First Attempt at Analysing the Data

6.5.1 Open Coding

I worked my way through all the case vignettes giving each meaning unit an

identifying code that gave the case study number plus sequence number (i.e. where it appeared in the text.) In some cases this was a relatively simple process. However, the case vignettes with large blocks of descriptive text and clinical commentaries woven through were more challenging. I managed this by open coding all the data that referred directly to mental imagery which comprised individual phrases and sentences. I coded the rest of the data in larger meaning units and this comprised a range of meaning units from individual sentences to small groupings of two to four sentences. This allowed me to focus more specifically on the data regarding the mental image itself.

6.5.2 Initial Categories

Each meaning unit was assigned to one or more categories. Initially I arrived at forty concrete descriptive categories. It was obvious on reading these through that here was a difficulty with the sheer range. Some of the categories were large and

undifferentiated e.g. client emotion. Others contained very few meaning units and were over-differentiated e.g. client response to imagery, effect of image on client, changes in client’s response to image.

Finally after conflating some of the smaller categories I arrived at thirty categories. These categories appeared to cluster around four main themes. I list the four themes and the categories below:

i. Concerning the client. This contained the following categories:

 Client background

 Presenting issue for imagery

 Client response to technique of imagery

 Client emotions

 Client response to imagery

 How client uses or works with image

68 ii. Concerning the therapist. This contained the following categories:

 Therapist interventions and rationale for using imagery intervention

 Therapist explanation of imagery

iii. Concerning the therapeutic outcome. This contained the following categories:

 Changes in client behaviours linked to imagery

 Therapeutic outcome

iv. Concerning the image itself. This contained the following categories:

 Changes in image

 Images with colours

 Images with sensory descriptions

 Images of imaginary figures

 Images of known people

 Images of clients own self

 Images of objects

 Images of plants

 Images of creatures

 Images of space and territory

 Images of body parts

 Images actively operating

 Images dialoguing

 Containing imagery

 Reparative/healing/imagery

 Somatic rather than visual imagery response

 Image deemed to have particular psychological function

 Actual recalled memories

And finally there was material that did not appear to be useful data which was collected together as:

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 Extraneous material e.g. tabulated research findings; client background etc.

Although I had been pursuing the initial line of inquiry of descriptive categories of mental imagery, this category listing did not look very promising. It appeared to me to be unfocussed. However, I decided to take my analysis one stage further.

6.5.3 Unsatisfactory Results from Constant Comparison

McLeod (2001:73) describes the processes of constant comparison and axial coding that follow on from open coding;

‘The file or set of categories is then examined as an entirety, to identify higher order categories (i.e. ideas that allow the clustering together of subsets of the initial categories that were created during the open coding).’ I decided to attempt the process of constant comparison by systematically working through each of the four groupings I had identified and I began with the smallest one i.e. therapeutic outcome that comprised two categories. On reviewing this grouping a clearer operationalisation of the therapeutic outcome of using mental imagery

emerged i.e.: improvement in behaviour; improvement in sense of self and emotions; and positive impact on therapeutic process. However, this did not seem to be very useful as it disclosed generic processes and was only tangentially related to mental imagery.

I then attended to the much larger and more relevant grouping of all the categories directly related to the mental image. As I reviewed the data contained within these categories and looked for higher order concepts a significant problem became apparent. I appeared to have listings of various common properties of the mental image that no longer had any therapeutic referent. In other words I might well be able to identify significant clusters of types of figures for example but this would be meaningless divorced from the original psychotherapeutic context. I could well be looking at mental images produced from dreams, reverie, or personal development etc. I had separated off the mental image from the producer of the image i.e. the client and therefore I would not be in any position to see if there were meaningful patterns emerging that related to therapy. McLeod (2001:73) states that this critical process of axial coding is the key to making sense of the data;

70 ‘This method allows the fragmentation of the research text that took place during coding to be reversed; the pieces of the jigsaw are put back together to make a whole picture.’

It was obvious to me at this point that no coherent picture was going to emerge from this attempt at analysing the data.

I felt stymied. I had followed basic grounded theory procedures for data analysis but it seemed to me that my data was fractured in a way that would not allow anything of any use to emerge. I could see that all I would be able to produce from this was purely lists of numbers of examples of for example figures or objects. I might be able to make a link between directive and nondirective imagery and the range of images produced but little more than that, e.g. directive therapeutic approaches tend to use imagery of figures and nondirective approaches tend to have a much wider range that includes objects, places etc. However, I did not think this was a particularly useful insight. I did not know how to proceed. As mentioned earlier (see 5.4) I had doubts regarding the suitability of my data at the onset of the analysis. Now I believed that not only had I collected unsuitable data, I had also chosen the wrong methodology to pursue my line of inquiry into typologies of mental imagery. It seemed to me that my research inquiry had reached a dead end. I decided to abandon my first attempt at analysing the data and return to the literature to see if there was another way through this impasse.