Process of Qualitative Data Analysis

There are several methods for qualitative data analysis, in order to organize the data in a way that would draw meaning according to specific criteria, reducing it to a more manageable

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form, displaying it in a form to help analysis, and interpreting it (Polit and Beck, 2006).The approach of analysing for the qualitative/semi-structured interviews in my research was thematic analysis. For Braun and Clarke (2006: 6) thematic analysis “is a method for identifying, analysing and reporting patterns within data”. The benefits of thematic analysis is its flexibility (Braun and Clarke, 2006). Through this flexibility, thematic analysis allows for rich, detailed and complex description of the data (Auerbach and Silverstein, 2003).

Thematic analysis consisted of a process of coding, clustering or subsuming particulars into the general, and confirming (Miles and Huberman, 1994). In order to access the participants’

interpretation of their attitudes towards DVAW, I translated all the interviews notes to English, which was difficult and time-consuming task, offering a vast amount of data. I saved the interview notes in files on a personal computer for confidentiality. I used pseudonyms instead of real names to distinguish between respondents and mainly to observe the codes of confidentiality. I decided not to use a computer software package for analysis such as Nvivo, because the software is very limited, also, it is less useful in order to gain in-depth understanding of the data. Therefore, I decided to analyse the semi-structured interviews on MS Word. This was expanded by writing initial notes in the left hand margins of the interviews notice, initial thoughts, and comments. I identified the common themes extracted from the interviews and analysis. Analytic induction and constant comparison strategies were carried out by systematic examination of similarities between different groups (such as women’s and men’s definitions of VAW) in order to develop concepts or ideas (Strauss and Corbin, 1998). Exploring the differences in men’s and the women’s accounts required a particular focus, and these differences are explored in the remainder of the thesis.

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Analysis was performed in two main stages involved. The first required the coding of the data, and the second involved making sense of the evidence through descriptive or explanatory accounts (Miles and Huberman, 1994). There are no standard rules about how to code the data and researchers differ on how to derive codes, when to start and stop coding and the level of detail they want. Some researchers develop codes that closely match the ideas or language found in the textual data. They want to avoid imposing words or concepts that might prevent them from seeing their data in a new way. Others borrow terms from the social science literature that represent more abstract concepts important to their field (Ulin et al., 2002).

Two types of codes were used: descriptive codes that identified contextual aspects of participants’ personal situation such as relationship parameters (gender, age, educational level, and time spent in the UK) and process codes that were reflective of participants’

responses to the questions regarding the topic. Proses codes were not generated earlier although some codes were suggested by the question that had been asked during the interview.

In seeking patterns and relationships in the data, the concern was to seek relationships between various themes that have been identified, and to relate participants’ views and ideas to socio- demographic characteristics such as age or gender. I searched for differences in experience and different views and perceptions of DVAW that existed among the sample.

When I started coding semi-structured interviews, certain patterns emerged from participants’

responses. These include physical violence, emotional violence, verbal abuse, violence in the family of origin, experience of different types of violence and men as dominate and women as submissive, DVAW as a family matter, controlling females sexuality etc. It appeared that

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many factors contributed in relation to these patterns and these factors led me to notice different attitudes towards DVAW among the participants in the same sample of Libyans in the UK. When I looked at the data several times and read it in Arabic prior to translation into English, it became clear that the factors of importance for the participants varied. Gender made a crucial difference to some themes. In exploring interviews, I noticed key differences between men and women in relation to their attitudes to and perceptions of DVAW. When these differences were examined, it was apparent that there were also other interconnecting factors. With regard to some themes, in some instances the participants’ attitudes differed in relation to their level of education, educational level was more important than the length of residence in the UK. I therefore, sought to establish differences between the group of men and women linked to their levels of education. In order to simplify the analysis, the sample was divided into two groups: `less-educated` and `well/highly-educated`, as outlined previously¹⁷.

On the other hand, one methodological issue in particular, participants’ social class background emerged in the analysis of semi-structured interviews. The issue of class position was highly problematic, so much so that I did not take this variable into consideration in the analysis [this was in both the survey and semi-structured interviews]. In response to

17 Children between the ages of 6 and 15 in Libya attend primary school and then attend secondary school for three additional years (15 to 18 year olds). Pre-university schooling is divided into three sections: primary, preparatory and secondary. The first nine years of education in Libya are compulsory and are known as basic education. They consist of six years of primary school and the first three years of secondary school. Primary education covers six years divided into a four-year period and a two-year period, and secondary education covers six to seven years divided into a three-year cycle (compulsory) and a three to four-year intermediate cycle. (The source: the British Council) http://www.britishcouncil.org/learning-skills-for-employability-libyan-country-education-system.htm

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questions¹⁸ about class position, some people’s perceptions of social class did not accord with common understandings and some participants found it is difficult objectively to state their class. Almost all said they were `middle-class`. Because of their migration to Britain, a substantial number of people as they had to undertake low-paid work, found themselves in a lower social class but continued to consider themselves as being of the same class as had been the case in Libya. Other participants declared themselves to be `middle-class` although their yearly income was less than £10,000 and they had not attained a higher education qualification. In addition, some women misunderstood the term `working-class` believing that, this referred to being in employment. Cultural differences were also noted in the way in which language was used. In Arabic the term used in for this, is `lower-class` and so is somewhat stigmatising. Overall, most of the participants in this sample tended to consider themselves middle-class, usually as they mentioned they were from `good` or `wealthy`

families in Libya and were supported to some degree by their families. Since informants did not differentiate themselves by class, it was not possible to include class as a variable in the analysis.

Drawing and verifying conclusions, included identifying patterns and themes, exploring what they mean, clustering things into categories, and making sure conclusions are acceptable and make sense (Miles and Huberman, 1994). This was done by reading through each interview several times. If a theme or pattern was recognised in more than two, it was noted down on the next to the specific excerpt that referred to it, as well as on a separate blank document.

18 What social class would you say you belong to? And `On what basis what makes you a 'member' of this class?

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This blank document would eventually have a list of all the themes that were identified. The themes and sub-themes were then categorised and organized. This process involved many revisions and feedback from my supervisors. Finally, the themes were organised by major themes and sub-themes, keeping the initial research questions in mind. This step helped to guide the analysis chapters which displays the results and discusses these categories in detail.

It also helped to link the themes to the research questions.

The participants’ accounts were the co-product of the participant and the researcher, with the participant having the main role in highlighting and stressing the main themes in responses to the research questions.Themes were written up using all the codes and categories within each theme with quotes to produce descriptive accounts. Using direct quotes from the interview data strengthened the face validity and credibility of the findings and demonstrated the integrity and competence of the results (Patton, 1990). This was followed by a final stage:

interpretation to provide associations between findings, explanations, and the nature of DVAW. This also would ensure the strength of the data analysis. Quality measures were undertaken to enhance the validity and reliability of the findings from the interviews and the survey. I selected the common themes; however, I did not ignore some of the specific cases.

Some of these common topics emerged as a result of the questions I asked each participant and others came about as a result of quantitative data analysis.To help manage the data, the thematic analysis was informed using a framework of triangulation method. I linked the findings of the survey and the matching themes that emerged from the interviews to triangulate the different types of data within the conceptual framework of my thesis. Data that informed the categories were charted in a table for each participant to provide an overview of

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the data gained in each interview. This allowed me to focus on each case and to link participants’ accounts in the semi-structured interview with the survey sample. This also allowed me to look across all participants’ accounts to compare their views in order to summarise theses into an outline of data. This also allowed the data to be analysed and explored by comparison between the quantitative and qualitative sample. The themes which emerged from the interviews matched those in the survey. The methodological reason for this, was that both the semi-structured interview guide and the survey questions were built on the same themes, seeking to approach the research aims and objectives.

Having discussed the processes of the analysis of semi-structured interviews, the next section now proceeds to the quantitative analysis. It commences with an exploration of the statistical analysis used in the quantitative/survey methods.