an introduction to phenomenographic research

An introduction to phenomenographic

research

Sheila Webber

and

Bill Johnston

EAHIL+ICAHIS+

ICLC workshop

Edinburgh

June 2015

Structure

• Introduction to phenomenography

– What it is & the process of research

– Examples of research

• Exercise: Examining a phenomenographic study

• Carrying out phenomenographic research

– Research question and sampling

– Phenomenographic interviewing

– Phenomenographic analysis

• Exercise: Transcript analysis

• How you could use phenomenography in your own work Sheila Webber and Bill Johnston, 2015

Introduction to phenomenography

Sheila Webber and Bill Johnston, 2015

"Phenomenography is the empirical

study of the differing ways in

which people experience,

perceive, apprehend, understand,

conceptualise various

phenomena in and aspects of the

world around us.”

Marton (1994)

Marton, F. (1994). Phenomenography. In T. Husén and T.N. Postlethwaite. (Eds.), The international

encyclopedia of education. (2nd ed.). (pp. 4424-4429) Oxford, England: Pergamon Press.


Phenomenon

?

Interviewee Interviewer

Interviewees chosen

purposively, usually to

maximise potential variation

The interview circles

around the central question:

discovering the key focus of

Interviewee’s conception of

the phenomenon

You should be empathetic,

but should not influence the

interviewee


Interviews

e.g. for academics’ conceptions

of IL and teaching IL - 3 basic

questions:

– What is your conception of IL?

– How do you engage your

students in IL?

– What is your conception of the

Information Literate University?


Categories

Pool of interview

transcripts

Analysis

e.g.

describing

different

ways of

experiencing

the

phenomenon

A descriptive ‘snapshot’ + Outcome Space (structure)

Holistic view

Variation not

communality

Not looking for

causal

relationships

Focus only on

transcripts


Examples

• Librarians’ conceptions of themselves as teachers

(Wheeler, 2014)

• UK academics’ conceptions of information literacy,

and pedagogy for information literacy (e.g. Webber

et al., 2005)

• Irish solo librarians’ conceptions of Continuing

Professional Development (Hornung, 2013)

• Older Australians’ experiences of health information

literacy (Yates et al., 2012)


Categories from Hornung’s research • Category 1 CPD is upskilling for the sake of the

organization/library service (service orientation)

• Category 2 CPD is about developing as a professional

librarian (LIS profession orientation)

• Category 3 CPD is helping you to do all the jobs an

OPL does (OPL orientation)

• Category 4 CPD is when you have learned something

and you want to do things in a better way when you

come back (personal orientation)

• Category 5 CPD is about your development as a

human being (lifelong learning orientation) Sheila Webber and Bill Johnston, 2015

Category 1

‘“Well, I did go to one on copyright and it was interesting, but . . . maybe

it would have been more relevant [mentions different library type]

librarian. And we’d be very, very direct and the type of work I do is

very consistent and I’d know things in copyright in terms of what I do.

I feel that I’m very much geared, like the library where I work has made

me, rather than, you know what I mean? I fit into what’s needed in the

organization and adapt to that . . . So I suppose I kind of see myself

more of an information officer rather than a librarian in the more

traditional sense, do you know . . . So, I think I’ve just kind of more

developed with the organization and knowing what that needs rather

than my own needs.”’ (Interviewee 4) (684-5)

Category 5

‘“Mmmmh. . . . for myself, personally, yeah? [Interviewer: Yeah] Oh, your mind

would go numb if you didn’t continue to learn. Everyone should learn for life, I

suppose.”’

(Interviewee 10) (689)


Examining a phenomenographic

study

Andresson, E.K., Willman, A., Sjostrom-Strand, A. and Borglin, G. (2015). Registered nurses' descriptions of caring: a phenomenographic interview study. BMC Nursing, 14:16. DOI 10.1186/s12912-015-0067-9 http://www.biomedcentral.com/1472-6955/14/16


http://www.biomedcentral.com/1472-6955/14/16



Discussion

• Questions that we already posed

– Think about how the researchers justified/located the

study in the overall context of the historical development

of nursing and some current challenges.

– How does the account of methods relates to your ideas

about how to conduct research?

– Raise any questions you would like to ask e.g. clarifying

terminology

• Discuss them in groups, then share in discussion


Carrying out a phenomenographic

study


Identifying the research question

This will be in the form of:

What are the qualtatively different ways in which [the

population] conceive of/ experience [the phenomenon]

“The focus of this study was to describe the variation

in how nurses could conceive, understand and

conceptualise the phenomenon of caring” (Andersson

et al, 2015)

Selecting the sample

• Identify target population

• Purposive sample

• Try to get variation (you may not know what the

factors in conceiving differently are, but think about

factors which might cause variation: these will vary

depending on the phenomenon studied)


Phenomenographic interviewing


Key issues

• Data normally normally gathered in semi structured

interviews

• Always circling round the main research question

(including asking it directly!) – sometimes talk about

a spiral process

• Empathy in interviewing

• Bracketing your own views (setting them to one

side); vital not to “lead” interviewee’s thinking

• Ashworth and Lucas (2000) useful article Sheila Webber and Bill Johnston, 2015

Interviewing as a learning experience (see Hornung Salha

& Webber: observations on 3 studies)

• Interviewees mentioned how interviews changed their thinking

• Interview as a learning experience for both interviewer and interviewee

• Relationship between interviewer and interviewee changed

• The setting influenced the quality of the relationship and of the interview

• Cultural issues & existing relationships need to be taken into account


Phenomenographic analysis


Analysis has to reveal 2 things

• Referential aspect (what is being experienced; what

it means): Categories of description, each

category describing one experience/ conception

• Structural aspect (how the phenomenon is

experienced): Outcome space showing how the

categories are related, including the dimensions of

variation that link and separate the conceptions

• We will focus on identifying categories in this

session


Process of analysis

• The most difficult, time-consuming part! “my

phenomenographic research odyssey” (Joseph Essel)

• Iterative process

• Remembering always to focus on quotations: these

exemplify meaning they are not just illustrative

• May be useful to start with one or a few transcripts

• Useful to have team or fellow researcher to challenge

each others’ ideas once you start proposing categories

• Generally categories start emerging before structure,

but again this is iterative


Pictures copyright Eva Hornung

• Many themes associated with the phenomenon may

emerge

• You are looking for the ones in focal awareness,

the ones that are returned to

• Therefore numerous themes may be identified

initially, but dropped in the final analysis


3 criteria for categories

• They must be qualitatively distinctive

• They should be structurally linked (possibly

hierarchically)

• There should be the minimum number of categories

that can capture the variations in experience or

conception

(Marton and Booth, 1997: 125)


Boon, Johnston &

Webber 2006

Transcripts Interview Atlas/TI

Interviewee

Discussion, debate,

and analysis

Atlas/TI data

(charts/graphs)

Reading, annotating,

highlighting, selecting

quotes, and concept-

mapping

Interviewer

Reflecting, distilling

and drafting

Example research process

Categories and

outcome space

Readings re: analysis

• 2 books published by RMIT (Bowden and Walsh,

2000; Bowden and Green, 2005)

• Methods chapters from PhD theses

• Data analysis section in Lupton (2004)

• Marton and Booth (1997)


Exercise: Transcript analysis


• Identify quotations which you think exemplify some

aspect of the interviewee’s conception(s) of

information literacy

– Individually read through the transcript and mark things

out

• Compare and discuss what you have discovered

– Agreement/ disagreement about what are significant

quotations

– Do they exemplify one or more conceptions?

– How might you start to categorise the conceptions?


How you could use

phenomenography in your own work


Reasons for understanding

phenomenography

• Gaining insight into information and healthcare

practice from existing phenomenographic research

• Carrying out your own research


Applications of phenomenographic research

• Variation theory: having identified how learners’

conceive of a subject, you design learning that

enables them to experience the variations

• Workplace training & education (e.g. studies of how

patients’ experience illnesses - useful for training

nurses)


Sheila Webber

Information School

University of Sheffield

[email protected]

Twitter & SL: Sheila Yoshikawa

http://information-literacy.blogspot.com/

http://www.slideshare.net/sheilawebber/

Orcid ID 0000-0002-2280-9519

Bill Johnston

Honorary Research Fellow

University of Strathclyde

[email protected]

References and readings • Ashworth, P. and Lucas, U. (2000). Achieving empathy and engagement: a practical

approach to the design, conduct and reporting of phenomenographic research. Studies in

Higher Education, 25(3), 295-308.

• Boon, S., Johnston, B. and Webber, S. (2007). A phenomenographic study of English

faculty's conceptions of information literacy. Journal of Documentation, 63 (2), 204-228.

• Bowden, J.A. & Green, P. (Eds.) (2005). Doing developmental phenomenography.

Melbourne, Australia: RMIT University Press.

https://universitypress.rmittraining.com/doing-developmental-phenomenography

• Bowden, J. and Walsh, E. (2000). Phenomenography. Melbourne, Australia: RMIT

University Press.

• Hornung, E. (2013). On your own, but not alone: one-person librarians in Ireland and their

perceptions of continuing professional development. Library Trends, 61 (3), 675-702.

• Hornung, E., Salha, S. and Webber, S. (2014). Phenomenographic interviews as a

learning process. https://www.slideshare.net/sheilawebber/webber-hornung-salha-ss

• Lupton, M. (2004) The learning connection: information literacy and the student

experience. Adelaide, Australia: Auslib Press.


• Marton, F., & Booth, S. (1997). Learning and awareness. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence

Erlbaum Associates.

• Sjostrom, B. and Dahlgren, L. (2002). Applying phenomenography in nursing

research. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 40(3), 339-345.

• Stenfors-Hayes, T., Hult, H. & Dahlgren, M. (2013). A phenomenographic approach

to research in medical education. Medical Education, 47, 261–270.

• Webber, S., Boon, S. & Johnston, B. (2005). A comparison of UK academics’

conceptions of information literacy in two disciplines: English and Marketing. Library

and Information Research, 29(93), 4-15.

• Wheeler, E. (2014). Investigating academic librarians’ perceptions of their own

teaching skills. Unpublished MA disseration. Sheffield, England: University of

Sheffield. http://dagda.shef.ac.uk/dispub/dissertations/2013-

14/External/Wheeler_130117630.pdf see also

https://www.slideshare.net/EmilyWheeler/teaching-or-training

• Yates, C., Partridge, H., & Bruce, C. (2012). Exploring information experiences

through phenomenography. Library and Information Research, 36 (112), 96–119.

• Yates, C., Stoodley, I., Partridge, H., Bruce, C., Cooper, H., Day, G., & Edwards, S.

(2012). Exploring health information use by older Australians within everyday life.

Library Trends, 60 (3), 460-478.


an introduction to phenomenographic research

Education

phenomenography sheila

transcripts sheila webber

work sheila webber

interviewee sheila webber

hornungs research category

opl orientation category

personal orientation

phenomenographic study