Lineamientos para evaluar la propuesta

INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPTION & CODING Introduction

This chapter provides the transcription and coding process involved in the study. It starts with details on how I did the transcription of the interviews and the protocol established for the purpose of establishing credibility and consistency. Next, I discuss the coding process adopted i.e. thematic analysis (TA). These details are discussed to give readers a good grasp of the evidence-generating process before I venture into the analysis in the next chapter.

Transcription

As Kvale (2007) states, “(t)o transcribe means to transform” (p. 93) the information from one form to another. In my case, I am transforming an interview conversation into a written form. At this first stage of the transcription, I also determine my strategy in analysing the interview data for my research. I selected the thematic approach as it allows me to explore the evidence more in-depth and to bring together viewpoints from different stakeholders on the research focus. I adopted Braun and Clarke’s (2013) seven stages of the thematic analysis (TA) for my study. The seven stages are as follows:

1. Transcription

2. Reading and familiarisation; taking note of items of potential interest.

3. Coding – complete, across entire dataset 4. Searching for themes

5. Reviewing themes (producing a map of the provisional themes and subthemes, and relationships between them – aka the ‘thematic map’)

6. Defining and naming themes

7. Writing – finalising analysis. (pp. 202-203)

Orthographic or Verbatim Transcription

The primary source of information for my research is the interviews done with Polytechnic stakeholders. The process of systematically

generating evidence from the interview is done through transcribing the interviews verbatim and analysing them. Sandelowski (1994) refers to transcript data from interviews as ‘partially cooked’ rather than as raw data. She argues that this is due to the ‘selective arrangements’ done by the researcher in preparing their data for analysis. Braun and Clarke (2013) had similar viewpoints in stating that a transcript is “two-steps removed from the actual interview experience” (p. 162) and that there will be a loss of information. The two-steps removed from the actual interview refer to the audio recording being one step and the transcription of the audio recording being a second step away from the actual interview. Braun and Clarke (2013) view the transcription process, as “an interaction between the recording and the transcriber, who listens to the recording and makes choices about what to preserve, and how to represent what they hear" (p. 162).

In due regards, I have adhered to the advice from Braun and Clarke (2013) to avoid listening to the meaning of words for the purpose of verbatim transcription. This helps capture the essence of the interviewees' ideas rather than venturing into my interpretation of what is said. I found this process very meaningful as I had different opinions on some of the matters discussed. It also helped me record what was spoken rather than my interpretation of the conversation.

There is also need to maintain consistency and be meticulous in the transcription of different interviews. To better manage the task, I adapted a notation guide. These notations are also useful in maintaining anonymity in the transcript. I also captured some nuances in interviewees’ conversation such as laughter, emphasis, repeating phrases like ‘you know', ‘right', ‘ah' and ‘lah', with the notation guide in the transcript. However, face-to-face interviews that are audio recorded could not capture some of the non-verbal expressions such as the ‘rolling of the eyes’, gesturing with hands, nodding of the head, that was visible to me during the interview. Some of these non-verbal expressions have meaning to the messages that the interviewees were

sharing but were sadly not recorded. On reflection, for the later interviews, I tried to incorporate some of the non-verbal gestures by articulating some of these expressions into my questions and in getting a verbal recording of it. Examples would be, ‘you nodded to the issue and hence confirm it – right?' or ‘your smile states you are in agreement with that view?' I have listed the notations that I have adopted in transcribing the interviews in Table 8.1 below.

Features Notation Explanation of Use

Identity of speaker Two-letters (e.g.,. PJ, TN, RG) VJ

A randomly selected pair of letters for each participant. This made the participants more personable in the analysis process than in assigning a numeric running number for each interview.

Assigned to me Non-verbal

utterances

(xxxx) Use of brackets to state or explain non-verbal utterances. Example, for laughing (laughter); coughing (cough).

Pausing (.); (..) & (…) (.) represent a short pause; (..) a slightly longer pause; (…) a long pause. Only three levels of a pause will be reflected in the transcript Abbreviations As spoken Will transcribe as spoken. Example,

– the term problem-based learning was transcribed as either PBL or problem-based learning as the interviewee mentions it.

Punctuation ‘.’; ‘?’; ‘!’ ‘-‘ A full stop is added when the speech indicates a sentence completion. If ideas and thought process are flowing in speech, a ‘–‘ will be used to separate such ideas or thought processes. The question mark and exclamation marks will be indicated according to tone and pitch detected in the recording. Word Emphasis Underlined Words that are emphasised in the

interview will be underlined. E.g. (Values).

Confidentiality and Anonymity

[ ] Where the interviewee reveals

details that can be used to trace back their identity, such details will

In each case the verbatim transcript was completed within three days of the interview and emailed to the interviewee for their reading. This is to provide interviewees with an opportunity to read what they had mentioned in the interview. This is in line with the credibility criterion – member check attribute, which I have used for the evaluation of my research (discussed in Chapter Two). Changes suggested to the transcript by participants were verified with the audio recording first. If the verifications were accurate, changes were made to the transcript. If the suggested changes consisted of new information that the participant wished to add on that were not in the audio recording, I tagged them as post-interview information in the transcript with the symbols ‘< >’ and the text within this in italic font, to differentiate the details. I considered these as post transcript details for the purpose of analysis. Two of the interviewees replied with slight changes to the transcript, to make their messages clearer. I have tagged these as post transcript details (Appendix 6).

All transcript documents were password protected and stored on my computer. Although the transcripts are anonymous, password protecting the document is another added security on data confidentiality.

be omitted from the transcript and a more generic term used to showcase the idea in square brackets. E.g. [course]; [colleagues name]; [subject title]; [appointment] etc.

Post transcript inclusions

<xxxx> All post transcript inclusions that are not in the audio recording will be captured with the ‘less than or more than' symbols, and the text would be in italic.

Table 8.1 Notations designed for the purpose of transcription. Adapted from Braun and Clarke (2013, pp. 165-166)

Coding and Thematic Analysis

All the transcripts were coded and analysed as detailed in Braun and Clarke’s (2013) TA stages, 2 to 6. In the coding process, I have adhered to the principles of being systematic and thorough. As a start to the TA process, I read all transcripts first to gain an understanding and familiarity with the content. This was useful for the coding segment of the task. Besides, having transcribed the interviews on my own, I was getting more acquainted with the text.

I adopted complete coding rather than selective coding for the study. The difference between these two process is that in complete coding the aim is to identify ‘anything and everything' for coding. In keeping with the protocol of TA, the selection of themes for analysis was done later. In selective coding, the process of identifying themes about the research question is done first, and only relevant information from the dataset is coded. I started with complete coding, systematically going through all lines of transcript, interview-by-interview and extracting key ideas, terms, and phrases from each transcript. All the extracted phrases contained citation details for purpose of tracking back to the original transcript. The extracted terms were collated together. Thereafter, I read through the details, demarcating each to a broad subject area. As I was doing this, themes started emerging and this was noted. Once this was completed, I read through details in the demarcated subject areas and started generating themes that best encapsulate the ideas shared by participants to the respective RQs. With the first cut of themes generated, I returned to the transcript to re- read, adopting the selective coding process of establishing relevant details for the themes. In the end, the process of coding incorporated both elements and this according to Braun and Clarke (2013) is the norm. This also makes the coding process inclusive. Another key point from Braun and Clarke (2013) was for codes generated to be meaningful for analysis without reference to the transcripts. I adhered to these principles and found it useful in generating themes for the

purpose of analysis. I did the coding process once the participants returned the transcripts via email. The coding process and the construction of themes were slowly showcasing a saturation point at the sixth interview transcript. I did two further interviews and felt sure that the information was saturating. Hence I concluded the process of my interviews for the research.

This chapter has described how I used the transcription of the interviews and notations in the process. I have also discussed the details of how I incorporated additional information in the transcript. The coding process was then detailed. I will move on to the analysis of the transcript in the next chapter.

CHAPTER NINE