Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis

IPA is the name given to the research strategy developed by Jonathan Smith, Professor of Psychology at Birkbeck University of London. IPA is the study of human existence and the way in which things are perceived as they appear in the consciousness (Smith, 1996; 2004; 2007). Applied in this study, it was used to focus a deep understanding of an individual’s perception of the care system.

IPA draws on Husserl’s, (1982; 1999) phenomenological perception but develops this further by including the works of Heidegger (2005), Merleau-Ponty (1962) and Sartre (1957). Separate to Husserlian phenomenology, IPA argues that it is important to view each person taking part in research as being embedded, and immersed, in a world of objects and relationships, language, culture, projects and concerns. By including this view, Smith, Flowers & Larkin (2009) explain that in contrast to the phenomenological practices of Husserl (1982):

‘IPA enables the research study to move away from the descriptive commitments and transcendental interests towards a more interpretative, and worldly position, with a specific focus on understanding the perspective of the individual’s involvement in the lived world’

(Smith, Flowers & Larkin, 2009: 5)

Thus, through the work of Husserl, (1982), Heidegger (2005), Merleau-Ponty (1962), and Sartre (1957), the existential aspects of IPA provide a basis for the development of a structure, or Gestalt, of a particular experience (Smith, 1996; 2004). The

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methods for achieving this will be developed over the course of the following discussion, but for now, the central aim is to demonstrate how the work of four major existentialist philosophers, Husserl, Heidegger, Sartre, and Merleau-Ponty, provide the basis for this study, thus demonstrating why IPA was best suited to overall research aims and objectives.

3.4.1 Husserlian phenomenology

The driving principle of IPA, owes its life to a German born mathematician and philosopher, Edmund Husserl (1859–1938). In spite of being criticised as an often ‘serious and inaccessible philosopher’, (Vandenberg, 1997), Husserl’s progressive approach to scientific knowledge laid the foundations for disclosing presuppositions about human experience and conceptualising their invariant elements (Macann, 2008). Husserl is most famous for rejecting the positivist orientation towards empiricism in a continuing and continuously revised effort to develop a method for grounding scientific knowledge in subjective truth (Sokolowski, 2000). According to Moustakas, (1994: 24) and Moran (2000: 65), Husserl saw positivism as ‘second order knowledge’, which he believed depends ultimately on a first order subjective understanding of lived experience. He was critical of science’s privileged knowledge claims, and argued that engaging with the ‘lebenswelt’, or lifeworld, of an individual is the only method capable of providing the experiential grounding of what may be called the objective scientific world (Husserl, 1982).

Langdridge (2008) suggests that the phenomenological apect of IPA owes its fruitfulness to the far-reaching and profound consequences that Husserl drew from Franz Brentano’s theoretical perception of ‘intentionality’. Here intentionality is not being used in the usual sense, by ‘intending to visit the dentist’, for example. Instead, it refers to the fact that whenever a person is conscious, or aware, they are always conscious, or aware, of something (Husserl, 1970; 1982).

3.4.2 Intentionality

In The idea of Phenomenology, Husserl (1999) introduces intentionality as a correlation between the principles of noesis and noema, which can be illustrated by

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example of the research focus. Consider, the scenario of a Traveller girl seeing a children’s home for the first time and feeling scared by it. Husserl would argue that when this young person saw the children’s home for the first time an intentional relationship, facilitated by the process of noesis and noema, occurred. Noesis, the actual experience of seeing of a children’s home, led to noema, the feeling of being scared.

The correlation between noesis and noema is important for IPA. According to Husserlian phenomenology, before the girl perceived the children’s home, it was nothing more than a meaningless object in the world; a simple organised pile of ceramic materials. However, when the girl saw it, and ascribed meaning to it, it ceased to be meaningless, and became a real object in the world with real value. The reality, or essence, of the children’s home only became known to her through her perception of it. Consistent with this example, Husserl (1999) argues that all objects in the world are meaningless until they are given status through the individual interpretations of the individual consciousness. Once the object has been given meaning, intentionality is used to describe the relationship between a person and the object that they perceive.

An important aspect of intentionality is the fact, like in most correlations, the relationship that the girl may have towards the children’s home is reciprocal, and therefore susceptible to change (Husserl, 1970; 1982; 1999; Langdridge, 2008; Smith, Flowers & Larkin, 2009). Therefore, if the girl was asked to describe the experience of seeing the children’s home a number of years after the event, Husserlian phenomenology would reason that whilst she may be able to recall a memory of it, the shape of the building, the number of windows, the colour of the front door, and so on, she may only be able to accurately remember how it made her feel when she first perceived it, through a series of well-chosen and considered questions. The formulation of these questions and the interest in original noesis noema experience is the precise focus of IPA (Smith, Flowers & Larkin, 2009).

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Intentionality in IPA

The concept of intentionality and the relationship between the noetic and noematic correlation, determined a predominant interested in finding a means by which a Traveller or Gypsy person might be enabled, by a researcher, to identify the essential qualities, or essence of their own experiences of living in care (Smith, Flowers & Larkin, 2009). However, the introduction of a researcher, in the understanding and representation of Traveller and Gypsy’s experience, introduces an additional aspect of IPA.

Husserl assumes that intentionality is not only correlated but it also unique to the individual observer (Moustakas, 1994). Whilst the Traveller girl from the above example may be enabled to describe her experience, intentionality holds that the researcher would naturally develop his or her own intentionality towards her response (Husserl, 1999). Whilst listening to her experience, the researcher may naturally begin to create a unique noetic picture of what her experience was like, and consequently develop a noematic interpretation of it (Bernet, Kern, & Marbach, 1999). Husserl’s (1982) writings warn that if this occurs, the girl’s description of seeing the children home could lose its significance because of the biases attached to her experience by a researcher.

In an attempt to reduce this risk, Ricoeur et al., (2007) explain that Husserl developed a number of ‘anti-intentionality’ principles. He believed that if these were implemented with due care and reflective eminence, a researcher might be able to understand the essence of another’s experience, away from the pressures and prejudices of their own noematic interpretation (Husserl, 1999). The foremost theoretical principle that Husserl describes to achieve this type of objectivity is known as the epochè.

3.4.3 The Epochè

The epochè is used to describe the process by which a researcher may be enabled to ensure that both they, and the person describing an experience, can abstain from applying any presuppositions, or preconceived ideas that might distort the essential

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features of it (Bernet, Kern & Marbach, 1999; Langdridge, 2008). The core aim of epochè is doubt (Ricoeur et al., 2007), not a complete doubt about everything that is in the world, but a doubt about the natural attitude or biases that may influence everyday knowledge (Siles i Borrás, 2010). Although a common misconception, it is important to appreciate that the epochè does not mean that the taken for granted world must disappear. Instead, Moran (2002) explains that Husserl wanted the epochè to enable the researcher, and the person taking part in the research, to be as objective as possible (Smith, Flowers & Larkin, 2009).

Most existential phenomenologists agree that the epochè is not an easy thing to achieve (Moustakas, 1994), and some writers question if it can be accomplished at all (Smith, 2009). Nevertheless, the challenge of the epochè, for both researcher, and the person describing the experience, is to let the things that are being described appear in their own consciousness as if it was for the first time (Langdridge, 2008). Although Husserl describes many methods to achieve the epochè, the majority, particularly in his later writings, are philosophically abstract and often contradictory. Consequently, variations in phenomenological methodology flourish as seen in the works of Ashworth, (1996; 2006), Ashworth & Ashworth, (2003), Todres, (2005; 2007), Halling, Leifer, & Rowe (2006), Van Manen (2007), Smith (2007) and Dalhberg, Dalhberg & Nyström (2008), although most adhere reasonably closely to Giorgi’s framework based on the reduction and imaginative variation commonly known as the ‘eidetic reduction’ (Giorgi, 1989; 1994; 1997; 2008a; 2008b).

3.4.4 Eidetic reduction

Many writers have tried to describe how eidetic reduction works in practice (Moran, 2002; Ricoeur et al., 2007; Bernet, Kern & Marbach, 1999; Siles i Borrás, 2010), but the one generally accepted technique is known as ‘free imaginative variation’ (Giorgi, 2008a). It is widely held that the purpose of this technique aims to enable people taking part in research to consider different possibilities of their original noetic experience, and epochè any potential influences that may have distorted this over time (Husserl, 1999). If achieved, IPA believes that the original intentionality of a

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person’s consciousness towards objects in the world can be understood and then communicated to others (Smith, Flowers & Larkin, 2009).

For a researcher, the preliminary aspect of eidetic reduction requires the careful consideration of the essence of an object in the world so to be able to bracket his or her own presuppositions towards them (Husserl, 1999). If this technique were applied to the example of asking the Traveller girl to describe her initial impression of a children’s home, Smith, Flowers & Larkin (2009: 14) suggest that the researcher would do well to epochè their own perceptions of a children’s home. If achieved, they would be better able to attend an interview with certain openness, ready to learn from the reported experience. By isolating their own beliefs, or prior knowledge, the researcher can then move towards the epochè demonstrated by the questions that they ask (Langdridge, 2008). Using ‘free imaginative variation’ an example of a typical research question, acknowledging epochè, may be: “What made the

children’s home a children’s home and not a hospital?” The aim of this question

would be to help establish the essential features of the children’s home, that is, to establish its essence from the viewpoint of the person with that experience.

Through the process of eidetic reduction, the researcher achieves an epochè of his or her own preconceived idea of a children’s home. By asking how it was different to a hospital, the person’s own consciousness of the children’s home can be explored. Husserl (1999) argues that this process is also likely to attend to what meaning the children’s home holds in the lived experience, and what the practical and emotional features of it are. The question, “what is the difference between the feeling of being

safe and the feeling of being scared?” is one further example of how this could be

achieved. Although the researcher may think they know what the difference between these experiences means for themselves, this question shows that they are not assuming the difference in the unique lives of others (Macann, 2008).

This clear focus upon experience demonstrates Husserl’s influence on IPA. Another influential philosopher was Martin Heidegger. His work was concerned with establishing the truth about the ontology of human existence.

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3.4.5 Heideggerian phenomenology

In Being and Time, Heidegger (2005) sought to examine the objects that exist in the world. In terms of the example of the Traveller girl, Heidegger would argue that phenomenological inquiry would become erroneous if it only sought to focus on the essence of her conscious experience. Instead, he believed that her ‘relatedness-to- the-world’ is a fundamental part of the phenomenological constitution and is therefore an essential feature of interpretation. Consequently, Heideggerian phenomenology reasons that experience must be seen in an historical and cultural context (Morran, 2002).

While this approach is concerned less with the universal discovery of the essence the girl’s consciousness of the children’s home, it is concerned more with interpreting the meaning of it from a position that is always grounded within cultural understanding (Langdridge, 2008). By taking this stance, Heidegger’s approach problematises the ability of phenomenology to adopt a ‘presuppositionless’ view, and insists that the systematic inquiry must be more focused on a person-centred position in relation to whatever it hopes to understand (ibid: 35). This move away from the Husserlian belief that experience can be classified through perception (Heidegger, 2005), awareness and consciousness (Moustakas, 1994), introduces the first concept of Heidegger’s approach to phenomenology, namely that of Dasein.

3.4.6 Dasein

Dasein represents Heidegger’s preferred term for the uniquely situated quality of people in the world. For Heidegger, a person is thrown into a pre-existing world of people and objects, language and culture, and the aim of phenomenology is to understand how experiences are created within socio-economic systems that may include amongst others, poverty, racism, disablement, marginalisation, homophobia, patriarchy, social exclusion, domestic violence, social control and so forth. By affording primacy to Dasein, Heideggarian phenomenology would assume that these factors have a direct impact on the lives of people in the world and shape and inform their construction, or intentionality towards objects within it.

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If the example of the children’s home were considered again, Heideggerian phenomenology would suggest that a person from the settled community, who, through the process of socialisation, believes that all people should live in a brick house, may interpret the elements that make up the object of the children’s home with some sense of familiarity. They may recognise the doors, the windows, the roof, the garden and so on, and, because of past noematic experiences, they may associate the object known as a children’s home with their intentional consciousness of a house. Conversely, a Traveller girl, again through the process of socialisation, may be less able to associate the object known as a children’s home with their intentional consciousness of a home. In fact, the object known as a children’s home may hold other significant meanings for her because of the external social systems that have maintained the physical separation between Travelling and settled communities throughout history (Cemlyn et al., 2009)

For Heidegger, these factors become manifest in an original emotional and physical response of being scared (Heidegger, 2005). For this girl, the children’s home may represent wider experiences that reinforce her disenfranchised position as a Traveller. Therefore, in order to understand the impact of this, Heideggerian phenomenology may also ask the person “What did the children’s home mean to you

as a Traveller?” By focusing on the self as a Traveller, this question acknowledges

that the children’s home and the girls’ self-concept as a Traveller are inextricably linked. By presenting this type of question, IPA is able to use this developing understanding to expand areas of knowledge that may otherwise be hidden behind the original commitment for Husserlian phenomenology (Smith, 1996).

A further feature of IPA expands the focus on a person’s cognitive and social intentionality towards an object in the world by moving towards the physicality of an experience of it. The most notable contributors to this development are Jean-Paul Sartre and Merleau-Ponty.

3.4.7 Sartrean phenomenology

Jean-Paul Sartre (1957) emphasised the empty nature of consciousness in Being

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human freedom itself. In this view, humans are not objects, things, to be studied and measured as subjects are measured in the natural sciences (Morran, 2002). Sartre’s (1957: 26) famous expression ‘existence comes before essence’ corroborates the Husserlian noesis noema correlation and underlines the phenomenological premise that humans are always becoming conscious of objects in the world.

As with Heidegger, Sartre would emphasise that the Traveller girl being asked to describe the object known as a children’s home is situated within her own social and cultural context. However, he also argues that whilst she is an individual that is self- conscious, she also seeks meaning as she engages with the world. Similar to Heidegger’s notion of Dasein, Sartre describes how consciousness is not owned or predetermined, but is instead being constantly created and recreated through lived experience (ibid.). Whilst the Traveller girl, on seeing the children’s home for the first time may feel scared by it, Sartrean existentialism would argue that she has a power to fight against that feeling (Sartre, 1957). His theory suggests that the girl is in a position to make sense of her experience, consider the aspects of it, and potentially overcome the anxieties that result within the facticity of her own existence, literally those external social factors that exist to maintain structural discrimination. Thus as her experiential noematic relationship with the children’s home develops, so would her sense making intentionality of it. This rationalisation is an additional feature of IPA and forms a core feature in the determination of experience (Smith, Flowers & Larkin, 2009).

Applied to this example, the Sartrean question might be summarised as “How did

you overcome the experience of being scared?” By responding to this question, the

person’s motivation to change could then be seen to demonstrate the nature of her consciousness, which Sartre argues is a driving desire for her being (Sartre, 1957). If explored fully, Sartrean existentialist phenomenology could be used to understand more about the experiences that led up to, and preceded the experience of seeing the children’s home, and thus understand more about the values that the girl thereby projected onto it (Langdridge, 2008). Even though the reiteration of Heidegger’s emphasis on the worldliness of the human experience is significant to IPA (Smith, Flowers & Larkin, 2009), Sartre extends this by developing the point in the context of

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personal and social relationships and arguing that human experience is contingent to social relationships. Consequently, while IPA will usually focus on a range of differing topics, this type of questioning recognises that people are engaged with objects in the world that embody the interpersonal, affective and the moral nature of those encounters in a similar way to that explored by Merleau-Ponty.

3.4.8 Merleau-Ponty

Merleau-Ponty was a French existentialist who shared Husserl’s and Heidegger’s commitments to understanding the experiences associated with ‘being-in-the-world’ but developed this to include the position of the physical self (Merleau-Ponty, 1962). In terms of trying to understand the way in which a Traveller girl may describe her experiences, Merleau-Ponty would use questions in such a way that emphasises the role that her physical perception plays in her understanding of the world as well as her engagement with it (Langdridge, 2008). This acknowledges the fact that people are unique, and as such see themselves as different from everything else (Morran, 2002). Merleau-Ponty rationalises this by arguing that all people are engaged in looking at the world, rather than being subsumed within it. As a result, in order to understand a person’s intentionality, he focuses on the ‘embodied relationship to the world’ (Merleau-Ponty, 1962:106).

For Merleau-Ponty, the intentional quality or essence of an experience of the children’s home would always be personal to the person who perceives it (Smith, Flowers & Larkin, 2009). He argued that no two people could interpret objects in the world in exactly the same way (Merleau-Ponty, 1962). Consequently, the girls feeling of being scared would be the significant focus of the experience of seeing the