Modelo constitutivo de elasticidad

Phenomenology can be classified according to its purpose: descriptive and/or interpretive (Lopez & Willis, 2004; Langdridge, 2007). The purpose of interpretive phenomenology is to go beyond describing participants’ experiences, and through constant engagement with the text, dig for hidden meaning within participants’ stories to find out how they experienced the phenomenon: of recovery from schizophrenia (Lopez & Wills, 2004; Smith et al., 2009). The researcher is seen to take a significant role by using his or her past knowledge and experiences as s/he brings out meaning in the stories (Geanellos, 2000; Langdridge, 2007).

In light of the above and the nature of my research questions, I chose a qualitative design that took the hermeneutic/interpretive phenomenological approach. Drawing from theorists discussed above, I chose the interpretive phenomenological approach to answer my research questions on Swazi women’s perceptions, experiences and meaning of recovery from schizophrenia. In choosing interpretative phenomenology, and because of the subjective nature of my research, I decided to use IPA as this approach allowed me to used both my experiences as a Swazi women and as a mental and general health trained nurse to gain an in- depth understanding of participants’ lived experience by contextualising their narratives within the Swazi socio-cultural context. Additionally, following the literature review in chapter 2, most studies have acknowledged the idiosyncratic definition of recovery by research participants, which has been generally noted to be different from the medical perspective. This being the case, because of its hermeneutic and ideographic focus in the quest of gaining insight into others’ lifeworld, I found IPA suitable for use to answer the research question of this study, thus broadening knowledge in an area which could have otherwise not been revealed should IPA have not been applied.

Heidegger initially introduced the hermeneutic cycle (Smith et al., 2009). The hermeneutic cycle of IPA means that the process of analysis is dynamic, non-linear and promotes critical thinking, as it facilitates different views and perspectives of participants’ stories. As they make sense of one aspect of data. The researcher must consider the whole narrative as data, but in order to make sense of the whole, they must first find meaning of the part(s) that make up the story. Meanwhile, that idiographic analysis must also be viewed in relationship to narratives of other participants, facilitating different ways of thinking, which leads to an in-depth

115 The merit of using IPA in this study included: a) giving participants a non-restricted opportunity to verbalise their experiences (phenomena) from their own point of view, especially (in reference to this study) using their native language; b) the perceptions and experiences of the participants were related within the confines of their own culture and familiar environment, after which interpretation of meaning was made within that context; c) the purpose of the study was accomplished through gaining added knowledge and insight into Swazi women’s experience of recovery from schizophrenia (Larkin et al., 2006). While other forms of qualitative analysis (such as discourse and thematic analysis) ascribe to the interpretive engagement of the researcher with the participants’ text (also referred to as cognition) IPA emphasises deeper levels of cognition. The commonly used cognition levels are: pre-reflective reflexivity, the reflective “glance at”, and attentive reflection on the pre- reflective (Smith et ale., 2009). IPA is unique because of the additional fourth level: Deliberate controlled reflection, and this involves seriously meditative planning and reflection on all the other three levels of reflection, as well as an account of the cognition levels (Smith et al., 2009).

The idiographic devotion of IPA makes it unique from most forms of qualitative research analysis (Langdridge, 2007). Recognition of the idiographic attribute is one of the core theoretical stances of IPA, where researchers are devoted to providing a detailed analysis of individual participants’ stories, and extensively engaging with the text to derive how each describe or understand the phenomena under investigation in relation to others within a specific context (Smith, 2009). In light of IPA taking account of the homogeneous traits of

participants and the idiographic commitment, the researcher is enabled to make declarations about participants’ related experiences (Smith et al., 2009).

The value of using IPA in analysing participants’ lived experiences is its holistic approach, the contextualising of their experience within the social, cultural, religious and linguistic aspects of their life (Biggerstaff & Thompson, 2008; Weston et al., 2011). This is significant for this study due to it being undertaken in an African socio-cultural context, where, for example, there is no siSwati word for schizophrenia, and this word would need to be defined in the Swazi cultural context, rather than in English.

According to Smith (2009) there are two ways of analysing data using the IPA format: the idiographic case-study and the theory building approach. The former was suitable to use in this study, because of my small sample size, and as such, allowed me to identify themes within each of the participants’ stories and latterly across stories. The theory building IPA approach leads to the formulation of a theory from the participants’ themes, often associated with a larger number of participants (Fade, 2004). Theory development was not the purpose of this study; however, this could have value should the data from this study be used in conjunction with that of other studies.

Another important element of IPA is the significance of the researcher in the analysis of participants’ meaning of a phenomenon. While participants’ ability to express or share their life experience is significant, the researcher’s beliefs, assumptions, and ability to reflect and analyse data is equally paramount in the understanding and formulation of meaning to

117 Smith (2004) the participant’s experience along with the researcher’s previous experience provides a rich dynamic interpretation of the phenomenon.

The merit of using IPA in this study included: a) giving participants a non-restricted opportunity to verbalise their experiences (phenomena) from their own point of view, especially using their native language; b) the perceptions and experiences of the participants were related within the confines of their own culture and familiar environment, after which interpretation of meaning was made within that context; c) the purpose of the study was accomplished through gaining added knowledge and insight into Swazi women’s experience of recovery from schizophrenia. Using IPA boosted my confidence as a novice researcher, as while offering a step by step guide to the analytic process, it also allowed me the freedom to fuse my horizon (experience, culture, knowledge) and this lead to a rich in-depth understanding of the participants’ life world.

3.7 Method

The method used to collect and analyse data in this study was guided by my theoretical perspective, and ontological positions as already discussed in the previous sections.