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Content analysis and thematic analysis: Implications for conducting a qualitative descriptive study
Author(s) -
Vaismoradi Mojtaba,
Turunen Hannele,
Bondas Terese
Publication year - 2013
Publication title -
nursing and health sciences
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.563
H-Index - 47
eISSN - 1442-2018
pISSN - 1441-0745
DOI - 10.1111/nhs.12048
Subject(s) - thematic analysis , content analysis , descriptive statistics , qualitative analysis , consistency (knowledge bases) , thematic map , thematic structure , qualitative research , data science , data analysis , psychology , computer science , sociology , data mining , social science , statistics , mathematics , cartography , artificial intelligence , programming language , geography
Abstract Qualitative content analysis and thematic analysis are two commonly used approaches in data analysis of nursing research, but boundaries between the two have not been clearly specified. In other words, they are being used interchangeably and it seems difficult for the researcher to choose between them. In this respect, this paper describes and discusses the boundaries between qualitative content analysis and thematic analysis and presents implications to improve the consistency between the purpose of related studies and the method of data analyses. This is a discussion paper, comprising an analytical overview and discussion of the definitions, aims, philosophical background, data gathering, and analysis of content analysis and thematic analysis, and addressing their methodological subtleties. It is concluded that in spite of many similarities between the approaches, including cutting across data and searching for patterns and themes, their main difference lies in the opportunity for quantification of data. It means that measuring the frequency of different categories and themes is possible in content analysis with caution as a proxy for significance.