FORMULATIONS OF THE MAIN GOAL IN LIFE: A QUALITATIVE CONTENT ANALYSIS

Humanistic tradition emphasizes the main goal in life as something towards which people determine themselves. The main goal (or a group of goals with the highest priority) provides the basis for the sense of purpose in life and for development of its meaning. This study aimed at revealing categories in formulations of the main goal in life. Participants were 226 adults aged from 18 to 69 (M = 25.34, SD = 8.51, 65% females). They answered an open question: “Kā Jūs raksturotu galveno dzīves mērķi? Lūdzu, padalieties ar savām pārdomām. [How could You describe the main goal in life? Please, share your opinion.]” The qualitative content analysis resulted in 29 categories. Inter-rater agreement among three raters was acceptable and varied from .72 to 1.00 (the mean Krippendorff’s alpha was .88). Work, Family, and Satisfaction were the most frequently selected categories for a formulation of the main goal, while Love, Leisure, and Transcendent Issues were the less selected ones. An additional step of thematic analysis demonstrated that categories can be joined in four overarching themes: Vague Formulations, Self, Others, and Desired States.

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Reasons to stop drinking alcohol among patients with rheumatoid arthritis in Sweden: a mixed-methods study

BMJ Open ◽

10.1136/bmjopen-2018-024367 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 8 (12) ◽

pp. e024367 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Ingrid Larsson ◽

Maria L E Andersson

Keyword(s):

Rheumatoid Arthritis ◽

Content Analysis ◽

Mixed Methods ◽

Qualitative Content Analysis ◽

Well Being ◽

Work And Family ◽

Drinking Alcohol ◽

Cross Sectional Survey ◽

Cross Sectional ◽

Open Question

ObjectivesThe aims were to identify patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) who had stopped drinking alcohol and compare them with patients drinking alcohol, and to explore reasons for stopping drinking alcohol.DesignA sequential explanatory mixed methods design was used.SettingSix rheumatology clinics in Southern Sweden Better Anti-Rheumatic FarmacOTherapy cohort.ParticipantsA total of 1509 patients completed the questions about alcohol and were included in the study. 86 of these had stopped drinking alcohol and 72 responded to the open question and their answers were analysed with qualitative content analysis.Outcome measuresThe quantitative data were from a cross-sectional survey assessing disease severity, physical function (Health Assessment Questionnaire, HAQ) and health-related quality of life (EuroQol five dimensions, EQ5D), pain, fatigue, patient global assessment (PatGA) and lifestyle factors, for example, alcohol. The questions assessing alcohol included an open question ‘Why have you stopped drinking alcohol?’ResultsThe patients who stopped drinking alcohol were older (median (min-max) 69 (36–90) vs 66 (23–95), p=0.011), had worse HAQ (1.00 (0–2.75) vs 0.50 (0–3.00), p<0.001), worse EQ5D (0.69 (−0.02–1.00) vs 0.76 (−0.58–1.00), p<0.001) worse PatGA (5 (0–10) vs 3 (0–10), p<0.001), more pain (5 (0–10) vs 3 (0–10), p<0.001) and more fatigue (6 (0–10) vs 4 (0–10), p<0.001 compared with patients drinking alcohol. The qualitative content analysis revealed five categories describing reasons for patients with RA to stop drinking alcohol: illness and treatment; health and well-being; work and family; faith and belief; and dependences and abuse.ConclusionsThe patients who had stopped drinking had worse physical functioning and higher levels in pain-related variables. Most stopped drinking due to their illness or a desire to improve health.

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Iterative Thematic Inquiry: A New Method for Analyzing Qualitative Data

International Journal of Qualitative Methods ◽

10.1177/1609406920955118 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 19 ◽

pp. 160940692095511

Author(s):

David L. Morgan ◽

Andreea Nica

Keyword(s):

Qualitative Research ◽

Content Analysis ◽

Data Analysis ◽

Thematic Analysis ◽

Theoretical Basis ◽

Qualitative Data ◽

Qualitative Content Analysis ◽

New Method ◽

Data Collection And Analysis ◽

Primary Procedure

Because themes play such a central role in the presentation of qualitative research results, we propose a new method, Iterative Thematic Inquiry (ITI), that is guided by the development of themes. We begin by describing how ITI uses pragmatism as a theoretical basis for linking beliefs, in the form of preconceptions, to actions, in the form of data collection and analysis. Next, we present the four basic phases that ITI relies on: assessing beliefs; building new beliefs through encounters with data; listing tentative themes; and, evaluating themes through coding. We also review several notable differences between ITI and existing methods for qualitative data analysis, such as thematic analysis, grounded theory, and qualitative content analysis. The use of ITI is then illustrated through its application in a study of exiters from fundamentalist religions. Overall, the two most notable features of ITI are that it begins the development of themes as early as possible, through an assessment of initial preconceptions, and that it relies on writing rather than coding, by using a continual revision of tentative results as the primary procedure for generating a final set of themes.

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Thematic Analysis

Research Methods in the Social Sciences: An A-Z of key concepts ◽

10.1093/hepl/9780198850298.003.0066 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 283-288

Author(s):

Jean-Frédéric Morin ◽

Christian Olsson ◽

Ece Özlem Atikcan

Keyword(s):

Social Sciences ◽

Content Analysis ◽

Thematic Analysis ◽

Qualitative Data ◽

Qualitative Content Analysis ◽

Analytic Method ◽

The Social ◽

Distinct Method

This chapter evaluates thematic analysis (TA), which is one of the oldest and most widely used qualitative analytic method across the social sciences. TA is a flexible method for identifying and analysing patterns of meaning — ‘themes’ — in qualitative data, with wide-ranging applications. The method has a long, if indeterminate, history in the social sciences, but seems likely to have evolved from early forms of (qualitative) content analysis. TA is now more likely to be demarcated and acknowledged as a distinct method; however, confusion remains about what TA is. The popularity of TA as a distinct method received a considerable boost from the publication of Using Thematic Analysis in Psychology by social psychologists Virginia Braun and Victoria Clarke in 2006, which has become one of the most cited academic papers of recent decades.

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Qualitative content analysis of the New Zealand troopship publications 1914-1920

10.26686/wgtn.17005531 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

◽

Peter Hoar

Keyword(s):

Content Analysis ◽

National Identity ◽

New Zealand ◽

Thematic Analysis ◽

Historical Perspective ◽

Qualitative Content Analysis ◽

Race And Gender ◽

Official Discourse ◽

Life Attitudes ◽

And Gender

<p>This study is a qualitative content analysis of the magazines and newspapers produced on New Zealand troopships between 1914 and 1920. It begins with an account of the troopships, the printing of the magazines and the individuals involved. The bulk of the study is concerned with a thematic analysis of the troopship publications from a cultural historical perspective. These themes are; troopship life, army life, attitudes to war, national identity, race and gender. The content analysis and interpretation considers the magazines as media products of a particular social group and examines the ways in which this group represented itself. The roles of official discourse, propaganda and resistance in the troopship publications are analysed and the interactions between these and the functions of the publications are explicated. The conclusion assesses the publications' position in the context of discussions of cultural rupture and continuity and finds that they emphasise the latter.</p>

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