The qualitative method of data analysis I have used is IPA (Smith, 1996). This method was chosen because it concerns itself with the “examination of lived experience” (Smith, Flowers & Larkin, 2009, p. 47) and aims to give an “insider’s perspective” to the phenomenon being investigated (Conrad, cited in Smith, Jarman & Osborn, 1999, p. 218). Therefore, this was consistent with the aims of this qualitative research which has a focus on PSWs’ experiences of recovery.
IPA emphasises the double hermeneutics of the approach: the researcher is trying to make sense of that which the participant is trying to make sense of (Smith & Osborn, 2008). Smith and Osborn (2008) explain that this acknowledges that the researcher is in the same position as the participant: they are both trying to make sense of experience. However, unlike the participants, the researcher does not have direct access to the experience they are examining. Smith and Osborn (2008) also describe the double hermeneutics involved in being empathic and standing in the participant’s shoes, while at the same time standing back and being able to observe the participant and be curious about them. The outcome of an IPA is an account of how the IPA researcher thinks the participant is thinking. In this way, I believe the approach is compatible with my critical realist stance. IPA acknowledges that the researcher’s beliefs and experiences will get in the way of observing the phenomenon under examination, but it does not
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discount that an objective reality exists. The next section considers the philosophical influences underpinning IPA.
3.3.1. Philosophical foundations of IPA
The main philosophical influences of IPA include hermeneutics, phenomenology, symbolic interactionism and idiography (Shinebourne, 2011; Smith et al., 2009). Consideration of these philosophical perspectives helped to confirm my use of IPA as a method for data analysis, and so I describe them further in the following sections.
3.3.1.1. Hermeneutics
IPA is informed by hermeneutics, and this connection relates to the interpretative aspect of the approach. People strive to make meaning out of their experience and so their account will be an interpretation influenced by their own idiosyncratic perspective. The researcher is seen as an active participant in the research process that tries to make sense of the participant’s account (Eatough & Smith, 2007). Hence, Smith et al. (2009) consider the IPA researcher to be engaged in a double hermeneutic.
3.3.1.2. Phenomenology
Phenomenology is an approach founded by Husserl (as cited in Crotty, 1998) and was developed as a reaction to the experimental scientific method which he believed to be an inadequate method in which to fully understand human experience. Husserl argued that science offers an abstract view of the “lived world” which is divorced from our actual lived experience (Crotty, 1998, p. 27). Phenomenology aims to offer a method of enquiry which searches for meaning and the essence of experience (Roberts, 2013). It encourages a phenomenological attitude which consists of putting aside expectations and assumptions and engaging fully with the here and now experience of the
phenomena we are wanting to understand. This then enables us to experience the “things themselves” and allows meanings to emerge from the experience (Crotty, 1998, p. 78).
3.3.1.3. Symbolic interactionism
IPA also utilises concepts from symbolic interactionism. This suggests that although our interpretations of the world around us are individual, the meaning we give to these
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experiences are located within a broader cultural and social context. Therefore, IPA does not focus solely on the participant’s experience, but considers the data in relation to its wider social, cultural and psychological meanings (Willig, 2008).
3.3.1.4. Idiography
An idiographic perspective focuses on “the particular” and emphasises the need for a detailed and in-depth analysis of the phenomenon being researched. In addition, it aims to understand the experience of “particular people in a particular context” (Smith et al., 2009, p. 29). In this way, it is able to offer knowledge and understanding about a particular experiential phenomenon (be it a situation, a process or a relationship); this is in contrast to a nomothetic approach, in which data is collected and analysed in a way that provides knowledge related to statistics and probabilities, but does not allow for an analysis of the individuals who provided the data (Smith, Harré & Van Langenhove, 1995).
As can be seen from reviewing the philosophical underpinnings of IPA, this
methodology was consistent with the aim of this qualitative research to gain an in-depth understanding of the experience of PSWs. It was not intended to find out why
experiences take place, or why there may be differences between them, but to describe and document the lived experiences of the participants. IPA is also consistent with a critical realist stance, and fits with my own philosophical positioning and with that of counselling psychology.
3.3.2. Limitations of IPA
In reflecting on whether IPA was the most appropriate approach to take for this study, I considered the potential limitations to this approach.
IPA is an approach which requires participants to be able to clearly articulate their experience through language, and so the data is dependent on their ability to do this (Willig, 2008). In addition, it does not provide an explanation (Shaw, 2001), nor does it test a hypothesis, and the results cannot be generalised (Pringle, Drummond,
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The reliability and validity of IPA have also been questioned (Smith, 2011). Even though the researcher may attempt to bracket assumptions, there is no denying that the data will be influenced by the researcher. Therefore, it is argued that IPA research is not replicable and that each researcher is likely to bring something different to the research; for some commentators this brings into question the reliability and validity of IPA studies (Silverman, 2006). However, many of the criticisms of IPA are made from a positivist stance. In contrast to a positivist perspective, IPA seeks to understand experience and does not seek to find facts (Clarke, 2009).
Although there are potential limitations and some criticisms of IPA, the approach is consistent with the aims of this study and with the philosophical underpinnings of the field of recovery and counselling psychology. IPA studies are able to provide useful insights and can make a valuable contribution to the literature by contextualising the research and making it more accessible (Pringle et al., 2011).