events, actions, and/or statements).

Theoretical Sorting, Diagramming, and Integrating

Sorting, diagramming, and integrating your memos are inter-related processes. grounded theorists use these strategies in service of the theoretical development of their analysis.

Theoretical Sorting

In Grounded theory sorting gives a means of creating and refining theoretical links. Through sorting, one can work on the theoretical integration of categories. Thus, sorting prompts to compare categories at an abstract level.

One go about sorting, comparing, and integrating memos as follows:

Diagramming

The advantage of diagrams is that they provide a visual representation of categories and their relationships. Diagrams can enable us to see the relative power, scope, and direction of the categories in analysis as well as the connections among them. We might develop a conceptual map that locates our concepts and directs movement between them.

Integrating Memos

Ordering for process is one obvious solution to integrate the piece, but analytic categories may have a subtle one that will make sense to your readers sso one must integrate memos to improve reader’s understanding.

Chapter 6: Reconstructing Theory in Grounded Theory Studies

Throughout this chapter, the author takes a step back and questions What stands as ‘theory’ in grounded theory? How do researchers make their grounded theory analyses theoretical; Which directions do grounded theories typically take? andtries to draw firm lines between positivist and interpretive inquiry, constructivist and objectivist grounded theory, and the subsequent distinctions and directions they suggest.

What Is Theory?

Positivist Definitions of Theory

Positivists view their theoretical concepts as variables and construct operational definitions of their concepts for hypothesis testing through accurate, replicable empirical measurement. Their theory seeks causes, favors deterministic explanations, and emphasizes generality and universality. Results of this theory can result in narrow, reductionist explanations with simplistic models of action.

Interpretive Definitions of Theory

Theory emphasizes understanding rather than explanation. Interpretive theories allow for indeterminacy rather than seek causality and give priority to showing patterns and connections rather than to linear reasoning. Interpretive theory calls for the imaginative understanding of the studied phenomenon. This type of theory assumes emergent, multiple realities; indeterminacy; facts and values as linked; truth as provisional; and social life as processual.

The Rhetoric, Reach, and Practice of Theorizing

When we consider either positivist or interpretive theory, we need to think of its theoretical reach and power within, beyond, and between disciplines. A theory can alter our viewpoint and change our consciousness. Through it, we can see the world from a different vantage point and create new meanings of it. Theories have an internal logic and more or less coalesce into coherent forms. Theorizing is a practice it entails the practical activity of engaging the world and of constructing abstract understandings about and within it. The fundamental contribution of grounded theory methods resides in offering a guide to interpretive theoretical practice not in providing a blueprint for theoretical products. Interpretive theorizing can infuse network analysis with the tools to bring meanings into view.

Constructivist and Objectivist Grounded Theory

Constructivist grounded theory is part of the interpretive tradition and objectivist grounded theory derives from positivism. However, whether you judge a specific study to be constructivist or objectivist depends on the extent to which its key characteristics conform to one tradition or the other.

Constructivist Grounded Theory

A constructivist approach places priority on the phenomena of study and sees both data and analysis as created from shared experiences and relationships with participants and other sources of data The logical extension of the constructivist approach means learning how, when, and to what extent the studied experience is embedded in larger and, often, hidden positions, networks, situations, and relationships. Constructivist grounded theories assume that both data and analyses are social constructions that reflect what their production entailed.

Objectivist Grounded Theory

An objectivist approach to grounded theory contrasts with the constructivist approach. Objectivist grounded theory resides in the positivist tradition and thus attends to data as real in and of themselves and does not attend to the processes of their production. It assumes that data represents objective facts about a knowable world with belief that careful application of methods produces theoretical understanding. Hence their role becomes more of a conduit for the research process rather than a creator of it. Objectivist grounded theorists remain separate and distant from research participants and their realities, although they may adopt observational methods.

Developing Theoretical Sensitivity through Theorizing

The acts involved in theorizing foster seeing possibilities, establishing connections, and asking questions. Grounded theory methods give theoretical openings that avoid importing and imposing packaged images and automatic answers. We reach down to; fundamentals, up to abstractions, and probe into experience. The content of theorizing cuts to the core of studied life and poses new questions about it. Studying a process fosters your efforts to construct theory because you define and conceptualize relationships between experiences and events. Then it helps to define the major phases and concentrate on the relationships between them.

Chapter 7: Writing the Draft

A grounded theory journey extends through the process of writing. Writing manuscript presents opportunities for drafting new discoveries with each revision and making a mark in one’s field with grace and style.Grounded theories dig deep into the empirical and build analytic structures that reach up to the hypothetical. Thus, straightforward categories about ordinary experiences shine with bright meanings-through our analytic renderings.

Regarding Writing

Making Your Mark

Authors invoke several strategies to claim originality in writing as they provide an analysis in a new area, an original treatise in an established or fading area, or/and an extension of current ideas. As a field develops, however, the areas narrow in which scholars can claim originality.

Drafting Discoveries

The discovery process in grounded theory extends into the writing and rewriting stages. Through rewriting one can see clearer connections between categories and draw implications from them. Thus writing and rewriting become crucial phases of the analytic process which bring out implicit arguments, provide their context, make links with extant literatures, critically examine categories, present our analysis, and provide data that support our analytic arguments. One must let ideas emerge before making decisions about what to do with the manuscript. Whether one intends to write a grounded theory class report or book, draft it first. Decide what to do with the manuscript and how to do it after having a solid analytic draft. While reassessing manuscript later, we may discover that it could serve a lofty goal. With revision, a thesis chapter might work as a journal submission. A dissertation could be rewritten to fit a particular series for a publishing house. Required formats often presuppose a traditional logico-deductive organization. Thus, we need to adapt the format rather than pour our work into standard categories. Rethink and adapt a prescribed format in ways that work for your ideas rather than compromise your analysis.

Revising Early Drafts

One must understand that writing qualitative research is an ambiguous process. Writing our analysis entails more than mere reporting. We may not realize what we’ve got or know where we’re going. At this stage, but we must learn to tolerate ambiguity and keep moving in the process. Learn to trust in the grounded theory analytic process as rewards will be discovered at the end.

Pulling the Pieces Together

Carefully sorted and selected memos give compelling content for presentation. How you present the material matters. In an oral presentation, we can impart significance through the rhythm and pacing of speech, emotional nuances and enthusiasm, body language, and eye contact with the audience. But in written paper, the powerful ideas, subtle meanings, and graceful transitions, so apparent in our talk, all disappear. Order your memos according to the logic of your sorting and the most telling diagram or clustering that you made. Study them. Then put your memos together in a first draft that integrates them and demonstrates the relations between them. As we work with the material, try to make the analysis more abstract. Look at your theory and keep things in mind like how have I increased understanding of the studied phenomenon? With which theoretical, substantive, or practical problems is this analysis most closely aligned? Which audiences might be most interested in it? Where shall I go with it? Then start writing an introduction and conclusion that takes these problems into account. These sections will be rough. Just keep refining them. We can-and should-rework each section multiple times. By reworking the draft several times, we catch vague statements and confusing sentences, and moreover craft a tight, convincing statement. We may have generated an absorbing grounded theory analysis, but it may not contain an explicit purpose or argument. Involved researchers often assume that their purposes are obvious and their arguments are clear. To make a contribution, one needs to position analysis for a specific purpose that drives argument for manuscript. We all make mistakes about the purpose and argument when immersed in our work. Just be aware that confusing an initial purpose for a contribution and assuming argument speaks for itself, are standard pitfalls.

Constructing Arguments

We convince researchers that we have solid data and sound analyses. A strong argument persuades the reader to accept the writer’s viewpoint. Writers must address the ‘So what?’ question. A strong argument answers the ‘So what?’ question because you explicitly claim why your grounded theory makes a significant contribution. Nonetheless, answering this question can lead to quandaries because arguments can be elusive-or stale. That means finding your argument and making it original and meaningful. Our actual argument likely differs from what we originally set out to do and that’s fine. That indicates that we’ve grown. An initial purpose brings us into the study but seldom suffices for an argument for a finished manuscript. So we should go ahead and revise and reorganize our draft around it and build our argument into each section, point by point, step by step. Realizing our argument will emerge and develop as our thinking progresses. Writing short successive memos about our emerging argument can help us to focus it. Some researchers benefit from talking out loud about their ideas at this point. In initial stages one can frame arguments like

An argument is a product of grappling with the material. It can be created from points embedded in our analysis. At this stage talking with other people is riskier than talking to yourself in writing. If you must talk with other people, then explain the logic of your analysis to them, and bring a tape recorder. We might capture the essence of an argument and its ordering during the conversation that we had not stated or left implicit in your manuscript. Outlining our paper for the main point in each paragraph can help us identify a nascent argument. To substantiate our argument, provide vivid description, examples, evidence that shows the point, rather than tells the reader what it is. Consider providing a balance of analytic statements anchored in concrete empirical instances. To keep analysis at the forefront, write for audience and professional standards after having established arguments and garnered evidence. Write in successive drafts. With each draft, adopt simpler, more direct words and tighter phrasing and logic.

Scrutinizing Categories

Inspect categories again to see how they shape manuscript. Scrutinize these categories for their power, purpose, and pattern. Then one can clean them up and make them clear and crisp. Compelling categories give us a fresh handle on our material. Be judicious in use of categories; don’t abuse them or your readers. One grounded theory pitfall is overloading work with clumsy jargon. Grounded theory methods prompt making connections within and between categories as an inherent part of the analytic process. Ask yourself: what purpose do they serve here? If you do not need them for this analysis, argument, or audience, drop them. As we shift from analytical writing to communicating with an audience, what we need to do for ourselves as writers and analysts differs from what we need to write for our audience. Use your major categories for headings of sections. Grounded theory gives a decided advantage when developing a completed report. Our categories ground readers in your topic and direct them through your analysis. They foreshadow the content and emphasize the logic of the piece.

Returning to the Library: Literature Reviews and Theoretical Frameworks

The literature review and theoretical frameworks are ideological sites in which we claim, locate, evaluate, and defend our position. So we must show why we favor certain arguments, what evidence we accept and reject, and how we arrived at considered decisions. And ask questions like What do we need to take into account? How do you go about it? If we plan to submit our grounded theory for publication, we must first take note of where related studies appear and next take a careful look at these journals and publishers, their editorial policies can help judge each editor’s potential interest in our study. Draft literature review and theoretical framework in relation to grounded theory. We can use it to direct how we critique earlier studies and theories and to make comparisons with these materials. The constant comparative method in grounded theory does not end with completion of data analysis. The literature review and theoretical framework can serve as valuable sources of comparison and analysis. Through comparing other scholars’ evidence and ideas with our grounded theory, we may show where and how their ideas illuminate our theoretical categories and how our theory extends, transcends, or challenges dominant ideas in our field.

Rendering through Writing

Writing reflects the choices authors make. Grounded theorists’ writing style typically relies on conventional reporting. Researchers record their grounded theories and recount ‘facts’ to support them. Simple language and straightforward ideas make theory readable. Again, the extent to which one uses these devices depends on our writing task and audience. A theory becomes more accessible but less identifiable as theory when woven into the narrative. Unexpected definitions and assertions can catch readers’ attention. So we should try to balance the logic of exposition with the logic of the theorized experience. Writers use linear logic to organize their analyses and to make experience understandable. Yet experience is neither necessarily linear, nor always conveniently demarcated with clear boundaries Consider the pacing and tone of the piece. Think about how and when one should alter them. Set the tone as you lead the reader into the topic. Provide evidence that fits your tone as well as your point.

Chapter 8: Reflecting on the Research Process

Author ends our journey by looking back on the steps we have taken and by looking forward to assessing the impact that grounded theory can make. This chapter ends our journey through the grounded theory research process. Along the way, we have gathered data, stopped, and categorized them through coding. Subsequently we cut new analytic paths through memo-writing. We widened our route by conducting theoretical sampling, and specified directions for our grounded theorizing through sorting and integrating our categories. Last, we explored ways of imparting what we have learned through writing.

Evaluating Grounded Theory

At the end we evaluate how our process might look to us and to our readers, as we portray that makes sense to us because we have been immersed in the process. For our audiences, however, lines become blurred between process and product Other scholars will likely judge the grounded theory process as an integral part of the product itself.

The author ends the book with the leaving note and hopes that grounded theory enhances our possibility to transform our knowledge and we do research that goes beyond our academic requirement and professional credits.