A systematic approach used to describe experiences and situations from the perspective of the person in a situation.

The experiences that comprise the lives of humans.

The extent to which the identified meanings represent the perspectives of the participants accurately.

A philosophy and a group of research methods congruent with the philosopy that guide the study of experiences or phenomena.

When researchers set aside their own biases and preconceptions to describe the phenomenon in a naïve way.

An inductive technique that emerged from the discipline of sociology.

Involves exploring how people define reality and how their beliefs are related to their actions.

A method to study cultures through immersion in a culture over time.

Studying behaviours from within the culture that recognizes the uniqueness of the individual.

Studying behavior from outside the culture and examining similarities and differences across cultures.

Being in the culture and gaining increasing familiarity with aspects of the culture, such as language, sociocultural norms, traditions, and other social dimensions, including family, communication patterns, religion, work patterns, and expressions of emotions.

Examines events of the past.

The interview of a person who played a role in the historical event.

People who lived at the same time or those who heard stories of that time may provide information to provide breadth and depth to the description that the researcher is developing.

Subjects in qualitative studies.

Persons with extensive knowledge and influence in a culture.

Fixed set of questions, no fixed responses.

Open-ended questions, with probes.

Are queries made by the researcher to obtain more information from the participant about a particular interview question.

Obtains the participants perceptions of a specific topic in a permissive and nonthreatening setting.

A method of gathering data for qualitative studies, especially ethnography studies.

Notes taken during or shortly after observations.

The process of reading the data, breaking text down into subparts, and giving a label to that part of the text.

The researcher places the findings in a larger context and may link different themes or factors in the findings to each other.