Process of Coding – open and axial coding

The following extract shows how coding changed and developed over time. The first example reflects the initial naivety of me as a researcher,’ forcing’ the data,

inadvertently, into pre-determined codes with minimal abstraction. The data was analysed ‘simply’ in terms of relationships and interactions in line with the questions asked. As I became more familiar and confident with the technique of coding through constant comparison and consideration of the properties and dimensions of the codes, levels of abstraction increased and the data was viewed with greater sensitivity25. (The final coding system used is available in Appendix 10.)

Below is an example of how the same extract was coded, re-analysed and the coding changed using MAXQDA. The colours within the text link with the codes assigned.

25 _{Sensitivity – The ability to pick up on subtle nuances and cues in the data that infer or point to}

Key: Codes

Commitment: adults expressing their commitment to the child

Feelings – adult: How the adult feels about the child

Relationships: General comments about the family relationships

Interaction Needs –adult: What the adult needs to support interaction with the child Other family relationships: What other family members think about each other Different: Child is different from adult in terms of mental state

Situation: Acknowledgement that child might present differently in different situations Roles: Role that people take on

Same text categorised in two ways Open Codes Potential axial code

Key: Codes

Love: Carer expresses love or strong positive emotion for child

We are family: How the adult sees the child fitting in with the family – the use of ‘we’ or collective pronouns

Foster-carer’s role – job: Role foster-carer takes on as paid role

Attachment – not moveable: Carer does not see attachments or relationships as transferrable, reflects their perception of whether they could lose the child

We are family – fitting in – with siblings: Child fits in with family members

We are family- child’s perspective: What the child thinks about the relationships within the family

Claimed – the child is claimed in the same way as the foster-carer’s biological children

“We love her” – changed from a general feeling to recognition of expressed love.

“She’s one of our babies” – changed from a general feeling of commitment to the carer’s claiming Katie.

“I don’t like the thought of them moving to a different foster- carer” – moved from a recognition of the carer’s feelings to attachment – not moveable with greater appreciation of her beliefs and underlying sentiment

As can be seen by this exerpt and how the coding changed once the conceptualisation moved from a focus on interaction and relationships to a more nebulous concept of family and how this was framed by the beliefs fo the foster-carers. Further

transformations occurred through the iterative process of coding, memo writing, integrative diagrams and reflection; both soliary and with colleagues. Coding and analysis therefore was flexible and used MAXQDA software as well as memoing and note taking.

Additional integrative diagrams are provided through the use of MAXMaps26 and these allow coding to be viewed from different perspectives. Two versions are used. One shows how the codes were linked from open codes to categories; One-Code Model, and the other displays how the codes relate to each foster-carer; One-Case Model. The One-Case Model allows pre and psot interviews to be compared and contrasted and form part of the analysis in Part 2 of this chapter. Examples of each are provided to illustrate how the codes link together.

26_{MAXMaps provide a graphical representation of the different codes within each of the} categories. They provide a way of visualising the codes and how each are linked to create the categories. The MAXMap ‘explodes’ the patches so that the detail can be examined.

Example of One-Code Model

In this example the factor is ‘Border.’ The codes linked to ‘Border’ show the coding process and how the codes link in a hierarchical structure; leading to greater levels of abstraction; from the open codes to a factor.

The open codes lead to the factor (category) which is more abstract:- ‘Positive’ and ‘Negative’ comments ->’What other people say’

‘Showing me up’ and ‘Other people’s views about child’s attributes’-> ‘People looking at me’

‘Other people’s views of family’ ->’Other people’

‘Other people’ and ‘What other people say’ led to the factor - ‘Border.’

Category/ factor

Example of One-Case Model

The case in this example is taken from how Daisy and Frank’s Interview One was coded. The MAXMap illustrates what each foster-carer said and how it was coded. Similarly to the Open-Code Model the open codes link with axial codes and factors. Within the One-Case Model some relative quantitative data is available which provides an indication of proportional codes within an interview and therefore offers another way of comparing before and after interviews. The thicker the line, the more a particular code was used.

Category / factor

Open Codes

The thickness of the lines from the case (foster-carer) denotes a proportion of what was said; therefore the thicker the line, the more the carer spoke about those codes in proportion to the rest of the interview.

Examples of memos are provided to show how thinking progressed in other ways to that of coding. Memo writing allowed for what was said by foster-carers to be further analysed and compared. The different formats allowed text to be viewed through micro-analysis to macro-analysis and back again. It was through this constant comparison and the different lenses to look at the data which supported my move to greater abstraction and less ‘forcing’ of the data. When quotes are provided; the person who said it, the interview (One or Two) and paragraph number are provided. (Individual transcripts are in Appendix 11.)

This excerpt shows how intertwined the child, the carer and the family had become. Claire wanted the carers to be her parents and the foster-carer felt that Claire could be one of her husband’s natural children. She had become an integral part of the family; she joined them like a puzzle. The similarity in physical features to her daughter and Memo One

She wants us to be, I know she does and she loves us. And it’s really amazing, I do jokingly say to my husband, “Did you go astray?” because she couldn’t be more like our birth children. I swear to God. You know her, some of her funny ways, the way she’s made, her looks, she couldn’t be more like my daughter if she tried. And it’s really strange. But obviously, not the bad, the difficult side of her but when she is in a good place, she joins us like a puzzle.

Tricia Interview 1 para 33. She wants us to be –

 relating to wanting them to be parents  providing a home

 Being – being there for her

I know she does-  Knows the child  Has insight  Can ‘read’ her

And she loves us –

 Child has strong emotional bond with carer

And it’s really amazing, I do jokingly say to my husband, “Did you go astray?” because she couldn’t be more like our birth children. –

 Amazing – that this child could have come into their life and love them  Amazing that this child could look so like her own children

 Could be related to her own children and/or her husband  That she might accept her husband’s child as her own  Biological bonds – nature vs nurture

When she is in a good place, she joins us like a puzzle

 She fits in with the family (seems to be more like integration rather than inclusion) as she needs to fit with them and the ‘fit’ is dependent on how ‘good’ she is.

husband were important; creating a bond or something that pulled the family members together. The “difficult” side of her though created some tension and seemed to make her less of a good fit.

Jacqueline, within this extract (Memo Two), showed her active efforts to protect herself from the possible loss of the children to another placement. In order to do this she seemed to create an idealised future placement where someone else would be more able to meet the children’s relationship needs and therefore they would be better off. She was readying herself for the children moving on and they were not seen as

Memo Two

I think I trained myself to detach from the …… but if I knew that they were moving on, if I knew that they were moving on to something better for them, for them I would detach myself. Push them to attach to someone else.

Jacqueline Interview 1 para 15 I think I trained myself

 Conscious decision

 Actively trying to do something repeatedly and in a structured formal way

Detach

 Not to attach

 To be separate from

 Detached affect – a psychoanalytic term for affect which has been removed from painful, anxiety or thought with which it was originally associated (Reber, 1985)  Detachment – a sense of emotional freedom, lack of feeling of emotional

involvement in a problem, a defence mechanism that functions by preventing one from forming emotionally intimate ties with others (Reber, 1985)

if I knew that they were moving on to something better for them, for them I would detach myself.

 Not yet in place, not certain,

 The change in placement will be better but some ambivalence

 Implication that move will be for the best and if so then will let them go  It is for them that I would detach, move away from, not for self

Push them to attach to someone else

 Move away with pressure, active act, deliberate  An emotional bond

 Attachment is fluid, something that you can give to someone else, a moveable thing, an entity that can be given, passed on

integral members of her family or long-term plans. Her focus was on her needs and what she needed to do rather than from the child’s viewpoint. Attachment seemed to be conceived as something that could be given away and passed on to someone else.

Memo Three

We talked about how our whole family have been a bit stitched together. And now we can't let go, so now we are stitched together, that's us. And that is where it came from. Patchwork family. And every time a child comes along we stitch them on.

Daisy and Frank – Interview 1 para 54 Use of collective pronouns –

we, our, us – inclusive terminology Whole family –

 links with other extended family members, integral  part of something bigger – more than parents and children

 suggestive of idea of flexible view of an extended family, made up of variety of people related by blood and circumstance (rather than nuclear or traditional family model)  historical view

Stitched –

 joined up, a purposeful act We can’t let go-

 beyond our power to release, come apart  tied, linked together

 not allow it to happen

Patch-

 a patch is something that covers or mends  an area under someone’s control

 covers a wound  a small area

 a temporary connection

Patchwork -

 patches sewn together in a decorative way  something made up of different parts

Every time a child comes along we stitch them on –  Children added to the quilt, pattern or design  Become attached to the quilt, part of the quilt

Quilts grow and reflect family traditions, have a patchwork of fabric of different designs and contexts, each piece adding to and changing the overall pattern. Patches are also used to mend and heal wounds which also fit with other ideas that were becoming apparent in the data.

Memo Three provides further contrasts to the different constructs of family, attachment and what being a foster-carer entails. Katie was an integral family member and fully included within the family. The family were pulled together, attached through ‘stitching’- an active process. Memo Three is one of the richest images of how families are constructed and became the basis for my thinking about how to conceptualise and think about the work and analysis. I kept returning to it as an idea and it became the core of how I integrated my findings.

This idea of the quilt and patchwork led to a revision of how the texts were coded and conceptualised. Basic website searches using ‘quilting glossary terms’ provided further material for consideration. Quilts are typically made of three layers; top, batting and backing. This was similar to the layers described by Bhaskar (1975) in his description of critical realism with the top being the visible, empirical, seen part of the world; the batting (the filler) the actual; that which contains the mechanisms or

processes that may or may not occur and lastly the backing which is not visible and containing reality.

Quilts serve many purposes other than for warmth and can act as representations of lives, values and to mark events. The top of the quilt is made of sewing pieces of fabric together to make up blocks which are usually square but can be of different shapes. These blocks can be made of irregular or scrap pieces with no pre-determined pattern or design. The irregular shaped blocks that represent different factors

identified seemed an apt representation of the different properties and dimensions of the varied factors/categories.

The three memos provide an insight to the similarities and differences between the participants’ perceptions of their relationships with foster-children. What they considered was important within these relationships was also evident. The analysis identified through coding these into factors/categories. This allowed for possible

changes to these factors to be identified and through the data collection mechanisms to be generated so that a theoretical explanatory model could be created.

The theoretical explanatory model created is presented which incorporates these factors /categories and links with the first research question. Subsequently, each of the factors is explained. The factors are the categories (Corbin and Strauss, 2008, p.159) that the carers felt were important when talking about their relationships and these form the patches on the quilt.