La caricatura política como forma discursiva: caracterización de la ironía

I used the steps outlined by Charmaz’s (2006) constructivist grounded theory

approach to guide my data analysis. The analysis of the data began during the course of transcribing interviews. In this section of the chapter I describe the transcription process and then explain how I employed coding techniques to analyse the data, which consisted of open, focused, in-vivo and axial coding. Coding refers to the way that data is made sense of by labelling, categorising and summarising, each piece of data being considered (Charmaz 2006, p. 43). I then explain how memo writing and the constant comparison method assisted the data analysis phase of this research and led to my understanding of the data as a whole.

Transcribing

Bailey (2008, p. 130) explains that:

Transcribing is an interpretive act rather than simply a technical procedure, and the close observation that transcribing entails can lead to noticing unanticipated phenomena. It is impossible to represent the full complexity of human

interaction on a transcript and so listening to … the ‘original’ recorded data brings data alive through appreciating the way that things have been said as well as what has been said.

While colleagues had suggested that employing someone else to transcribe the data would be a valuable time saving measure, I chose to undertake this task myself. The transcription process prompted me to remember emotional responses and body language that were displayed by the participants, but not necessarily conveyed in the recording. If a third party had undertaken the transcription process, they would not have had this knowledge to draw on. Listening to the interviews enabled me to begin immersing myself in the data and to consider factors that I may have missed from simply reading the transcripts.

I used the Express Scribe software program to assist with the transcription process. I typed the transcriptions into a ‘Word’ document and as a proficient touch typist I

84 was able to do this quite quickly. The automatic ‘pause’ function on this program also helped me to transcribe the interviews in an efficient and timely manner. I was able to transcribe thirty minutes of interview recording in approximately one hour. I transcribed each interview verbatim and I included my own questions, comments and responses as well as the participants. I included all words such as ‘um’ and ‘ah’ and words and phrases that were repeated. This helped capture all the nuances of the conversation, indicating times when participants were struggling to articulate their ideas, or conversely punctuating particular views. I noted emotions that were expressed by participants in brackets within the transcript. These included crying, laughter, angry tone, significant variation in the volume of the participant’s voice and expressions of joy. This added context and meaning to the data and helped me determine how segments of the data fitted particular codes and categories. I typed an ‘I’ in the left hand margin of the document to indicate the parts of the interview where I spoke and a ‘P’ to indicate the parts of the interview where the participant spoke. I used the participant number and pseudonym as the title for each transcript so that I could easily identify the participant while at the same time ensuring that they remained anonymous in the event that another person ever gained access to the transcript.

Each interview was transcribed within a week of the interview being conducted. This helped ensure that the conversation remained fresh in my mind. I made notes of my memories of non-verbal responses along the way. The transcription process enabled me to become familiar with the data as a whole. I began to document recurrent ideas and interesting insights that were evident in the data. Therefore, the initial data analysis began with the transcribing of the interviews.

Each interview transcription was mailed to participants on its completion,

accompanied by the Letter to Participants Accompanying Interview Transcript (see Appendix 11). The letter reiterated that participants were free to change or delete any portion of the transcript without question. Two social workers and one client returned the transcripts, marking segments of the interview to be changed or deleted. I made the alterations to my copies and reposted the corrected editions for approval and removed any deleted segments and quotes that I had already lifted from the transcripts for use in my data analysis.

85 There was one exception to this process. As one client did not want the interview recorded, I could not produce a formal, verbatim transcription of the interview. Instead, as soon as I arrived home from the interview, I expanded on the brief notes that I had taken throughout the interview. I had managed to write down a couple of short direct quotes during the interview so that these could be used accurately. I mailed a copy of the completed notes to the participant and made a follow up phone call to check whether I had represented the participants’ views correctly and if she/he wanted to add anything. The participant was satisfied with what I had written and happy for me to use the notes for the purpose of analysing the data and reporting the findings.

Initial coding

The initial open coding involved a close analysis of each transcript and labelling each segment of the data by hand, by writing these initial codes in the left hand margins of the transcripts. While traditional grounded theorists (Glaser 1978; Glaser & Strauss 1967) promote line-by-line coding, Charmaz (2006, p. 83) suggests incident by incident coding as an alternative method, particularly when working with data that largely involves behaviourist descriptions of people’s actions. I created codes for each section of the data that conveyed perceptions, beliefs, actions and reactions. On average a code was used for every two to three lines of data. In-vivo coding was also employed in this initial phase of analysis. In-vivo coding involves paying attention to specific terms and phrases used by participants, and in turn aids in making comparisons and identifying themes (Charmaz 2006, p. 55). In-vivo coding was particularly useful when considering the meaning participants gave to concepts and experiences. For example, the phrase ‘just being there’ was not one that I would have used, however it was frequently coined by the social workers who participated in this study. It became clear that participants were using this term to describe the value of a form of care that involved a compassionate presence. This term became one of the key themes presented in Chapter 6 of this thesis, which is the second findings chapter.

86

Focused coding

I proceeded to develop focused codes from the data by beginning to categorise the data. Hence I started a more conceptual analysis of the data. This form of coding involves using the most significant and/or commonly used earlier codes and is developed by comparing data (Charmaz 2006, p. 60). Foss and Waters (2007) provide a hands-on, practical approach to conducting this form of data analysis. I began by using scissors to manually cut up each printed segment of coded data for every transcript from interviews with social workers. This ensured that all data was accounted for as I began to make sense of the codes. I then laid out the segments, creating categories from codes that seemed to relate to one another. For example, the codes ‘warmth’, ‘non-judgment’ and ‘empathy’ all fitted the category of ‘caring qualities’. Cuttings from each category were placed in labelled envelopes for future use when reporting findings. I then repeated this process with the data from client interviews. Forty four categories were deduced from the social worker data and 32 categories from the client data. This process enabled me to identify both

commonalities and differences in the data. A coded hard-copy of the complete data set was kept to refer to as needed. Table 2 illustrates examples of focused codes that were derived from initial codes applied to the data.

Table 2: A sample of Codes Applied to Social Worker Participant Data

Focused codes Initial codes

Just being there Helping client feel less alone

The power of sitting with someone in the moment Just being with someone is sometimes the most appropriate intervention

Recognition of common humanity

Always possible that we could be in the clients’ position some day

Everyone needs care to some degree

As human beings we are all interconnected and interdependent

Valuing the client Putting the client first

Recognising the clients’ truth as valid Honouring the client

Table 3 illustrates examples of focused codes derived from initial codes applied to the data from client participants.

87 Table 3: A sample of codes applied to client participant data

Focused codes Initial codes

Importance of care in social work practice

Care can make the difference between a life or death outcome

Care is the most important thing of all Lack of care is isolating

Care as non-judgment Feeling judged about one’s choices is uncaring Appreciates feeling accepted no matter what Feel looked down on

Genuineness and honesty Being real is important

Social workers should do what they say they will do Pretending to care is worse than not caring at all

Axial coding

Axial coding was employed as a way of identifying relationships between categories and moving from a descriptive to a more conceptual understanding of the data (Charmaz, 2006, p. 63). To support this process I typed up and cut out the codes deduced from the focused coding. I then laid out the labels that related to one another while looking for possible major themes. I repeated this process several times, moving the labels around. Each time I aimed to create a deeper understanding of the data as a whole and the story that social workers and social work clients were telling about care in social work practice. For instance, the focused codes ‘picking battles’, ‘taking a stand’ and ‘considering risk’ all related to ideas around resisting barriers to carewhich became a theme of the data. Others, such as ‘just being there’, ‘listening’ and ‘non-judgment’ related to clients’ views of how social workers

created a connection with clients. These focused codes led to the key theme of ‘experiencing care through connection with social workers’ being identified.

Memo writing

Throughout both the interview and coding stages I continually employed memo writing. I used a journal to write anything and everything that seemed relevant to answering the research question when analysing the data. This step helped make sense of codes and to conceptualise the data (Charmaz 2006, p. 72). It was useful

88 when I began to write up the findings of the research. I included my own thoughts, judgments and the difficulties I encountered throughout the interview process. Memo writing enabled me to understand and minimise the way in which my own interpretations impacted the construction of the data analysis and my

recommendations for social work practice. When I initially heard depictions of social workers’ practice that emphasised the importance of attending to professional boundaries and speaking firmly with clients about the reality of certain situations, I did not think that these narratives aligned with a caring approach. It was not until I began to reflect more through journaling that I realised that the intent of the

participants who spoke in these ways came from a place of deep care. It became evident from some social workers’ stories that strong, respectful relationships were formed with clients as a result of being honest and open about limits to

confidentiality, and highlighting likely negative consequences of clients’ actions that may lead to further suffering. I then noticed that this realisation was supported by several of the client participants, who appreciated it when a social worker who they trusted and felt valued by was completely honest, even when it was not always pleasant for the client in the moment. I began to recognise that sometimes care was enacted and experienced from a stance of ‘tough love’. It was often the social worker’s attitude that indicated care more than the approach that followed. Initially I could easily have perceived the stories of ‘tough love’ as antithetical to care and as exceptions to caring practice in this study. It was through the reflective space of journaling that I identified that these participants’ versions of caring practice were as valid as others who took a more outwardly empathic and compassionate approach, an approach that was more easily recognised as care.

Constant comparison

Throughout the process of coding and memo-writing I continually compared the incidents described by participants and the codes I had identified. I considered how and if they related to one another. For example, after I had developed the focus codes, and written the codes on envelopes that contained the segments of data relating to those codes, I began to arrange the envelopes in different ways. Thus, I began to explore how the codes related to one another and I continued to move them around, making new connections between the codes which helped me to see the data in different ways. After separately establishing relationships between categories

89 from interviews with clients and social workers I then began to draw links between the two sets of data, exploring any themes that were evident across both data sets, as well as differences between them. This final step enabled me to see the overall story evident within the data, which I present in the following three chapters.

Concluding Comments to the Chapter

This chapter has discussed the theoretical and ethical framework that was used to support this study. The use of a qualitative approach, guided by constructivist

grounded theory was chosen as the most appropriate framework for meeting the aims and purposes of this research. Sampling and recruitment methods have been

discussed, along with interviewing methods that were used to collect rich,

meaningful data about participants’ subjective experiences. An in-depth discussion of the way that ethical considerations and concerns were addressed, including principles of informed consent, confidentiality, anonymity and protection from harm has been provided. A rationale for ensuring that an ethic of care informed the research process has been included. Finally, the constructivist grounded theory approach to data analysis has been described in detail. Throughout the data analysis process I remained committed to interpreting the data in a way that did not

misrepresent or question the participants’ conveyed thoughts, actions and overall messages. This helped ensure that the practice theory I developed from my analysis was grounded in the data. All of these aspects of the research design worked in synergy with one another, and created a strong framework for answering the research question. The following three chapters present the key findings that have resulted from the methods used in data collection and analysis. Chapters 5 and 6 report the key findings from the interviews with the social workers who participated in this study. Chapter 7 presents results from interviews with social work clients.

90

Chapter 5: Meaning and Features – The

Social Worker Perspective

Introduction to the Chapter

In the previous chapter I explained the methodology that I used to undertake this research. This chapter is the first of three results chapters, each of which provides findings that answer the research question: ‘How does thinking about, doing and experiencing care in direct social work inform an ethic of care for the profession?’. The number of participants represented in each of the themes presented in these chapters is reported. The value of providing numbers lies in the way it assists in making the selection of themes transparent, offering a supplementary support for the chosen themes, and highlights to the reader what the most common ideas, practices and experiences were (Maxwell 2010; Sandelowski 2001). I acknowledge that reporting of frequencies does not always reflect the significance of the themes. Several of the sub-themes mentioned in the following chapters report numbers of only two or three participants. This data was considered important enough to be included because it was related to major themes, while presenting a different perspective. For example, all social workers spoke about how empathy and

compassion are important features of care, with two participants discussing the idea of ‘compassion with boundaries’.

I begin this chapter by presenting a profile summary of social workers who

participated in this study, followed by an outline of the main conceptual themes and sub-themes. As the title of the chapter indicates, I show how social workers

understood care in direct social work practice in terms of its meaning and features. Making sense of the concept of care in social work was a necessary pre-requisite to describing how care was enacted in practice in the research interviews. I present the findings that relate to the first main theme, namely, the meaning that participants attributed to care in direct practice. While some social workers viewed care as a personal orientation, others saw it as being more practical, and many social workers

91 described care as both an attitude and an action. Several practitioners made a

distinction between the care that is enacted and experienced in their personal lives and care in the professional context. There was a general reticence towards associating care in social work practice with maternalistic/paternalistic notions of care.

The second major theme identifies the features participants believed constituted caring social work practice. Valuing the other, empathy and compassion, listening, non-judgement, genuineness and honesty, respect and understanding were

considered the key indicators of a caring social worker. The chapter concludes with participants’ reflections on the relevance of care in social work practice, where presenting their views on the visibility and the importance of care in direct practice is presented. Social workers who participated in this study perceived care to be a key element of their practice and with the exception of one participant, they saw the need for it to be made more prominent in codes of ethics and social work education and training forums.