Content Analysis & Coding
Content analysis is a method used to analyse qualitative data and is often used when analysing data in case studies. In its most common form it is a technique that allows a researcher to take qualitative data and convert it into quantitative data (numerical data).
The technique can be used for data in many different formats, for example interview transcripts, film, audio recordings, diary entries, emails etc.
Stages of Content Analysis:
- Read, or watch the data a number of times
- Identify appropriate categories
- Tally the amount of times each category occurs within the data
Example: How content analysis is carried out
One example is if a researcher wanted to analyse data from an observational study where 100 cars were fitted with video cameras to record the driver’s behaviour. In order to analyse the videos using content analysis, the following steps would be made:
- The psychologist would begin by watching some of the film clips of driver behaviour.
- This would enable the psychologist to identify potential categories which emerged from the data. These categories would tend to be behaviours that appeared to happen regularly throughout the film. Some examples of categories / themes from this video may include: passenger distractions, gadget distractions, etc.
- The psychologists would then have watch the films again and count the number of examples which fell into each category to provide quantitative data. This is called Coding because it involves categorising large amounts of information into meaningful chunks/codes
Other examples of coding include:
- counting how many times particular words are used in children’s adverts aimed at boys compared to girls e.g. words like adventurous, caring or kind
- number of positive or negative words used by a mother to describe her child’s behaviour
- number of swear words in a film.
Evaluating Content Analysis:
Strengths:
- Once the categories/codes have been decided, it is a reliable way to analyse data, as there is clear criteria that is followed for each code, making it more consistent. When there are simple codes, a computer can be used to pick them out, which increases the reliability even further.
- Converting the qualitative data into quantitative means that it can be easy to present data and make comparisons of the categories/codes. It is also time efficient if carried out by a computer.
- Offers a method to analyse a variety of forms of data including newspapers, online interviews, adverts and self-report methods so that insights can be provided on data that is not collected by the researchers themselves.
Weaknesses:
- Converting qualitative data into quantitative data can strip away the detail. It can also make it difficult to understand the data as a whole. This could lead to inaccurate conclusions.
- The identification of suitable categories and codes is subjective and decided by the researcher alone, meaning that conclusions lack any scrutiny or objectivity.
Thematic Analysis
The main difference between Thematic analysis and Content analysis is that, content converts qualitative data into quantitative data, whereas, thematic analysis keeps the data as qualitative, but it attempts to condense it.
Psychologists can do this by repeatedly reviewing the data so that they can identify trends in the meaning conveyed by language.
Themes are descriptive in comparison to coding in content analysis, and is therefore under the branch of qualitative data. Themes will tend to focus on identifying trends and commonalities in terms of ideas, expression, and emotion, whereas coding within content analysis is more focused on how many particular words are used, or how often a particular behaviour has occurred.
The themes identified are within thematic analysis are re-analysed so that they become more refined and relevant. The researcher then picks out specific examples of the themes by quoting the qualitative data in order to support the existence of the theme. The researcher may then collect further data from other people and then look for the same themes to see if a pattern emerges, thus improving the validity.
For example, when I was at university, I used thematic analysis to identify themes in an interview that I carried out with someone about their depression and physical disability.
I found themes like ‘dehumanising the illness’. Through the process of coding, the words ‘monster’, ‘fight’ and ‘it’ came up quite a lot, and it was through this coding, that I was able to identify a theme. I then provided quotes, every time the individual did this. For example ‘It’s like a monster that you have to fight everyday. It’s hard to not let it beat you, but I try my best to keep it at bay’ I interpreted this as the individual, trying to detach themselves from from the illness and not wanting to accept that it was a part of them.
Evaluating Thematic Analysis:
Strengths:
- Provides and in depth analysis of the data which can provide the researcher with a in depth insight which quantitative data is unable to do.
- It can direct future research as it may uncover details which have not been identified by quantitative analyses.
- This approach is flexible so that the analysis can be accommodated to the data as themes or codes do not have to be pre-defined.
Weaknesses:
- The researcher analyses the data, so themes identified and results may be due to investigator bias, reducing the validity of findings.
- Has poor reliability. This is because each researcher will come up with their own unique themes, making it difficult to replicate, or check consistency.
- Causality cannot be established as it merely describes the data and bases interpretations on the researchers beliefs.
- Thematic analysis can be quite time consuming. This is because in order to build themes, you need to go over the content a number of times.
- Many psychologists regard this analysis technique as unscientific due to its subjective nature and the fact that is it difficult to establish if the data supports or negates a hypothesis.
Try it yourself!
If you want to, you guys could have a go at content analysis yourself. Please see below a video of Richard Kuklinski. He was a hit man and he has claimed to have killed over 200 people. In a usual content analysis you would watch the video over and over again and pick out commonalities in order do develop codes and themes, but I’ve watched this so many times that I will give them to you.
In terms of coding as part of content analysis, I want you to tally on a piece of paper every time he refers to basic physical and materialistic things such as sex, food, clothes, money, possessions. I have chosen this code because psychopaths tend to place a lot of importance on basic needs compared to emotional needs.
The second code, tally every time he smirks, laughs or smiles when he is talking about extreme things, things that your usual person may not find very funny. I have chosen this code as it is a sign of a lack of remorse.
Now, for thematic analysis, you need to have some themes, and you need to provide quotes of what Kuklinski says that could fit into those themes. For example the first theme I would like you to find quotes for is ‘Casual Language -Extreme Behaviour’
For example when Kuklinski is talking about his crimes, he says it in a very matter of fact way, again evidence for a lack of remorse
‘I once shot a guy in his Adam’s apple, to see how long it took for him to die. A few minutes. He drowned actually. I was with someone else, we had a $50 bet….. I lost’
The final theme I would like you to find quotes for is ‘Victims Deserving of Death’. For example when Kuklinski talks about his murders he tends to make it sound like there was no other option and that they were kind of asking to die.
‘This person decided that he couldn’t wait to get inside to urinate. He never did’
I really recommend that you have a go at this. It’s a very interesting documentary and highlights the contributions of nature and nurture towards the end.
CGS Psychology Blog: Mrs Harris 