Marco Nacional

Coffey and Atkinson (1996) suggest that data analysis is not a “distinct stage” (p. 6) of research, but a “reflective activity that should inform data collection, writing, further data collection, and so forth” (p. 6). My interviews collectively spanned eight months, with interviews carried out at different time intervals. During this time, I used what I had previously obtained to guide further interviews during the overall course of this research. Therefore, like Coffey and Atkinson (1996), I did not perceive analysis as the last stage of research. Instead, given that theorisation, data-gathering and –analysing, and data/theory integration is commonly applied within the domain of socio-criminological research (Bottoms, 2008), I perceived analysis as having fluidity during my collection of interview data, because I was categorising, thematically coding, thinking about and connecting disclosed responses throughout the entire research process.

During this fluid process of analysing my qualitative data, I used a thematic type of analysis. This is consistent with Tesch (1990), who stated that the process of analysing qualitative data involves the ‘translation’ of raw data, which places the researcher as an instrument in the process. Therefore, the researcher is required to engage on their own behalf, which results in a second-level data document, instead of perceiving analysis as an exact science (Tesch, 1990). As previously stated, I acknowledge the role that my identity and my experiences have upon how I analysed my data, hence why it was explored in detail. Therefore, I openly acknowledge that my own theoretical positions and values was embedded in all aspects of this research.

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Notably, I do not subscribe to a naïve realist view that researchers can simply ‘give voice’ (see: Fine, 2002) to all research participants. As Fine (2002: p. 218) states ‘giving voice’ “involves carving out unacknowledged pieces of narrative evidence that we select, edit, and deploy to border our arguments”. Consistent with arguments by Braun and Clarke (2006), I acknowledge that these decisions existed during the process of thematic analysis and I openly recognise them as decisions. Therefore, my thematic analysis relied upon my own inductive approach of recognising an important moment or experience that was disclosed and encoding it prior to the process of interpretation (Boyatzia, 1998). Since I relied upon my own inductive reasoning, the data that was identified as a theme was based on how I viewed its occurrence in frequency. In other words, I let the data guide me to determine what a theme was and what was not. Notably, the entire process was reliant upon how I interpreted the transcriptions of my interviews so the data was influenced by my own interpretation.

Despite acknowledging the impact that researchers have upon data during thematic analysis, I found that using thematic analysis possessed more benefits in this type of research than any of its perceived detriments. First “thematic analysis provides a flexible and useful tool, which can potentially provide a rich and detailed, yet complex account of data” (Braun and Clarke, 2006, p. 5). Following up on Braun and Clarke (2006), Smith (2015) and McLeod (2011) state that thematic analysis has an increased capability to uncover rich data that other sources may not. Similarly, I found this to be true when examining individual experiences of my participants, their views and opinions, and the reasons why they felt the way they felt. Second, besides identifying and recognizing themes within data, thematic analysis interprets various aspects of the research topic (Boyatzia, 1998; McLeod, 2011; Smith, 2015). Notably, I started this research with a focus on a specific concept: the experiences of transgender police within police culture. However, various other topics arose that turned out to be unexpected findings. In other words, I discovered several contributory findings that were not related to my original investigative intention.

Third, thematic analysis is not committed to any pre-existing theoretical framework and can be used within different frameworks. From an essentialist or realist method, thematic analysis can report experiences, meanings, and the perception of reality of participants. From a constructionist method, thematic analysis can examine the ways in which events, realities, meanings and experiences are on the effects of a range of discourses operating within society (Braun and Clarke, 2006). Further, somewhere within the range of essentialism and constructionism (e.g. critical realism) thematic analysis encourages the ways individuals make meaning of their experiences and the broader social context impinges on those meanings (Braun and Clarke, 2006). During the construction of these meanings, focus can retain on these experiences and other limits of ‘reality’ (Braun and Clarke, 2006). Therefore, one of the most positive contributions thematic analysis can make is that it is a method which works to both reflect reality while at the same time revealing and dissecting the surface of said reality.

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During analysis, “fracturing” (Strauss, 1987, p. 55) of my data into specific “codes” occurred so “individual pieces can be classified or categorized” (Babbie, 2009, p. 402) and situated within broader (theoretical) ideas and themes (Bottoms, 2007; Coffey and Atkinson, 1996). I established, identified and validated each specific theme while fluidly transitioning from collecting data to defining conceptual categories based on these themes. Subsequently, I clarified the links between the conceptual categories. Notably, I was not using data to obtain meaning; instead I used the recurring patterns in which certain themes emerged in interview transcripts to confirm their importance based what a respondent disclosed. Themes that emerged during data-gathering and –analysis, were simultaneously used to, first of all, provide (increased) focus on collecting data and, second of all, theorising and connecting between the empirical reality and my view and experience of it. All in all, treating data and the coding of it in this way, enabled me to highlight possible problems, issues, concerns and matters of importance to my respondents.

By coding data by hand, I was able to prefect my coding categories. During this process, I gained a better ability to organise the data. When I was coding the data by hand I began to see the patterns that emerged because I was at all times close to the data. Therefore, I felt more connected to my research and the data itself.