Using Secondary Data for Grounded Theory Analysis

Abstract

Grounded theory is well utilised in qualitative research for building theoretical understanding of complex social processes. Grounded theory data analysis strategies can be used with different types of data, including secondary data. Despite the potential advantages of secondary data, it is rarely used for grounded theory studies, largely due to a perception that researchers are unable to follow the guidelines of this research design with data that they themselves have not collected. This paper demonstrates the use of secondary data in a study investigating the substantive area of Indigenous empowerment. Potential pitfalls and advantages of using grounded theory methods to analyse secondary data are discussed, as well as factors that facilitated the analytic process in this study. These factors included having a large data set across multiple sites and the use of literature as a source of data. The findings provide a valuable model for combining research and practise.     

Linked and Situated: Grounded Knowledge

Local knowledge registers prominently in scholarly efforts to resolve environmental problems, ushering in widespread use of participatory practices of deliberation. Without the incorporation of local knowledge, many scholars contend that environmental science and planning remain beholden to the unbridled reign of the expert, and the daunting complexity of environmental problems remains seemingly impossible to penetrate. Following in this vein of work, we formed our participatory research project on nonpoint water pollution in two watersheds around four action clusters. On the local side, we included a cluster of farmers and farmland owners and a cluster of general community members. On the expert side, we included a cluster of researchers and another of government officials. However, we found in our research that the development of democratic deliberation depended more on whether participants situated and linked their knowledge than whether it was local or expert in origin. We suggest grounded knowledge, situating one's experiences in a way that enables participants to actively link with other knowledge, as a concept useful for scholars to better understand which ways of knowing enable deliberation in the participatory processes.     

Measuring and Modeling Cohabitation: New Perspectives From Qualitative Data

Almost all our knowledge about cohabitation in the United States rests on analysis of nationally representative, large‐scale surveys. We move beyond this work by drawing on 115 in‐depth interviews with a sample of young men and women with recent cohabitation experience. These data allow us to address two issues of central interest to family studies. First, we use our qualitative data to assess the measurement of cohabitation in surveys and the census. We find that current measurement strategies are probably underestimating cohabitation, and we may need to find new ways to measure cohabitation. Second, we employ qualitative findings to address issues relating to how we empirically model union formation. We find that the movement into cohabitation is not akin to marriage. It is often not a deliberate decision. Couples do not appear to be deciding between cohabitation and marriage; rather, their decision seems to center around whether to remain single or cohabit. These results have important implications for our analysis and understanding of cohabitation.     

Random-Effects Modeling of Categorical Response Data

In many applications observations have some type of clustering, with observations within clusters tending to be correlated. A common instance of this occurs when each subject in the sample undergoes repeated measurement, in which case a cluster consists of the set of observations for the subject. One approach to modeling clustered data introduces cluster-level random effects into the model. The use of random effects in linear models for normal responses is well established. By contrast, random effects have only recently seen much use in models for categorical data. This chapter surveys a variety of potential social science applications of random effects modeling of categorical data. Applications discussed include repeated measurement for binary or ordinal responses, shrinkage to improve multiparameter estimation of a set of proportions or rates, multivariate latent variable modeling, hierarchically structured modeling, and cluster sampling. The models discussed belong to the class of generalized linear mixed models (GLMMs), an extension of ordinary linear models that permits nonnormal response variables and both fixed and random effects in the predictor term. The models are GLMMs for either binomial or Poisson response variables, although we also present extensions to multicategory (nominal or ordinal) responses. We also summarize some of the technical issues of model-fitting that complicate the fitting of GLMMs even with existing software.     

Latent Variable Modeling of Longitudinal and Multilevel Data

An overview is given of modeling of longitudinal and multilevel data using a latent variable framework. Particular emphasis is placed on growth modeling. A latent variable model is presented for three-level data, where the modeling of the longitudinal part of the data imposes both a covariance and a mean structure. Examples are discussed where repeated observations are made on students sampled within classrooms and schools.     

Situational Analyses: Grounded Theory Mapping After the Postmodern Turn

To better address differences and complexities of social life articulated through the postmodern turn, grounded theory is being regenerated and updated. Based on Strauss's ecological frameworks in his social worlds and arenas theory, I offer situational maps and analyses as innovative supplements to the basic social process analyses characteristic of traditional grounded theory. There are three kinds of analytic maps: maps of situations including all the key human and nonhuman elements, maps of social worlds and arenas, and maps of positionality along salient analytic axes. This article introduces all three kinds of maps and explicates one—situational maps—as a means of coherently elucidating and analyzing some of the complexities and instabilities of social life.     

Modeling Repeatable Events Using Discrete‐Time Data: Predicting Marital Dissolution

I join two methodologies by illustrating the application of multilevel modeling principles to hazard‐rate models with an emphasis on procedures for discrete‐time data that contain repeatable events. I demonstrate this application using data taken from the 1995 National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG) to ascertain the relationship between multiple covariates and risk of subsequent marital dissolution. I consider both fixed‐ and random‐effects versions of the multilevel model, as well as a Generalized Estimating Equation alternative to estimating random effects. I compare results obtained from the various estimators, noting why differences occur, and recommend when to choose the various alternatives. I also provide a set of SAS and STATA programs that can be used to analyze the NSFG data.     

Going Public: Networking Globally and Locally*

Abstract Rural sociologists figure prominently in the move towards public sociology. The paper takes up Michael Burawoy's call for public sociology and discusses what rural sociologists have to offer to publics and how we stand to gain as a discipline in working with publics. The paper argues that rural sociologists' ability to adopt a cosmopolitan view while negotiating the complexities of global/local processes provides a useful theoretical stance for doing public sociology. Methodologically, both feminist methods and various approaches to networks can guide us as we do public sociology. Then, the paper provides two examples of recent efforts to do public sociology with a women's community group in Sri Lanka in response to the tsunami and with the Pennsylvania Women's Agricultural Network to illustrate the possibilities and limitations of working with networks. In conclusion, the paper addresses opportunities for doing public sociology, the challenges we face as we go public, and future work that is needed to develop theoretically and methodologically strong public rural sociology.     

Grounded theory research: Procedures,canons, and evaluative criteria

Using grounded theory as an example, this paper examines three methodological questions that are generally applicable to all qualitative methods. How should the usual scientific canons be reinterpreted for qualitative research? How should researchers report the procedures and canons used in their research? What evaluative criteria should be used in judging the research products? We propose that the criteria should be adapted to fit the procedures of the method. We demonstrate how this can be done for grounded theory and suggest criteria for evaluating studies following this approach. We argue that other qualitative researchers might be similarly specific about their procedures and evaluative criteria.     

Grounded in the World: Developmental Origins of the Embodied Mind

Piaget's (1952) question of how the adult mind emerges from the sensorimotor infant is still the framing issue for developmental psychology. Here I suggest that real‐life skill is better understood if the sensorimotor origins of cognition are not abandoned. Skilled people are not only better at both abstract and logical thinking but also at processing the world “online” and, most important, seamlessly and rapidly shifting between the two modes. I illustrate the tight coupling between action, perception, and cognition in early life and propose that this coupling remains but becomes more flexibly adaptive. Further, I show that the language of dynamics is appropriate to capture these mind‐body‐world interconnections.     

Grounded Futurity: Time and Subjectivity in Lisa Baraitser's Maternal Encounters

In this article, I explore how moments of the “new” that Baraitser (2009 Baraitser , L. ( 2009 ). Maternal Encounters: The Ethics of Interruption . London , UK : Routledge . [Google Scholar]) describes throughout Maternal Encounters are characterized by a time of futurity, a time marked by the potentialities of change. By tracing how futuristic time operates in the various maternal encounters that Baraitser details, including naming, interruptions, love and crying, and maternal “stuff,” I argue that each transitory moment is marked by openness to possibility for the maternal self. One of the main innovations of Baraitser's theory is its concurrent ability to ground futuristic force in such a way that enables an articulation of subjectivity in the midst of processes that work to unsettle fixed sureties. And this works two ways. Conjoining maternal subjectivity with futurity, Maternal Encounters has the important, indeed groundbreaking, effect of refiguring the mother, so often constructed as generator of the future, as a futuristic subject in her own right.     

The Neighborhood History Calendar: A Data Collection Method Designed for Dynamic Multilevel Modeling

This paper presents a new data collection method, called the Neighborhood History Calendar, designed to collect event histories of community-level changes over time. We discuss the need for and the uses of this method. We describe issues related to the design of instruments, collection of data, and data entry. We provide detailed examples from an application of this method to the study of marriage, contraception, and fertility in rural Nepal. The paper addresses applications of this same technique to other settings and research problems. We also extend the technique to collection of other forms of contextual-history data, including school histories and health service histories. Finally, we discuss how Geographic Information System (GIS) technology can be used to link together multiple sources of contextual-history data.     

Modeling Multiple Failure Time Data: A Survey of Variance–Corrected Proportional Hazards Models with Empirical Applications to Arrest Data

Proportional hazards models are powerful methods for the analysis of dynamic social processes and are widely used in sociology to estimate the effects of covariates on event timing (e.g., time to arrest, birth, marriage). The proper statistical modeling of failure time data is an important analytical issue in sociology, but to date the field has largely neglected the application of these models to multiple failure time data in which the conventional assumption of the independence of failure times is not tenable. This paper critically describes a class of models known as variance–corrected proportional hazards models that have been developed by statisticians to take into account a lack of independence among failure times. The purpose is to provide an exposition and comparison for sociologists of several such models and associated methods for handling multiple failure time data that can be readily estimated in commonly available statistical software packages. We pay special attention to the data requirements necessary for estimation of the models. The paper concludes with an illustrative application of the models to analyze the arrest patterns of a sample of California Youth Authority parolees.     

Covenant Attachment: A Constructivist Grounded Theory of Christian Couples and God

The purpose of this constructivist grounded theory study was to develop a deeper understanding of the relational system of married couples and God. We interviewed nine marital couples from Christian denominations that reported having a strong relationship with each other and with God together. We used constructivist grounded theory techniques presented by Charmaz (2006) and analyzed emergent categories of behaviors, emotions, and cognitions to construct a theory and model of Christian marital couples and their shared relationship with God. We then compared and contrasted the results and theory to existing literature on attachment theory and theorized a shared attachment to God. We applied the theological concept of kinship covenant to the results in order to organize and situate the theory into a Christian framework. Finally, we discuss clinical, pastoral, and future research implications.     

Implicit Theories of Marital Relationships: A Grounded Theory of Socialization Influences

A qualitative study was conducted in an Eastern European university, involving 16 participants from functional and dysfunctional families who participated in semistructured interviews about the development of their implicit theories of a happy marital relationship. The students shared their ideas of a happy marriage, their parents’ marriage, including the level of happiness, conflict and other issues, what they thought were major influences on the formation of their ideas of marriage including exploration of the role of fiction media. The following major socialization influences emerged as themes: parental relationship, individual parental characteristics, observation of other relationships, gender role ideology, education, media, and experiences of own relationships.     

Elders' Decisions To Enter Assisted Living Facilities: A Grounded Theory Study

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this qualitative study was to develop a substantive theory of elders' decision-making process to relocate to an assisted living facility. The researchers interviewed a purposive sample of 28 elders who resided in assisted living facilities. The theory of elders' decisions to relocate to an assisted living facility is a story about elders weighing and balancing gains and losses to go to where the help is. Decision makers weigh and balance gains and losses before, during, and after relocating to an assisted living facility. Elders stay at their current residence if gains outweigh losses and they relocate if losses outweigh gains. Understanding the process of decision-making in this segment of the population may lead to the development of interventions that can promote positive relocation experiences among elders and increase the effectiveness of their decision-making behaviors.