The DOI matches its Crossref record; 36 of the 37 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Applying Thematic Analysis to Education: A Hybrid Approach to Interpreting Data in Practitioner Research
Open accessAbstract
Thematic analysis (TA), as a qualitative analytic method, is widely used in health care, psychology, and beyond. However, scant details are often given to demonstrate the process of data analysis, especially in the field of education. This article describes how a hybrid approach of TA was applied to interpret multiple data sources in a practitioner inquiry. Particular attention is given to the inductive and deductive coding and theme development process of TA. Underpinned by the constructivist epistemology, codes were driven by both data per se and theories, through a “bottom-up” and “top-down” approach to identify themes. A detailed example of six steps of data analysis is presented, which evidences the systematic analysis of raw data from observation and research journals, students’ focus groups, and a classroom teacher’s semistructured interviews. This example demonstrates how classroom practice was unpacked and how insiders’ insights were interpreted through the theoretical lens while also allowing the participants to express themselves. By providing step-by-step guidelines in data coding and identification of themes, this article contributes to informing qualitative researchers, especially teacher-researchers who undertake their research in the classroom setting.
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Cites
Using thematic analysis in psychology
Braun, V., & Clarke, V. (2006) · Qualitative Research in Psychology · doi:10.1191/1478088706qp063oa · Cited by 194,414
Lincoln, Y. S., Guba, E. G., & Pilotta, J. J. (1985) · International Journal of Intercultural Relations · doi:10.1016/0147-1767(85)90062-8 · Cited by 45,787
How Many Interviews Are Enough?: An Experiment with Data Saturation and Variability
Guest, G., Bunce, A., & Johnson, L. (2006) · Field Methods · doi:10.1177/1525822x05279903 · Cited by 20,808 · cited 3×
“Based upon a set of codes, definitions, examples, and “when to use” and “when not to used” sections, a codebook can be developed as a guide to help analyze data (Guest et al., 2006).”
BackgroundInfluentialReflecting on reflexive thematic analysis
Braun, V., & Clarke, V. (2019) · Qualitative Research in Sport, Exercise and Health · doi:10.1080/2159676x.2019.1628806 · Cited by 19,677 · cited 5×
“In “Using Thematic Analysis in Psychology,” Braun and Clarke (2006) delineate a straightforward, step-bystep approach to conducting TA and now is referred to as reflexive TA (Braun & Clarke, 2019).”
BackgroundMethodInfluentialResearch Design: Qualitative, Quantitative, and Mixed Methods Approaches
Sloane-Seale, A. (2009) · Canadian Journal of University Continuing Education · doi:10.21225/d54s3d · Cited by 14,328
S., N. L. (2017) · doi:10.1177/1609406917733847 · Cited by 14,051 · cited 1×
“…made to detail a step-by-step guide to apply TA to practice in psychology, nursing, and sport and exercise research (Braun & Clarke, 2006; Braun et al., 2019; Braun et al., 2017; Clarke & Braun, 2014; Fereday & Muir-Cochrane, 2006; Nowell et al., 2017), there is a paucity of description…”
Method(1998) · Cited by 13,501
Fereday, J., & Muir-Cochrane, E. (2006) · International Journal of Qualitative Methods · doi:10.1177/160940690600500107 · Cited by 11,829 · cited 4×
“In addition to detailing the steps of conducting TA as other practical examples have undertaken (Braun & Clarke, 2006; Fereday & Muir-Cochrane, 2006; Nowell et al., 2017), this article has its strength in outlining multiple data collection tools and their associated analytical processes.”
BackgroundMethodInfluential(2017) · Cited by 9,643
Content analysis and thematic analysis: Implications for conducting a qualitative descriptive study
Vaismoradi, M., Turunen, H., & Bondas, T. (2013) · Nursing & Health Sciences · doi:10.1111/nhs.12048 · Cited by 8,327 · cited 5×
“It seems confusing for researchers to distinguish and choose between TA and content analysis, considering many similarities between the approaches and the least thoughtful discussion in the literature (Vaismoradi et al., 2013).”
BackgroundInfluential
Research works printed but not linked: 4
- Fair Go Team, 2006, School is for me: Pathways to student engagement
- New South Wales Department of Education and Training, 2003, Quality teaching in NSW public schools
- Roberts K., 2019, BMC Medical Research Methodology, 19, 1
- Saldana J., 2016, The coding manual for qualitative researchers
Cited by
Sorted by citations
A Step-by-Step Process of Thematic Analysis to Develop a Conceptual Model in Qualitative Research
Naeem, M., Ozuem, W., Howell, K., & Ranfagni, S. (2023) · International Journal of Qualitative Methods · doi:10.1177/16094069231205789 · Cited by 2,243
“It involves the identi fi cation and reporting of patterns in a data set, which are then interpreted for their inherent meaning (Braun & Clarke, 2006; Liebenberg et al., 2020; Xu & Zammit, 2020); these patterns can be found on the basis of understanding the meaning of keywords used by participants.”
BackgroundXie, X., Liu, X., & McNay, I. (2023) · Humanities and Social Sciences Communications · doi:10.1057/s41599-022-01483-z · Cited by 393
“To be specific, we followed several stages (Xu and Zammit, 2020) to analyse the primary and secondary data.”
MethodUser Experience Design Professionals’ Perceptions of Generative Artificial Intelligence
Li, J., Cao, H., Lin, L., Hou, Y., Zhu, R., & Ali, A. E. (2024) · CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems · doi:10.1145/3613904.3642114 · Cited by 249
“We analyzed the data following a deductive/inductive hybrid thematic analysis approach [29, 101]: First, the transcripts were coded by five researchers using a deductive coding approach, where each researcher identified topics in the transcripts independently according to four categories in our…”
MethodKong, S.-C., Cheung, M.-Y. W., & Tsang, O. (2024) · Computers and Education: Artificial Intelligence · doi:10.1016/j.caeai.2024.100214 · Cited by 167
Jeon, J., Lee, S., & Choi, S. (2024) · Interactive Learning Environments · doi:10.1080/10494820.2023.2204343 · Cited by 143
“For thematic data analysis, a hybrid approach that employed both deductive and inductive processes was taken to prepare a coding scheme (Braun & Clarke, 2006; Xu & Zammit, 2020).”
Metadata
- Authors
- Xu, W., & Zammit, K.
- Affiliations
- Western Sydney University (AU)
- Corresponding author
- Xu, Wen
- Venue
- International Journal of Qualitative Methods
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2020-01-01
- Volume
- 19
- ISSN
- 1609-4069 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W3017081314
- Semantic Scholar
- ef33d721af2df64450ea917acadf108460bfc0de
- Cited by
- 634
- References
- 37
- Citations by year
- 2026: 122 · 2025: 161 · 2024: 121 · 2023: 111 · 2022: 85 · 2021: 28 · 2020: 6
- FWCI
- 87.27
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- International Journal of Qualitative Methods (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Education › Qualitative Research Methods and Applications
- Social Sciences › Education › Educational Research and Methods
- Social Sciences › Education › Educational Research and Analysis
- Keywords
- thematic analysis, practitioner research, teacher research, theme development, constructivist epistemology, teaching practice, multi-source data
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