Time and time again, our clients have to cut words from their theses so they can meet their university’s guidelines. This need to be ruthless with words continues after postgrad work. Grant proposals, book chapters and peer-reviewed papers often have word or character limits that must be followed. Additionally, omitting needless words is just a good rule of thumb, no matter what you’re writing. Short sentences are impactful!
However, writing tight can be extra challenging when you’re a qualitative researcher. For a start, our data takes up far more words than for quant people, yet we often still have the same word counts to contend with. Secondly, our interpretations can be complex, feeling as though they need paragraphs of text to be properly unpacked. Trying to cram all our lovely findings into a draconian word count can feel impossible at times!
Writing succinctly can feel frustrating for qual researchers Photo by Andre Hunter on Unsplash
Fortunately, we at PGPR have years of experience with trimming down qualitative PhDs so that they are the required length and yet still contain the depth and nuance needed. Here are some of our top tips for writing qualitative research as succinctly as possible.
Watch out for written tics
We all have stock phrases that we fall back on and reuse when we’re speaking or writing. These are often overly wordy at best and totally unnecessary at worst. They might include wording such as:
It appears that the participants expressed…
It is interesting to note that…
It could therefore be suggested that…
Research carried out by Smith et al. (2012) found that…
In order to…
Due to the fact that…
A number of…
All these overly wordy phrases can be replaced with more succinct alternatives, as shown below…
Read some of your work back and look out for phrases like this that you over-use, then use the search function to find all examples. You’ll be able to cut many of these back, which will have the dual benefit of getting you closer to your word count and making your work more readable.
(NB: don’t just do a find and replace – find each instance and use your judgement to work out whether it can be replaced and if so, what with!)
Put your work down for a few days
In addition to these common phrases, many qualitative students tend to write in a flowery, verbose way. This is fine for a first draft. Indeed, I don’t recommend even trying to think about word count while you’re getting your initial ideas down. Capturing your interpretations and ideas is far more important in the early stages of writing.
However, if you put your too-long chapter down for a couple of days and then come back to it with a clear head, you’ll almost certainly start to spot unnecessary words. Reading your work aloud really helps with this, so if you’re struggling, try reading a page or so to yourself. You’ll instantly see cuts you can make – and then you can apply that same thinking to subsequent pages.
Taking a break can help you work out which words you can cut Photo by Artem Beliaikin on Unsplash
Trim data
As mentioned above, the data we deal with as qualitative researchers is one of the reasons we can struggle with word counts. Of course, it’s important to ensure that you are including quotes that are long enough to illustrate all the interpretations you’re making.
However, it’s often the case that a bit of data can be trimmed off the beginning or end of a long quote. Or maybe there’s a section in the middle that is less relevant? If so, you can take this out, as long as you use some notation to mark this. […] is a common way to demonstrate the removal of less relevant material.
Be careful here – don’t take out sections of data that point to a different interpretation than the one you want to make, just to strengthen your argument! Data like this must stay in and be considered. However, if the participant says something in the middle of a quote that is just not relevant to this subtheme topic, it’s fine to take it out.
Stay laser-focused on your theme topics and research questions
And speaking of subtheme topics – one of the most common problems I see in my clients’ work is that data and interpretations are presented that are lovely, but not actually relevant.
Remember that no matter which qualitative method you’re using, all the material you present under a section or subtheme must feed into that topic. Similarly, each subtheme or lower-order section should feed into the higher-order theme or section. And everything you discuss in the findings section must be relevant to your research question.
Staying laser-focused on your thematic points and research question will help you write succinctly Photo by Erfan Afshari on Unsplash
While the tips I’ve offered so far are all about trimming individual sentences, this final tip can help you to remove whole paragraphs or even pages that you don’t need. This can be painful if you’ve spent a long time reaching this interpretation, but if it’s not relevant to your research question, I’m afraid it belongs on the cutting room floor!
Book PGPR
If all of this feels too much like hard work, get in touch with PGPR via the contact form below, and we help you to cut your thesis down to size by trimming individual sentences and suggesting larger areas that you may be able to edit down. We’ll be happy to help!
Congratulations – you’ve written a paper based on your qualitative study, and now you’re deciding where to try to publish. That’s fantastic! Getting a few peer-reviewed publications under your belt is an essential step in the academic career path. However, if you’ve not done it before, the publication process can feel daunting. Don’t worry: PGPR are here to guide you.
Congratulations: You’re ready to publish! Photo by Yen Vu on Unsplash
Selecting a journal
Make a list of journals that publish in your area
The process of reading existing research and writing your reference list will mean that you have almost certainly internalised the names of more relevant journals than you think. Jot those down, then look through your reference list for others you haven’t remembered. Ask your co-authors for their ideas. Do a Google search for ‘journal’ + your topic. This should result in a good list for you to consider.
Check which are open to publishing qualitative research
This is essential! There is no point submitting your study, beautiful as it might be, to a journal that has never published any qualitative work before. Doing so will waste both your time and the editors’ time, so do everyone a favour and search the archives of your longlisted journals for the word ‘qualitative’ in the titles of published articles. If there are none, cross that one off your list.
Ideally, you want to find a journal that often publishes qual work and has published at least some articles using your methodology. Of course, there are some qual-specific journals out there, such as Qualitative Research and the Journal of Qualitative Health Research. These will always be open to qualitative work, and their reviewers will have the expertise to provide relevant, helpful feedback.
Check your chosen journal publishes qualitative research before submitting. Photo by Yen Vu on Unsplash
Make a table of each journal’s attributes
This table should include the journal’s impact factor – a number that indicates how often papers from this journal are cited and so how prestigious the journal is – their word count (you can’t publish three GETs from your beautiful IPA study in a journal whose maximum word count is 2,000), who the readers of the journal are, whether or not it is open access and so on. It could be that your co-authors have had good or bad experiences publishing in the papers on your list; if so, include that too.
Note that if you are choosing to publish in an open-access journal, your university will need to pay some rather weighty fees, so do check that they have the budget for that before pursuing that route.
Rank journals in order of preference, depending on your priorities
Looking at this information in table form will help you decide which journal to target first. If you have high ambitions for forging a lofty academic career (and why not?), aim for the high-impact journals first. Just be prepared for the potential of a knock-back, and be ready to move on to the next journal on the list. If your priority is to get your research seen by other qual researchers sooner rather than later, consider a less high-impact journal with a stronger proven track record for qual researchers. (Unfortunately, these two things often go hand in hand!)
For what it’s worth, I don’t think that impact factors mean much more than a plus point on your CV. I don’t know of any academics who find papers to read based on the impact factor of the journal. Instead, just as you very likely did, other academics use Google Scholar to look for papers in the relevant area, read them, and cite the best ones, often not worrying at all about which journal those papers are in. So I never really worry about impact factors. However, if you are more ambitious in that area, I doff my cap to you and wish you the best of luck.
Deciding which journals to target takes some thought. Photo by No Revisions on Unsplash
Read through the author guidelines of your chosen journal
Once you’ve decided on your ideal journal, the next step is to carefully read over the author guidelines and ensure your paper follows them. This might involve changing your references from APA7 to Harvard (not an issue if you’ve used referencing software – a right pain if you haven’t, I’m afraid!), cutting a few words or changing from UK to US spelling. Following the guidelines as closely as possible at this stage will save you hassle later on. I recommend saving a new version of the paper and adding the journal to the title so you can revert to your original if it isn’t accepted the first time.
Ensure you have cited any relevant papers from your chosen journal
This is self-explanatory! Do a quick search of recent editions of your chosen journal and include any relevant references. This will show the journal’s editors that you’ve paid attention to their publication.
Write a killer cover letter
Ensure you’ve written a confident and concise cover letter before you start the submission process. This is your chance to tell the editor why their publication and readership need to read your amazing research. Again, check the author guidelines for any instructions on what to include in the letter for your chosen journal.
Sadly, academic publishing involves some rejection. Photo by Steve Johnson on Unsplash
8. Be prepared for some rejection
Unfortunately, publishing academic work comes with its fair share of rejection, which can sting, especially when you’re starting out. Give yourself a day or two to feel the pain, then move on to the next journal. Keep working through your list until you find someone who recognises your genius and says yes!
If a journal rejects your paper but gives you some feedback, read that feedback carefully. If the reviewers have said anything you agree with, redraft the paper to smooth out those issues. If you don’t agree, move on. The good news is that the longer you do this, the easier it becomes to shrug off any difficult feelings that come with rejection and keep moving forward.
Submitting your paper involves filling out a long, complex online form and is often more frustrating than you want it to be! Give yourself a good hour or so to complete this process, and ensure that you have all relevant info to hand before you get started, such as your co-authors’ contact details and your cover letter. If possible, look through the form before you get started so you can spot anything you might need to ask your supervisor about in advance.
One thing you will need to do is nominate peer-reviewers; that is, experts in your field who you would ideally like to review your paper. Peer reviewers decide whether your work is ready for publication and, if not, what needs to change. It is extremely rare for a paper to be accepted with no revisions, so be ready to respond to your reviewers’ comments before publication.
How to nominate peer reviewers:
Have this discussion with your co-authors before you submit
It’s really frustrating to be 75% of the way through submitting your paper before you realise that you haven’t discussed potential reviewers with your co-authors, as that means you have to pause the process to have that conversation. Therefore, I recommend going into the submission process with a list of agreed-upon potential reviewers to nominate, along with their institutions and contact details.
Talk to your co-authors about which peer reviewers to nominate. Photo by Brooke Cagle on Unsplash
2. Who can’t review your work?
For obvious reasons, you cannot nominate current or recent co-authors, someone at your institution, a mentor, close colleague or friend. Therefore, tempting as it might be, don’t put any of those friendly faces on your list.
3. Who should review your work?
As mentioned above, your nominated reviewers should be experts in the field. I believe it’s more important that these people are qualitative researchers (or at least open to qualitative research) than that they are well-versed in your exact topic. Otherwise, you run the risk of reviews from people who don’t understand qualitative research and will waste your time asking about generalisability or insisting that you should have reported data saturation in your three-participant IPA study. If you can think of people who are qual researchers and also experts in your topic, all the better. You can find people like this by looking at who wrote the work you’ve cited and asking your co-authors for ideas.
4. Make sure you’ve cited their relevant work
Once you’ve decided on a few names, check whether these people have published a relevant paper that you have somehow missed. If you find something important, cite it. Everyone is susceptible to flattery. Plus, if the work is relevant, the reviewers will certainly point out that you’ve missed it, so this saves everyone time.
Make sure you’ve cited your ideal peer-reviewers in your paper. Photo by Daniel Thomas on Unsplash
5. If possible, list more than two people
Bear in mind that your nominated reviewers are not under any obligation to say yes. Academics are stressed, busy people and reviewing is not paid work. For example, I probably review only one in every five papers I’m asked to read. I say no to any quantitative papers or those I have no expertise in at all (so again, do everyone a favour and only nominate people who have the relevant knowledge), but also have to say no to some fascinating-sounding papers because I don’t have the time to read them. Therefore, the longer your list of potential reviewers, the better.
In my experience, if a paper is about a strong, important study and you are targeting relevant journals, you will only need to try two or three publications before you find the right home for your work. The more experienced you become at this, the more likely it is that you’ll find the right journal the first time around.
If you need any help preparing your study for publication, contact PGPR using the form below. We are qualitative experts who offer proofreading and feedback to postgrad students like you.
PGPR is the brainchild of Johanna Spiers, business owner, qualitative researcher and proofreader extraordinaire. Johanna loves running PGPR and working with her clients, and she appreciates how hard it can be to turn the thesis you’ve spent months and years working on over to her to edit and/or critique.
As such, we thought it might be useful for Johanna to share a bit about who she is, where her training comes from and how she came up with the idea for PGPR. We’re hoping this will help you feel confident that your work will be in good hands when you send it to us.
Johanna is happy to help with all your proofreading and feedback needs
Johanna says…
On getting into qualitative research
My first qualitative study was an undergrad IPA project that I completed under the guidance of Jonathan A Smith at Birkbeck University. The project was about academic mothers juggling their work and family demands. I was hugely lucky to be supervised by the man who created IPA; I found his insights and tutelage inspirational.
I came from a creative background – my first degree, completed back in the late 1990s, was in creative writing, and when I’m not helping PGPR students, I write fiction. I love exploring the nuances of words and delving into their deeper meanings. Plus, I’ve been drawn to understanding relationships and diverse perspectives since childhood.
As such, I found IPA’s combination of deep, idiographic textual analysis and psychological underpinnings hugely attractive.
Indeed, I loved doing that study so much that I applied to do my PhD with Jonathan as soon as my undergrad was over. My PhD – which was about the experience of living with and being treated for renal failure – led to three publications, which you can read here, here and here.
Johanna’s first qualitative project was about working mothers
On the qualitative projects she’s worked on:
Since finishing my PhD, I’ve worked on research projects at universities including Hull, Bristol, UCL, Birmingham and Surrey. The topics I’ve researched have tended to be related to health conditions – either physical or mental – and include areas like living with an ileostomy, the mental health of healthcare professionals, adherence to HIV medication and an evaluation of a dementia healthcare program.
While I have continued to use IPA, my first (and true!) qualitative love, I’ve also been fortunate enough to work on studies which required me to use a range of other methodologies, including thematic analysis, grounded theory, realist evaluation and even, on one shocking occasion, quantitative methods.
I’ve also co-authored several literature reviews, including an integrative review of postvention guidance and a rapid review of reviews of dementia healthcare programs (in press).
This experience means that I am well qualified to offer feedback on a range of studies and methodologies – so your work is in good hands when you send it to me.
Your work is in good hands when you send it to PGPR
Of all the research I’ve worked on, I have felt most passionate about the series of studies I completed with Dr Ruth Riley about various aspects of healthcare professionals’ mental health.
I love our NHS and feel very strongly that it needs to be better funded and the staff who work for it better looked after. As such, being able to speak first-hand to GPs, junior doctors and a range of other NHS workers about their jobs and mental health was a true privilege.
My proudest – and most cited! – paper comes out of one of those jobs. This is a paper I especially love because it highlights some of the struggles faced by NHS workers whilst also offering help to qualitative students, as I explain how to analyse one dataset (about the distress of GPs) with both IPA and thematic analysis.
As I mentioned above, I started life as an editorial person rather than a scientist. After completing my degree in creative writing, I moved back to my hometown of London and worked in the editorial world, writing Teletext (remember that??) for various cable channels and then sub-editing copy on a range of magazines and newspapers.
This work taught me how to make words work in the most efficient way possible. At the same time, I continued to work on my fiction (an example of which you can read here, if you’re interested).
While I was doing my PhD, I worked on the QMiP Bulletin, eventually serving as editor for a brief spell. I think I rather terrified everyone else on the team by introducing glossy magazine-level proofreading standards to what was a volunteer position. I loved that work – combining my new psychology knowledge with my trusty editorial skills felt like a dream for me.
In 2017, I finished work on a postdoc study at Bristol and started applying for lecturing positions. However, my heart wasn’t really in the search – lecturing looks like arduous work (hats off to all the supervisors out there toiling away at the frontline!) and I was still plugging away at my fiction writing.
So I decided to see if any postgrad students wanted help proofreading their theses, something I felt uniquely qualified to offer.
I was amazed by the response – PGPR has been running ever since then!
PGPR has been helping postgrad students since 2017
On PGPR’s journey
PGPR has undergone several iterations in the nine years it has been running. At first, it was just me and my laptop. However, I was so quickly overwhelmed by clients that I started recruiting other qualitative and editorial experts to take on the work I didn’t have time for.
At one time, PGPR had 10 proofreaders on the books, a fantastic admin assistant and a business manager.
These days, we’re a more humble affair: it’s now just me and Astrid taking on work, and I’ve gone back to doing all my own admin, meaning you get the personal touch from the moment you contact us.
I love the proofreading work I do for all you lovely students. I get to read about such a range of fascinating topics. My clients are a warm, clever and funny bunch, and I feel lucky to be able to help them on their roads to success. I love hearing about vivas passed and papers published.
If you’d like Johanna to proofread some of your work or offer feedback, you can get in touch via the form below. She’ll be happy to hear from you!
Here at PGPR, we’ve been helping postgrad qualitative students polish and refine their work since 2018. We love our work and our clients – you guys are dedicated, friendly and warm, and you all do such amazing research. We always enjoy helping you, so in that spirit, here’s a list of some of the problems we see cropping up time and time again – and some ideas for how to avoid them.
1. Dictionary swallowing
Postgrad work is a few steps up from undergrad – steps that can initially feel huge and intimidating. One of the hardest things can be getting to grips with all the new terminology you’re suddenly dealing with.
Phenomenology, hermeneutics, heuristics, epistemology, ontology – it’s enough to make your head spin.
Getting to grips with all these concepts and presenting your understanding of them can be tricky. Making it even more complex is the fact that academic writing follows a particular style and has certain (often unspoken) rules.
Read the dictionary by all means – but don’t swallow it!
A common response to these factors is to write in sentences and paragraphs that are so chock-full of multi-syllabic words and awkward passive phrasing that they must be read six times to be understood. So where you could have said:
Ontology and epistemology are two key ideas in philosophy that help us understand reality and knowledge.
Instead, you will say:
Ontology and epistemology constitute the foundational pillars of philosophical inquiry, delineating the fundamental nature of reality and the mechanisms through which knowledge about that reality is ascertained.
As you can see, this longer and more complex sentence is in no way better. The first and best rule of any writing is ‘omit needless words’ (Strunk and White, 1918), and that definitely applies here.
When we at PGPR see language like this, it can make us wonder whether the client really understands what they are describing. Therefore, first, check that you fully understand the concepts you’re writing about. Try explaining them to a friend and then writing that explanation down. What you get from this exercise will almost certainly be better than striving to write in ‘academise’.
Try checking out this quick video where Steven Pinker explains why many academics write so badly – it’s not just the students who do this!
2. Analytical teething troubles
A common problem with qualitative work is that the analysis needs to be refined further. Perhaps you need to dig deeper into the participants’ language. Maybe your themes read like a list of different experiences rather than a discussion of what brings those experiences together. It could be that those themes or codes are disorganised.
If this is the case for you, fear not! Qualitative analysis is hard, and it’s rare for students (or academics) to get it ‘right’ the first time. Collaboration and inspiration from supervisors, colleagues, research groups or from PGPR can be beneficial for pushing your ideas forward and doing justice to your lovely data.
If you could do more with your data, contact us via the box below and you can book in for some feedback.
3. Not knowing when to quit…
When writing a postgrad thesis, you’re a bit like Aerosmith – because you don’t want to miss a thing. You’ve put your blood, sweat and tears into this thesis, so it’s entirely understandable that you will want to ensure nothing gets missed out.
Since the thesis is your baby, it might be hard to determine what needs to be included and what is less essential.
Additionally, many of our clients have trouble trusting that readers are paying attention to their work, which means they can repeat the same ideas and concepts, in the same level of detail, many times throughout their thesis.
If you’re struggling with your word count, put your thesis down for a bit. Returning to it with fresh eyes will help you spot areas you can cut out or points you’ve repeated.
Plus, did you know that PGPR offers a word reduction service? We can cut up to 20% from your work for a small additional fee when you book in for proofreading. Another pair of eyes can be useful in murdering those darlings and getting your work as sharp and shiny as a diamond.
The table of contents (or the ToC) can be a puzzling beast to get right. Page numbers will keep shifting as you keep adding to your masterpiece. Headings and subheadings shift around and get amended – and many of our clients think they need to deal with this manually.
Here’s the fantastic news – you can leave your ToC to us entirely. With just a few simple clicks and highlights, our formatting whizz Astrid can create an interactive table of contents that you can update when you amend your thesis.
If you’re coming unstuck with your ToC, book in for our formatting service and we will do all the heavy lifting for you.
Look – we get it. Time goes quickly, life is hectic. All of a sudden, your postgrad deadline is only two weeks away, and you still haven’t booked that brilliant proofreading and feedback service you heard about. (That’s us, BTW!) If this is you, don’t worry – we will do our best to still fit you in.
However, if you can send your work earlier, we hugely recommend this. Why? Well, for a start, a longer period between us looking at the work and you submitting your thesis gives you longer to respond to our amendments. This is especially useful if you’ve booked feedback. Sometimes an analysis chapter might benefit from two rounds of feedback, which means that waiting until you’ve dotted all the ‘i’s, crossed all the ‘t’s and are eager to submit can lead to problems.
Of course, sometimes we are fully booked, so if you wait until the last minute, we might be unable to help you, which would be a shame.
We’re happy to look at individual sections of your thesis over weeks, months or even years. You don’t have to wait until everything is finished to book our services. If you’ve got a lit review you’ve finished but you’re waiting for ethics to come through so you can recruit the participants, send us that lit review and you can be doing your amends while you wait. And then when the deadline comes around, you’re ahead of the game and can smile the smile of the smug!
Whatever your issue, if you’re a postgrad qualitative student needing extra help, we are here for you. Just contact us via the box below and tell us what’s going on for you.
Whether you’re preparing a thesis, a paper or an essay, if you’re reporting on a study you have conducted, the method is crucial. This is the section that your readers will use to check how you conducted your research, so it’s vital that you clearly demonstrate what you did and how you did it. You can have the most beautifully nuanced findings in the world, but if the reader doesn’t know how you got to them, they won’t be able to trust in the validity of your work.
This sounds super serious, but don’t panic – although important, methodologies are one of the easier sections to write, as they tend to follow a specific structure and are all about reporting what you did. The good news is, you did that stuff! So you are the most uniquely qualified person to write about it. Check you out.
The level of detail you need in your method section will vary depending on the type of paper you’re writing. For example, a systematic review will need a much longer and more detailed method section than a small interview study. The following tips will be useful no matter what type of method section you’re working on.
Write your method first; in fact, start whilst still doing the study
When you’re in the midst of recruiting participants, juggling interview schedules or scouring databases for papers, it can feel like you will never forget the steps you took to get from A to B (and then to C and E and H). However, you’d be amazed at how quickly these details can vanish if you haven’t been taking careful notes. As such, we recommend starting to write your methodology section almost in real-time – as you’re doing the actual study. Yes, you’ll need to edit it later, but getting those key facts down while they’re fresh in your mind can save you a whole host of hair-pulling further down the road. Additionally, since the method can be straightforward to write, this is a great way to combat empty page syndrome. Yes, you’ve still got some of the longer sections to write, but you’ve made a start, and that’s always a good feeling.
Juggling the different parts of the methodology can feel like a struggle, but getting those key facts down while they’re fresh in your mind can save you a whole heap of time. Photo by Marije Woudsma on Unsplash
Follow the subheadings set out by your target journal or your institution
In their guidance for authors, journals often include a list of subheadings that they expect to see in a method section. This can be helpful, as the headings make it clear exactly what you need to include and what you can leave out. If you’re writing up a thesis, check with your supervisor or in your institution’s handbook to see if they also suggest subheadings. If they do, use them. Start by writing each subheading into a Word document, then make bullet points of all the relevant info for each one. You can shape those points into paragraphs in the next step.
Succinctly provide enough information so that someone can follow the steps you took and (where possible) replicate the study
Traditionally, the point of the method section is to give your readers enough information to replicate the study if they want to. This idea is more suitable for quantitative experiments – where you have a certain amount of control over the various variables – than qualitative research, which is led by participants and their stories. However, the principle still applies. Following the suggested subheadings, as per the point above, should help with this.
Telling the story of how you designed your study is an important step! Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash
You need to tell the story of what you did and how you did it. How did you contact and recruit participants? Where did you conduct your interviews? How did you record them? Which methodology did you use to analyse your data? Did you use any software to help you? Who gave you ethics clearance? All these questions will need to be answered. And, importantly, they should be answered using as few words as possible. This section is about presenting the facts, not flowery language. If you’re writing for a peer-reviewed paper, you’re likely to have quite a tight word count. If your method section is concise as possible, this frees up more words for your findings.
Think carefully about anonymisation vs information about participants
If you’re writing up a qualitative study, as most PGPR clients are, you need to think carefully about how much information you’re going to provide about your participants. Demographic details about the participants which have a bearing on the research question need to be provided, but participants’ identities must be protected. This information will often be presented in a table. Let’s say you’re writing up a study about what it’s like to give birth to your first child. Your table might include participants’ pseudonyms/ID numbers, their age, the age of their child and their ethnicity. You might choose to leave out where they live and their occupation. However, if your study is about young working mothers, occupation is more important, so you would include that, but perhaps leave out other details. Always check your consent form to be sure you’re not conveying any information that participants haven’t given you permission to share.
Ensure you provide enough info about the fit between your research question and your method
Unfortunately, there are still quite a few reviewers and examiners out there who don’t understand or trust qualitative methods. As such, you need to ensure that your justification for using the methodology you’ve picked is ironclad. You may only need a sentence or two, but do include some lines to explain why qualitative methods are the perfect fit for your study, even if it seems really obvious to you!
You need to ensure that your justification for using the methodology you’ve picked is ironclad. Photo by John Salvino on Unsplash
Save discussion of difficulties for the limitations section
Research is unpredictable. Things go wrong, and that’s fine. You might not have been able to recruit as many participants as you’d hoped. Some interviews might not have recorded perfectly. You might be new to qualitative methods and have struggled with analysis. None of these are reasons to beat yourself up; we’re all learning, all the time. If things have gone less than brilliantly, state that plainly in this section. You can then go on to talk about the implications of those hiccups and what you might do next time in your limitations section, all whilst reminding yourself that even the most esteemed professors run into difficulties at times. You’ve still completed your study and that is brilliant.
Contact PGPR
If you’re struggling with your method section – or any other area of your write-up – just get in touch with us via the box below. We’re a friendly team of qualitative and mixed methods experts who can help you with feedback, proofreading and word reduction on this and any other section of your thesis or paper.
Whether you are new to Interpretative Phenomenological
Analysis (IPA) or have been using it for a while, you may have noticed some
differences in the language associated with this qualitative approach to
research.
This might seem confusing at first but don’t worry; help is at hand!
The guidance and steps suggested to conduct
your analysis remain the same. So do the underlying principles. All that’s changed
is some of the terminology.
Terms like emergent theme or superordinate theme, which you will see in most IPA papers published pre-2022 and in the first edition of Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis: Theory, Method and Researchby Jonathan Smith, Paul Flowers and Michael Larkin (2009), have been updated, as explained in the table below.
Old term
New term
Emergent Theme
Experiential Statement
Superordinate Theme
Personal Experiential Theme (PET)
Master Theme
Group Experiential Theme (GET)
Emergent Themes are now known as experiential statements, superordinate themes are now called personal experiential themes, and master themes are now referred to as group experiential themes.
This change in terminology can actually make things clearer as you work through your analysis. Experiential statements are just that, statements about the experiences captured in your data in terms of their meaning for the participant.
Let the new IPA terminology light your pathway through analysis
The example transcript includes the lines “so I really had to put in the effort and judge people quite quickly as well. So, yeah, I just had to put stuff out there quite a lot”. One of the experiential statements to arise from this analysis is ‘Selectively and purposively bonding with strangers’ (p. 41).
This statement is both concise and rich. It captures the participant’s description of forging relationships with other travellers and their sense of this being a deliberate, active process. A statement such as ‘Meeting new people’ or ‘Social aspects of travel’, although still reflective of the data, would not provide the same experiential detail.
The new IPA terminology is nearly as much fun as meeting new friends whilst travelling. Honest!
Thinking in terms of experiential statements – rather than emergent themes – can help you orient yourself during the earlier analytic stages. An experiential statement involves summarising the meaning in a short portion of the text – perhaps just a few lines. At this stage, being too concerned with the bigger picture of ‘themes’ can distract you from looking carefully at each section of the transcript in a close, fine-grained fashion.
Personal experiential themes or PETs, are themes developed through an analysis of a
single case, meaning they are personal to that individual.
Group experiential themes or GETs are developed by looking across individual cases for patterns of
convergence and divergence. They are themes which represent the group.
As you can see, the revised terminology makes finding your way through the analysis easier.
Doing IPA can feel like tackling a maze. The new terminology can help you find your way.
Are you a postgrad student using qualitative methods to explore a social science topic?
Are you wrestling with your analysis, your themes, your write up? Or maybe you’re feeling nervous about your viva?
Qualitative research is an intense process that requires a lot of careful thinking. You need to hold many ideas in your mind as you consider connections between your themes and how your research fits into the wider picture. It’s no wonder analysis can cause a headache.
That’s why PGPR offers video consultations: hour-long sessions in which one of our team of qualitative experts talks you through the challenges you’re facing in your research project.
If you’re wondering whether a PGPR VC can help you, read the following examples to see how we’ve helped clients in the past…
Aimee was working on resubmitting a reflective assignment as part of her psychotherapy doctorate. She was finding it challenging to revise her previous submission to ensure she met the assessment criteria while expressing her lived experiences clearly in a formal academic style. Aimee sent us her original submission, along with the feedback from her assessors and the assessment criteria. Through a series of video consultations, we explored how Aimee could relate psychotherapeutic theory to both her personal and professional experiences. We identified specific areas where she could demonstrate her relevant understanding in relation to the required learning outcomes. By explaining her ideas verbally, Aimee felt more confident communicating her knowledge, and successfully reworked her assignment with a clearer narrative arc.
We helped Aimee with her reflective assignment through a VC
Bob had completed the write up of his interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) findings for his doctoral thesis. He had received feedback that his work was descriptive rather than interpretative and was unsure how to address this. Bob sent us his results chapter and we had a chat about how we could best support him. We agreed that a general discussion about how to be interpretative would be too abstract, so decided he would select some quotes from his findings which we could explore together. During the hour, we talked through a small selection of extracts in depth. This allowed Bob to get a sense of how to approach his data interpretatively, what to look for and the types of questions he could ask himself. He then felt more able to apply this to the rest of his findings chapter, which he continued to revise on his own.
Thanks to a PGPR VC, Bob was able to rewrite his results chapter
Cathy had completed her PhD viva and was unsure how to approach her revisions. She sent us her viva report and thesis. In a series of video consultations, we focused on the different amendments required. In one session, we made a detailed plan for a chapter she had been asked to re-structure so that she could go away and organise her writing with clarity. In another, we discussed the examiners’ request that Cathy acknowledge the influence of her position on the research. We decided that writing a single reflexive statement would be appropriate and talked through what she might include in it. Cathy later sent some sections of her amended thesis for proofreading and written feedback to iron out the last details. Her revised thesis was accepted.
If you decide to book a VC with PGPR, we will spend an hour looking at your work before the session, and then an hour discussing the work once it’s done.
Previous PGPR VC client Andrea K said:
“I found my consultation meetings with Rachel incredibly helpful. When I felt stuck in my analysis, Rachel helped me to understand better what I am doing well (which motivated me to continue) as well as areas for further learning by discussing specific examples in my data. She definitely helped me to understand better how to put theory (IPA principles) into practice (analysis). Each consultation was used very efficiently thanks to Rachel’s clear focus, and she also made sure we had some time to discuss any questions/dilemmas that I had. I would recommend these consultations to anyone who feels stuck or wants to learn what they do well and what they can improve. Do not hesitate to contact the team if you have any other issues in your research study as they seem to consider individual needs and requests very well.”
Get in touch via the form below to book a session with one of our qualitative experts.
By this stage in your postgrad journey, you have probably read thousands of academic papers – or at least it feels that way. Indeed, you may have written one or two as well. But was the process quick and painless – or did it involve tears, tantrums and having to cut far too many of your carefully honed words? If you fall into the latter camp, you’ve come to the right place. Don’t panic; paper writing is challenging at first. But the more you practice, the slicker the process gets.
The method section is the simplest section of the paper. What did you do? Can you remember? If so, write it down. Check your target journal to see whether they have certain subheadings they want you to include (examples might be data collection, analysis, ethics and so on). If they don’t, have a look at other papers and copy their headings. Writing this short, factual series of paragraphs gets you into your stride and breaks that terrifying ‘blank page’ syndrome.
If you can, it’s often a good idea to start writing your method section while you’re still conducting the research. This ensures that you don’t forget any of those details about exactly where you found participant 14 or when you made those all-important changes to your interview schedule.
2. Use your table of themes to create your findings section
The findings are the most important section of a qualitative paper. This should be the longest and most detailed element and will guide the material you include in your introduction and discussion sections. This is why, once you’ve got started with the super-simple method, you should tackle the findings next.
You’ve got a table of themes that you lovingly created during your analysis, right? Well – I say lovingly created – what I mean is wrote, crossed out, re-created, kicked down the stairs a few times and cried over until you reached this final draft. Am I right?
Well, there’s good news and bad news. The good news is that (nearly all) of the hard work is already done. Created correctly, your table of themes should be the blueprint for your findings section. This means that you already know what points you want to make, in what order, and supported by which quotes. Brilliant, right? Well done past you. In theory, all you need to do now is turn write about why you named the themes and subthemes as you did, how those ideas are supported by the quotes and any interplay between the themes. With the right table of themes, this is easier than it sounds – the section almost writes itself.
The bad news – which really isn’t all that bad – is that analysis continues during writing. This means that, as you write your findings up, you are likely to realise that some quotes don’t quite do the right job, or that some points need shuffling around. You might need to seek out some different quotes, or re-order things. That’s fine; it’s good, in fact, as it shows you’re really engaging with the material. In this instance, use your new findings section to re-order the table.
The next stage is the introduction. These can be tough to write when you start writing papers as opposed to a thesis. They are somewhat equivalent to the lit review chapter of the thesis – but much, much shorter. And shorter does not mean easier!
Start by making a bullet point list of all the points you need to make in your introduction. These should include:
Setting the scene for your research question
The main points which need addressing from that question. So, for example, if you’re asking what it is like to work in criminal law (a heteronormative culture) as an LGBTQ person, you might have a bullet point on heteronormativity, a bullet point on the culture in criminal law and a bullet point on the challenges faced by LGBTQ people working in heteronormative environments. (I kinda want to read that paper now…)
Why your approach is the best way to answer your question
Once you have the list, approach this in the same way you did the method section – just fill in the blanks and write a paragraph (two at most) for each bullet point. If you’re lucky, you’ll already have done all the relevant reading. If you’re not, you’ll need to conduct a lit review at this point. However, knowing exactly what areas you’re interested in will make this quicker and easier than if you were just exploring the topic as a whole. Search for relevant, recent papers, plug them into EndNote or whichever referencing system you’re using, whizz through the relevant sections and make notes on anything useful. As you go, slot useful points into your skeleton intro, following the bullet points. You can refine it later. Ensure you don’t just look for papers that back up your pre-existing point of view; remember to be critical at all times, even of your own ideas.
Think of your introduction as a funnel. You’re starting with the wider context of the question and then narrowing down to the point where the reader agrees with you that answering this is question is essential, and that your stance is the best way to do so.
4. Discussion
Once you’ve presented your findings and shown the reader why they are important via the introduction, the next stage is to discuss them (hence the name!) in the light of other people’s work. Discussion sections can be notoriously tricky, which is why we have an entire blog post dedicated to getting them just right.
Qualitative discussions will generally follow the same structure as your findings. Work through each theme in the same order you presented them, showing how your findings confirm, contradict or build on existing work.
If time is of the essence, you can start your discussion section simultaneously with the introduction – after all, the two map onto each other to a certain extent. As you read the papers and make notes in a skeleton discussion section too. Write out your theme names under the ‘discussion’ title and note down any useful findings from others. All you need is to polish up your notes (and potentially look for a few more papers), and voila! You’re nearly done.
5. References
Please tell me you’ve been doing these the whole time? And that you’re using a handy piece of referencing software like EndNote or Zotero? If so – easy peasy. Use your software to set the references to the right system for your chosen journal (APA 7, Chicago or Harvard, most likely), and away you go. If you haven’t been using software, step one is to amend this immediately for next time. I know it feels like an intimidating pain before you get started, but it is SUCH a lifesaver in the end. Step two, for now, is to get onto Google Scholar and copy and paste those bad boys in by hand.
Ever tried to cook without spices? A good abstract provides a taste of what’s to come in your paper!
And finally, the abstract. Journals often have tight rules for how long an abstract should be and what structure it should follow, so check those first. Your abstract needs to give a small flavour of all the other elements of the paper. They can be hard to get right and might be best left for a week or so (if you have time) so that you can get a bit of distance from the work. Or, if you’ve done the bulk of the writing, you might ask another member of your research team to have a crack at this bit.
7. Send to PGPR
Whether you’re a total paper-newbie or an old hand, we can all use an extra pair of eyes now and then. If you’re struggling with any element of your paper writing, just get in touch with us using the form below, and we’ll be happy to help.
You’re committed to completing a rigorous, thorough and well-developed analysis. You’ve collected your data and spent hours immersing yourself in coding and organising your codes into themes. When are you ready to start writing up?
When is the best time to start writing? Photo by Engin Akyurt on Pixabay
How final is the final
report?
It’s useful to
address the perception of qualitative research as a linear process with writing
up as the conclusion. If you follow this model, you may be reluctant to move on
until you’re sure your codes are ‘finished’. Perhaps that idea comes from quantitative
research, where you analyse your data then write up your report to present to
others. Based on this, your concerns might be mostly about judging when you’re ‘ready’
to move onto writing.
Writing as a
process
Instead, consider
writing as an integral part of continuing your analysis. The use of writing as
an analysis tool crops up across social sciences and qualitative methods. You
might have read about memo-writing in grounded theory, for instance.
Hermeneutic psychology writers have suggested writing should be an integral part
of developing an analysis.
In this vision, the
writing is less about reporting your fully formed ideas and more about refining
your thinking, ideas and arguments about your data. Codes only capture a small
part of your thinking and don’t allow you to explain or explore. As you write,
you can capture and develop initially nebulous ideas about your work.
How does writing
help?
Initially, writing
can be for yourself. You can test your arguments and reasoning. You might start
setting down your analytic claims about your data. How did you make sense of
the participants’ words? Which parts of the text do you think were particularly
relevant? These don’t have to be final ideas, but they can help you decide what
might be useful.
Writing can also help you get feedback from others. A narrative with quotes, analytic commentary and overarching comments communicates your ideas with more depth than code names or standalone quotes. A written account helps an outsider understand the reasoning that took you from data to themes and how you’re interpreting the data.
Sharing your ideas Photo by Startupstockphotos via Pixabay
A short, written analysis example can reassure your supervisor that you’re engaging in a thorough analysis. They will then be able to see your work’s structure, content and analysis style, which can be vital to ensure you’re creating a well-developed piece of analysis.
What to write?
There are many options for when to write and how much.
Personally, I like to write often, even if many of those narratives only
collect virtual cobwebs on my laptop (I always believe I’ll use them one day).
You can write a brief reflection on each interview and after transcription. You
might want to write up some key themes from one transcript, explain what you
think is important about a small group of quotes, or write a full analysis of
each participant’s account.
Strange things
happen when you write. Despite rigorous attention to coding, our analytic ideas
can prove frustratingly slippery when we try to explain them. You might find that
some themes develop beyond their original scope as you find more to say about
them. Others may turn out to be uninteresting once you start writing. Either
situation should nudge you to return to your data and see what was happening
(moving back around the hermeneutic circle). Are there multiple ideas within
one initial code that might benefit from more thought? Are there other parts of
the data that might elaborate your ideas and develop those dull themes? If you
encounter these questions early, it’s an exciting way to advance your analysis.
How can PGPR help
We can help you take the plunge Image by Anja via Pixabay
If you’re unsure or
reluctant to take the plunge, we can help. A Skype session might help make
decisions about writing. If your supervisor can’t review all your developing
ideas, you can ask for feedback from our team. We can review early drafts and
help you refine and focus further analysis.
Starting to write and explain your ideas is an exciting time in your research. Take the plunge to see where it can take you.
If you’re reading this blog, you’re either a PGPR client or you’re thinking about becoming one. Either way – welcome! We hope we’ll get the chance to read some of your research soon.
We offer several levels of service here at PGPR. This is a blog to explain what you’ll get when you book each of those services.
1. Standard proofreading
First and foremost, proofreading is about ensuring that your spelling and grammar are correct. You probably realised that, but PGPR proofreaders also look out for and help you with more than just those factors. Those extra areas include:
Tightening your writing by cutting down overly long sentences
Clarifying confusing text
Ensuring consistency of formatting, terminology, punctuation and so on
Improving readability by removing repetition and style
We’ll amend your piece using Word’s track changes feature and send you back two copies: one with the changes still marked and one clean copy. We will also include some comments to ensure we haven’t changed your meaning, ask any questions or check that you agree with any suggested re-formatting.
Who should use our basic proofreading service? Clients who are happy with the structure and meaning of their work, but who struggle with English or academic writing.
2. Light proofreading
We also offer a light proofreading service which is perfect for those on a tight budget or those whose work is 90% there. With this service, we just check spelling, punctuation and grammar, rather than looking for those extras included in our standard service. This service is quicker and cheaper than our standard service.
Who should use our light proofreading service? Clients who are on a tight budget and/or those who are confident that their writing is strong and just want a second pair of eyes. Please note that we have to check that work is of a high enough standard to qualify for light proofreading as this is not always the case.
3. Feedback only
PGPR consists of Johanna Spiers and Astrid Coxon, both of whom are qualitative methods experts. As such, we can offer feedback on your structure, methodology, findings and discussion sections. We might ask whether you could dig a bit deeper with a certain interpretation, or if you can find links between certain themes. We may also suggest papers which would be useful to read, point out methodological errors or highlight sections of your thesis which your examiners might question you about.
We can also offer feedback on earlier stages of analysis, such as tables of themes or transcripts. It might be helpful for you to consider a Video Consultation with us if you’re at this earlier stage – more on those below.
If you book feedback only, you’ll get a single copy of your work back, marked up with helpful comments from one of our team. Read more about our brilliant team here.
The PGPR team will tell you what’s working and what needs more polishing
Who should use our feedback only service? If you are confident that your writing is strong, but you feel less sure about whether your analysis or methodology are as robust as they can be, this is the service for you.
4. Proofreading plus feedback
This is our deluxe service and is fairly self-explanatory! If you book this service, we’ll combine all the elements of basic proofreading and feedback. This means you’ll get two copies of your work back: one with the tracked changes still there for you to look at and one clean copy. Both copies will include the feedback comments.
PGPR clients are great; we genuinely enjoy giving you feedback Photo by Adam Jang on Unsplash
Who should book proofreading plus feedback? If you’re feeling unsure about your English or academic writing skills and need some extra assistance with your analysis, book this service.
5. Video consultations
We also offer video consultations for our qualitative clients. These are an ideal opportunity to talk through difficulties you’re having at any stage of your research project with either Johanna or Astrid.
Once you’ve booked a session, you can send some examples of your work for us to look over. We will then spend up to an hour discussing the work with you via a video chat. Note it’s fine to turn the video function off if you feel shy – you’ll still be able to hear our advice and questions.
You can read more about the benefits of our video consultations here.
Use one of our friendly VC sessions to steer you in the right direction Photo by visuals on Unsplash
Who should book a video consultation? Anyone who is feeling stuck with any stage of their qualitative research project.
6. Per-hour feedback
We now offer written feedback for tables of themes and other early stages of analysis. We charge per hour (instead of per word) for this because a table of themes might not have many words yet is likely to include a lot of material for discussion. We will comb through the documents you send us and offer our feedback via comments on the page and a written report. You can set the amount of time you want us to spend on your documents or we can estimate how long the job will take before we start. Just get in touch to hear more.
Who should use our per-hour feedback service? Clients who are at an early stage of their analysis and want written feedback to help them move forwards.
7. Referencing services
Reference sections can be a huge challenge for postgrad students. Fortunately, PGPR can help! We offer two referencing services. In the first, reference checking, we will proofread your reference list and ensure that every entry follows the exact format of the referencing system you’re using, whether that’s APA, Harvard, Chicago or any other system. In the second service, cross-checking, we will ensure that every reference on your list is included in your thesis and every in-text citation in your thesis appears on your reference list. This means we will flag up any references you can delete or that you need to add.
Who should book our referencing services? Anyone who is in a muddle about their reference list and can’t bear to sort it out themselves… We know there’s a lot of you out there!
8. Formatting
Our final service involves ensuring that your thesis looks as polished and professional as it can. We will ensure that all your headings are consistent and correct, that your table of contents is up to date, that your tables are formatted correctly and that everything looks just as it should. We recommend that you book our formatting service as the very last thing you do before submitting your thesis, so that everything is perfect before you send your precious research out into the world.
Who should use our formatting service? Anyone who isn’t that techy but still wants their work to visually dazzle – and to follow academic guidelines for presentation.
Our formatting service will ensure that your thesis is perfectly ordered
