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Cited by 463

The DOI matches its Crossref record; 10 of the 10 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.

Focus Groups in Health Research: Exploring the Meanings of Health and Illness

Open access
Wilkinson, Sue·1998·Journal of Health Psychology

Abstract

Focus group method is becoming increasingly popular among qualitative researchers. After introducing focus group method and briefly overviewing its use in health research, this article shows that the distinctive (and under-used) feature of focus group method is its generation of interactive data. Illustrating my argument with examples from health- related focus group research (including my own data on breast cancer), I argue that this feature makes focus groups an ideal method for gaining access to research participants' own meanings. Interactive data result in enhanced disclosure, improved access to participants' own language and concepts, better understanding of participants' own agendas, the production of more elaborated accounts, and the opportunity to observe the co-construction of meaning in action. Focus groups are, then, an ideal method for exploring people's own meanings and understandings of health and illness.

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Metadata

Authors
Wilkinson, S.
Venue
Journal of Health Psychology
Published
1998-07
Volume
3
Issue
3
Pages
329-348
ISSN
  • 1359-1053 (ISSN-L)
  • 1461-7277
OpenAlex
W2120660436
Cited by
463
References
10
FWCI
37.34
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
bronze

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CoChat. (2026). Citation check: Focus Groups in Health Research: Exploring the Meanings of Health and Illness. https://app.cochat.ai/papers/10.1177/135910539800300304
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Wilkinson, S. (1998). Focus Groups in Health Research: Exploring the Meanings of Health and Illness. Journal of Health Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1177/135910539800300304

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Contains information from the Semantic Scholar Academic Graph Datasets, made available under the ODC Attribution License (ODC-BY 1.0).

Semantic Scholar’s data is described in: Kinney, R., et al. (2023). The Semantic Scholar Open Data Platform. arXiv:2301.10140.