Justificación del proceso de aglomeración

As this was a heuristic inquiry, the aim was focused on the capturing the meaning of the lived experience of emotional intelligence through means of interpretation. In order for the method to fit with the methodology, it is required that the researcher involves himself or herself with the participant so that they more fully appreciate the lived experiences under study. Van Manen, (1997) refers to this as a borrowing of experiences that enhances our own perception and allows us to reflect on ourselves. That is, Van Manen argues that the researchers own understanding of the meaning of emotional intelligence in the lived experiences of a group of student nurses is mediated through the experiences of others.

Benner (1994) suggested that this process of entering into the experiences, reflections and understandings of others was not a typical Western linear way of thinking but rather, the process was circular in both construction and motion. There is a dynamic to this process: subjectivity – entering into the lived experience of others represents a movement of the researcher back and forth between the segments of the story and the story as a whole. This has been referred to as the ‘hermeneutic circle’ and this enables the researcher to take off the taken-for-granted meanings of the phenomenon and uncover the meaning that exists embedded within the text. In this context, the ‘text’ in this study refers to audio-voice transcriptions, samples of poetry, art and personal written reflections offered up voluntarily by the participants as part of their interview. Following the chosen methodology for this study, the search for meaning from the whole and the parts it was necessary that meaning be located within each participant’s unique experience of the phenomenon and against my own history as a nurse and the pre-understandings that were associated with that fact. Heuristic interpretations and judgements emerged from my own horizon of understanding as a nurse and those of these neophyte nurses.

As alluded to above it would be impossible to engage on this study without being cognisant of the exposure to ideas, experiences, and knowledge that

exists within a nurse education context. Furthermore, it would be difficult to have engaged upon this study without an unintentional exposure to the writings of the main topic area: emotional intelligence. Consequently, reflexivity as a concept highlights this connectedness, this intimacy with the research topic area, and ensuing research process and product (Horsburgh 2003). Lincoln and Guba (1985) have suggested that reflexivity is a necessary consideration for qualitative researchers. Lamb and Huttlinger (1989) state that reflexivity is not only about self-awareness but also awareness of the research context or setting. Authors such as Finlay (2002), suggest that reflexivity allows the researcher not only to be aware of their role and co-participation within the research enterprise, but it enables a conscious presentation of oneself, or I would suggest a (re) presentation of oneself to oneself: this is how I am in this venture. This creative tension around oneself as an object and as a subject can be achieved through for example, the supervisory relationship. Acting as a critical friend, an early question asked of me by my Director of Studies was based on how I viewed myself approaching this study. Was I a sociologist who had an interest in psychological ideas, or a psychologist who was interested in sociology? This question helped me to clarify my thinking and focus with regard to this study.

Dowling (2007: 11) asserts, that there is an epistemological reflexivity that the researcher should be aware of:

[This [“…broader view of reflexivity is evident in epistemological reflexivity

where the researcher is required to ask such questions as: ‘how has the research question defined and limited what can be found and how could the research question have been investigated differently?”

This would support the partnership of the researcher with participant in the co- creation of research text, as the researcher, like the participant, is in the world. As researcher, I bring pre-judgements with me into the research process that can and do affect interpretation. Thus, one may strongly suggest that such has echoes of the hermeneutic circle.

Reflexivity challenges me as the researcher to demonstrate an authentic self in the research enterprise. I have made explicit in the chapter that I entered into the research process with my own pre-judgements and perspectives gained through exposure to the topic area as a nurse and as an educator. However, if I am to be true to the ideas behind reflexive thinking then I must admit to dilemmas around my roles as a researcher. For example, when I recruited the study group my presentation to them was on the basis that I was a nurse, I was a nurse educator, and that my study was looking at emotions in nursing. A challenge within that approach is how far, or to what degree did I step back from my ‘nurse’ persona when engaged in the actual research process? Some of the study participants shared some deeply personal material during the interviews that produced tears. I was to be honest not wholly prepared for that. Arguably, some of the conversations that took place were more one-sided. I was conscious that the interviewer-interviewee relationship was reciprocal but I was aware that I was not there as a counsellor or therapeutic partner. However, was that a case of stepping back from my role as a nurse? This dilemma has emerged within qualitative research over the past number of years as an issue of significance (Whitehead 2004). Reflexive approaches within research arguably provoke the question of the researcher, “who am I?’ in this process. Engaging authentically with this challenge requires an intentional act to move away from engaging in reflexive self-dialogue as a ‘tick-box’ exercise to demonstrate that a study has the necessary elements of rigour within it. Reflexivity in research is more important that that. It is the great ontological question about oneself.

Dowling (2007) highlights the potential for reflexivity as a meaningful concept and way of thinking to implode due to the potentiality of an infinite regression of reflection upon reflection as one seeks the authentic self. However, whilst a danger of reflexive saturation may loom upon the horizon, as an instrument of rigour, reflexivity adds value by means of making evident the perspective of the researcher and by articulating what it can mean for the researcher to be in the world within this given research study.