What this means is that there can be many correct answers, but there also can be wrong answers.

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THEME DEVELOPMENT ACTIVITY
OVERVIEW
There is typically a minimum of three steps to qualitative data analysis that results in meaningful themes and most good studies have four or five levels of analysis to derive themes from raw data. At a minimum, there will be a first level of coding that has many names but serves the same purpose: to reduce large volumes of raw data to manageable codes (e.g., open coding, Initial coding, micro coding, etc.) You conducted initial/open coding in Week 6 of this course. The second level of coding is to begin to combine, or chunk, the initial codes into categories. Again the various levels of coding can have many names (e.g., axial coding, second level coding, intermediate codes, chunking, etc.), but it is the purpose of this stage of analysis that is important: to begin collapsing initial codes into more manageable related clusters for further analysis.
INSTRUCTIONS
In this activity, a series of second level codes, or chunks, will be presented, and you will derive themes from these chunks. Keep in mind that qualitative data analysis is a subjective process, unique to each researcher, and is also influenced by the theoretical or conceptual framework, research questions, subject matter under examination, and conditions of the study. What this means is that there can be many correct answers, but there also can be wrong answers. The key to theme development is to be able to draw a logic path from your intermediate codes to the themes, and that logic path should be fairly obvious to anyone who follows the audit trail of your study.
For example, in a study of passionate fans of sports teams, some of the intermediate codes might be spacious tailgating, courteous spectators, frequent winning results, and fast stadium departure at the end of games leading to a theme of Awesome Fan Experience.
In this activity, several intermediate codes will be listed, and you will derive 3-7 themes as you would for a complete qualitative study. The clusters will be in the left column of the table. You will group clusters into the center column and will derive themes for those clusters in the right column. Upload your table (see Table 1) as a Word document in Module 8: Week 8. See Table 2 as an example. Due Friday at 11:59pm.
Table 1. Activity Table
Intermediate Codes Grouped Intermediate Codes Resulting Theme
Supportive Friends
Life Experiences
Negative Stress Events
Divorce
Family Members Who Cause Stress
Supportive Family Members
Personal Development
Increasing Family Communication
Job Changes
Friends Who Cause Stress
Positive Stress Events
Family Moves
Eliminating Stressful Activities
Supportive Church Community
Expected Events that Don’t Happen
Education Level
Table 2. Student Example Table
Intermediate Codes Grouped Intermediate Codes Resulting Theme
Green Red
Primary Colors
Blue-Violet Yellow
Red Blue
Blue Violet
Secondary Colors
Violet Orange
Red-Orange Green
Orange Red-Violet
Tertiary Colors
Yellow Yellow-Orange
Red-Violet Yellow Green
Yellow-Orange Blue-Green
Yellow Green Blue-Violet
Blue-Green Red-Orange

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