DE SELGUA A BIERGE

In keeping with my aim for a rich, detailed account of the lifeworlds of the participating students, all 43 interviews were analysed according to the principles of IPA. This consisted of both within-case analysis and across-case analysis (Creswell, 2007). The former analysis refers to a detailed description of a few single cases and the themes within them, while the latter implies the thematic analysis across all cases (Smith, 1999, 2011). This is in keeping with Yin‟s (2003) suggestion that an analytic process may involve the identification of themes within individual cases, followed by a mapping of common themes that would transcend the cases.

Whereas the within-case analysis primarily served as the foundation for the across-case analysis, its results were also used to provide four in-depth case studies. Throughout the

146 individual case studies and cross-case analysis, I also included many extracts from the

interviews in an attempt to deepen the analysis and to validate my findings. This analysis thus shed light on the shared experiences of students with a visual impairment, while allowing for their individual voices to be heard through verbatim quotes and individual case studies (Brocki & Wearden, 2006). “In a good IPA study, it should be possible to parse the account both for shared themes, and for the distinctive voices and variations on those themes” (Smith et al., 2009, p. 38).

In the following sections, I will give a fuller explanation of these constructs and how they pertained to this research analysis.

5.5.1 Within-case analysis

I analysed the interviews of each participant individually, in order that the findings would reflect the detailed, deep layers of their experiences (Smith, 2011; Smith et al., 2009). In other words, the idea was to discover and reveal the heart of the lifeworlds as experienced by the individuals who are living it. For this purpose, I followed the IPA steps as suggested by Smith et al. (2009).

I believe, along with many other researchers, that thorough preparation is essential when embarking on a qualitative analysis. Therefore, reading and re-reading an interview transcript is considered the first step in this endeavour. This step enabled me to become acquainted with the content of the interview and helped me to recognise possible patterns and connections within the text. Furthermore, reading the same text repeatedly increased the likelihood of the participant becoming the centre and focus of the analysis (Smith et al., 2009). Repeated reading thus assisted in subduing my voice, allowing the voice of the participant to be heard (see 5.2). Through this process, I slowly began entering the lifeworld of each participant.

147 When I felt sufficiently comfortable with the explicit content of the transcript, I moved to the next analytic step. This involved re-reading of the text and adding notes and comments to it. For this process to be successful, I had to engage in what Smith et al. (2009) call “analytic dialogue”. In other words, I had to establish what each line of the transcript meant to me, while trying to understand what it meant to the student. This required paying close attention to the context of each student‟s lifeworld and the content of their language (use of specific words). As a result, the comments started to reveal the meaning of experiences for the student, identified and recognised similarities and contradictions within the transcript and informed the development of abstract concepts (Smith et al., 2009). As can be expected, this process increased my familiarity with the text and, moreover, enhanced and deepened my

understanding of the student‟s lifeworld.

Next, I was ready to develop themes that emerged from my notes and the transcript. Despite the suggestion that themes should solely rest upon the researcher‟s notes, (Smith et al., 2009), I used the original transcript in conjunction with the notes in order to reflect the data

accurately. As a further precaution, I included verbatim quotes in support of each theme and as validation that I did not stray too far from the original text. It is thus evident that the themes reflect not only my interpretation, but also the original words of the research participants.

Identifying themes required the fragmentation and re-organisation of the original text. This represents the hermeneutic circle, since the whole transcript is fragmented into various parts, but is eventually reconstructed into the write-up as a whole (Smith et al., 2009). With the development of themes, I aimed to reflect interconnections and patterns between parts of the interview and the accompanying comments. Moreover, it provided me with an understanding of what was important in the comments and transcript.

148 By this time I knew the data adequately enough to find connections between themes. This meant that I steered away from the order in which the themes were presented to me. Rather, I re-arranged the themes so that they told the interpreted story of the student. This step

completed the analysis of the first case and, subsequently, I moved to the next case and started the process again. Here I needed to bracket the ideas and themes that emerged from the first case to be able to give an unbiased account of the unique lifeworld of the next participant.

Upon completion of all 23 cases (39 individual interviews and four focus group interviews) the actual write-up of the analysis involved two different processes. Firstly, four of these within-case analyses resulted in individual, detailed case studies. Secondly, each one of the analysed transcripts, including the four that were used for case studies, also formed the basis of the across-case analysis. Hence, I will describe each of these two analyses in turn.

5.5.2 Across-case analysis

In the across-case analysis, I had the task of looking for patterns across the analysed cases. This involved the grouping of similarities and differences across the cases, restructuring and relabeling the original individual themes, so that patterns of meaning became clear in a final account of their shared experience (Smith et al., 2009).

5.5.3 Case studies

“But do we always have to find out universal truths of behavior? Sometimes, surely, it‟s enough to explore the life of a unique individual” (Rolls, 2005, p. 2).

Case studies can be conceptualised as examining a particular case such as an individual with a visual impairment, within clearly defined boundaries such as two selected universities

149 Case study analysis is in direct alignment with IPA‟s commitment to idiography. Therefore it could provide rich, particular details of a particular case (Bramley & Eatough, 2005; De Visser & Smith, 2006; Smith, 2011; Stake, 1995, 2005). This means that, by looking at a single case, it will be possible to get a sense of their lived experiences. It goes further by illuminating how these individuals make sense of and attach meaning to their experiences (Creswell, 2007; Smith et al., 2009). Lastly, case studies enable a researcher to draw

connections between accounts and sense-making processes. As can be expected, this process assisted me in becoming intimately familiar and involved with the narrative of each student. Hence, it is no wonder that Smith et al. (2009) reported single case studies to be powerful.

In this research, case studies resulted from the within-case analysis. In other words, I followed all the steps in the within-case analysis and used this re-organised compilation of the

interview transcript and notes as case studies. All the cases were thus developed using the same procedure (Yin, 2003). This left me with the task of choosing four case-studies amongst 23 completely developed cases. First, I selected cases that provided a variety of interesting and unusual perspectives and experiences. This procedure is called purposeful maximal sampling (Creswell, 2005). In the second instance, I based my decision on the depth and width of detail provided by the student. Lastly, I chose cases that were not similar, in order for the reader to get a sense of the variety of lived experiences of visually impaired students.

I believe that the four case studies deepened and widened the across-case analysis and

facilitated a deeper understanding of individual students‟ lifeworlds (Creswell, 2009; Henning et al., 2004). It thus allowed the reader to hear individual voices amidst the multiple voices of shared experience.

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5.5.4 Summary

In conclusion, the data analysis of this study lead to rich, thick descriptions of the findings and provides the reader with an insider‟s perspective. This was achieved through a thorough description of the research setting, four thorough, in-depth case studies and a thematic analysis containing extracts from interviews.