The purpose of the present study is to explore the complicated career decisions facing unemployed younger baby boom women (Duberly et al., 2014; Onyx & Benton, 1996; Sok, 2010). The baby boom generation has changed the way individuals age, including the trajectory of career decision making (Anderson et al., 2012; Bateson, 2010; Coogan & Chen, 2007). In addition, the 21st century workplace is characterized by change and uncertainty: changing career opportunities and social policies affecting work decisions as well as uncertainty about the
recovering economy (Pelsma & Arnett, 2002; Pew Research Center, 2014). Unemployment in late middle age is problematic for women especially in the decade prior to receiving retirement benefits. The problem is that unemployed women over 50 urgently need to hold a job in order to make contributions to retirement plans to assure future retirement income. The women need to make decisions about their future career in light of this problem.
Previous studies of women’s decision making focused on listening to women as a way to understand female decision making. The researchers acknowledged a uniqueness that was identified as a women’s subjective epistemology and considered female development (Belenky et al., 1986; Gilligan, 1982). In addition, Gilligan (1993) recognized gender differences involved in decision making due to identity. Gilligan found that women tend to make decisions in a relational manner.
A growing body of work in women’s career decision-making research explores the importance of the relational paradigm, especially for women and the influence of work-life balance, mothering, and midlife women’s career transition (Motulsky, 2010). Ebberwein et al. (2004) designed a qualitative study to better understand career transition in unemployed middle
age adults. This study found that the subjective experience provided evidence of career adaptability (Ebberwein et al., 2004).
While previous qualitative research has enriched the understanding of career decision making, Motulsky (2010) argues that there is still a need for more career counseling research to explore populations of various age groups, genders, and culture. The research question of the present inquiry addresses a particular age group, gender, and generation with its own cultural significance. This study assumes that reality is socially constructed and people’s perceptions about their career decisions are all valid. Qualitative research honors the social constructivist framework (Creswell, 2013).
The current study employs a qualitative research method to extend career decision- making research based on the subjective experience of the unemployed younger baby boom women.
The central research question is, “How do the thoughts, assumptions, and opinions of unemployed younger baby boom women affect their career decision-making experience?”
The related subsidiary questions are:
How do the bioecological spheres of human development affect the career decision- making experience of the unemployed younger baby boom women?
How does the psychosocial crisis of generativity vs. stagnation in adulthood affect the career decision-making experience of younger baby boom women?
How does womanhood affect the career decision-making experience of unemployed younger baby boom women?
What criteria do unemployed younger baby boom women use to evaluate or define vocational alternatives?
The chapter presents the research methodology and specific procedures used in
conducting the study. Specifically, the research paradigm, approach, and tradition support the methodological choices of the study. The chapter provides a detailed rationale for selection of interpretative phenomenological analysis and the related data analysis procedure. The chapter concludes with descriptions of the ethical considerations, issues of trustworthiness, and
limitations of the study.
Research Paradigm
A research paradigm is a model, or as described by Patton (1990), a general perspective. Social science researchers must consider several defining beliefs in order to decide the
appropriate research paradigm. Those beliefs are also recognized as the philosophical
orientation of the inquiry. In general, Berg (2007) recommends qualitative research for those research questions that seek answers to questions within social settings. The philosophical framework depends on the researcher’s ontological, epistemological, axiological, and methodological beliefs.
Vagle (2014) provides clarification of the ontological beliefs of phenomenologists. The lived experience is the focus of the inquiry. The actual living in the world is the subject of the inquiry. Phenomenologists contemplate how it is to be in the experience. Vagle (2014) further clarifies how the current research question connects to the phenomenological orientation. “Phenomenologists . . . are not primarily interested in what humans decide, but rather how they experience their decision-making” (Vagle, 2014, p. 21). One way to understand reality is to question the individuals who live in the social setting about their experience of the phenomena. This is known as the epistemological belief, which in this present inquiry is known as social constructivism (Creswell, 2013).
Social constructivism is the worldview that individuals understand reality subjectively based on experiences of history and culture (Creswell, 2013). Creswell (2013) suggests that this worldview is interested in understanding complex patterns of meaning. Researchers seek to understand the individual’s view of the phenomenon to better understand the historical and cultural settings of the individual. Glesne (2011) describes social constructivism as
understanding the perspectives of several members of a social group that experienced the same phenomena in order to understand patterns of thought and action for that group.
Social constructivism’s worldview acknowledges the role of the researcher (Creswell, 2013). The researcher’s questions are broad and open for discussion in order to promote
interaction between the researcher and the research participant. The researcher concedes that the interpretation may be influenced by her own personal, historical, and cultural experiences. Thus the researcher makes an interpretation of the findings, an interpretation shaped by personal experiences and background. Axiological beliefs in social constructivism lead to valuing and negotiating the final interpretation of the experience (Creswell, 2013). Managing the
collaboration and interpretation then becomes an issue of trustworthiness that is discussed later in this chapter. The current inquiry concentrated on understanding the career decision-making experience when particular factors (i.e., gender, age, life stage, generation, unemployment) were present.
Research Approach
The phenomenological approach was used to understand the essential “truths” of the lived experience of unemployed younger baby boom women making career decisions. The qualitative approach focuses on the unemployed younger baby boom women’s description of their career decision-making experiences. As stated in the research paradigm, the match between
a constructivist approach and qualitative research was driven by the research question.
Qualitative research methodologies created opportunities to explore the individual’s experience of the world of work (Stead et al., 2012).
Smith et al. (2009) advise researchers to choose the purpose of the research and then choose the appropriate approach. Within the research approaches of phenomenology, the research tradition known as interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) focuses on individual experience and understanding of the experience. Smith et al. (2009) describes the hierarchy of experiences. The smallest unit of the experience could be considered, but IPA is also appropriate to research experiences that hold larger significance in a person’s life (Smith et al., 2009). Dilthy (1976) describes the larger experience as a “comprehensive unit.” The
comprehensive unit is “made up of parts of a life, linked by a common meaning… even when the parts are separated by interrupting events” (Dilthy, 1976, p. 210). The present inquiry is
concerned with the hierarchy of experiences of the unemployed younger baby boom women, which led to conducting the research in the tradition of IPA.
Research Tradition
Among the different research traditions in qualitative research, the present inquiry is phenomenological oriented, specifically IPA. The chosen research tradition aligns with a constructivist research philosophy within a qualitative research paradigm. The
phenomenological research approach suits the research question and more specifically, IPA suits the intended purpose of the research. IPA is influenced by the various phenomenological
theorists (Smith et al., 2009). IPA researchers study people who “do things in the world, . . . reflect on what they do, and those actions have meaningful, existential consequences” (Smith et al., 2009, p. 34). To further elaborate, this portion of the chapter aligns the research tradition
with the manner of phenomenology, hermeneutics, and idiography which are the foundation of IPA.
Phenomenological Foundations of IPA
IPA examines how individuals make sense of major life experiences (Smith et al., 2009). Smith et al. explains that IPA fundamentally focuses on experience and perception in the manner of Husserl’s work in phenomenological philosophy. Although this is the foundation, IPA is also influenced by the work of Heidegger, Merlau-Ponty, and Sartre. Smith et al. explain that the influence of these philosophers moves toward a more interpretive perspective. The “focus on understanding the perspectival directedness of our involvement in the lived world–something which is personal to each of us, but which is a property of our relationships to the world and others . . . (Smith et al., 2009, p. 21). For this reason, the IPA research tradition aligns well with the research question of this present inquiry. The phenomenological orientation of IPA attends to the women’s description of their experiences in such a way that meaning comes from the things that happen to them and their activities. Reporting the meaning also involves
interpretative involvement.
Hermeneutic Foundation of IPA
Smith et al. (2009) explain that making meaning from discourse is known as
hermeneutics, an interpretive principle. “Hermeneutic phenomenology is a human science which studies persons” (van Manen, 1990, p. 6). Hermeneutics involves the interpretive reporting of the data through the lens of the researcher (Smith et al., 2009). The hermeneutic circle is both iterative and circular, navigating through a path that “allows the new stimulus to speak in its own voice” and recognizes that the researchers’ presumptions could be detrimental to the
of a phenomenon, requiring the researcher capture an accurate and empathic understanding of the phenomenon through language.
One of the ways to reflect on and interpret the meaning of phenomena is to apply the existentials of lived experience (van Manen, 2014). There are five manners that all humans experience the lived world. Those five lived existentials are lived relation (relationality), lived body (corporeality), lived space (spatiality), lived time (temporality), and lived things and technology (materiality). These universal themes are expressed as a “silent theme;” the
individual alludes to the meaning of each existential when describing the phenomenon but does not necessarily state the theme explicitly (van Manen, 2014). Therefore, it is incumbent on the researcher to guide the hermeneutic analysis through the possible themes during analysis. Idiographic Foundation of IPA
IPA research is idiographic in that it entails searching for and uncovering the details of the person’s experience. IPA is recommended within sociological research on topics including psychological distress, life transitions, and identity (Smith et al., 2009). The present study seeks to understand emotional experiences as well as the developmental experiences of the
unemployed younger baby boom women as they make career decisions.
The idiographic nature of IPA contributes to the understanding of an individual and the relation to a particular life experience. IPA acknowledges the significance attached to an experience by an individual, interprets the experience to provide thick meaning (precisely
descriptive), and then relates that experience in such a way to share the essential features through detailed reporting (Smith et al., 2009). Therefore, given the present research questions,
collecting detailed accounts from a small number of women is preferred over using survey data (Smith et al., 2009).
Research Design
The present study focuses on exploring the personal career decision-making experience of a group of unemployed women who share the generational context of history, culture, and economics. The research design allows for participants to describe their personal experiences which are then reflected on and interpreted by the researcher (Smith et al., 2009; van Manen, 1990). The use of IPA is suitable based on the epistemological position of the research question (Smith et al., 2009). The study’s research questions focused on making sense of career decision- making by unemployed younger baby boom women.
Research Focus
Smith et al. (2009) extend the aims of IPA research to include participant perceptions and
views. The IPA researcher more often is exploring an experience and is process oriented. In the
current study, the primary research question is guided by phenomenological purpose (van Manen, 2014). IPA research involves secondary research aims that include understanding and investigating (Smith et al., 2009). The researcher is open-minded and seeks to investigate a specified phenomenon. IPA is an inductive procedure and the research questions are not meant to be explanatory. The researcher is not seeking a source of causality (Smith et al., 2009). Once the experiential data are obtained, the researcher reflects in a phenomenological manner to complete analysis (van Manen, 2014).
While the research design is exploratory and seeks to understand career decision making, the researcher intends to understand how particular factors were involved in the experience. Smith et al. (2009) refer to these as secondary, or theory driven questions. The related subsidiary questions arose during the literature review. Smith et al. (2009) recognize that the IPA
Qualitative data collection does not guarantee an answer to those second-tier questions. During interpretation, the researcher essentially is answering the question “to what extent can accounts of the decision-making process be explained by theory y” (Smith et al., 2009, p. 48). The questions are intended to understand the existing theories and models. Table 1 illustrates the alignment of the central research question and subsidiary research question with the conceptual framework of existing theories.
Table 1
Alignment of Research Questions and Conceptual Frameworks
Research Question Conceptual Framework
How do the thoughts, assumptions, and opinions of unemployed younger baby boom women affect
their career decision-making experience?
van Manen guided existential inquiry
How do the bioecological spheres of human development affect the career decision-making
experience of the unemployed younger baby boom women?
Bronfenbrenner bioecological model
How does the psychosocial crisis of generativity vs. stagnation in adulthood affect the career decision-making experience of younger baby
boom women?
Erikson lifespan theory
How does womanhood affect the career decision- making experience of unemployed younger baby
boom women?
Erikson identity development, Gilligan gender and adult development
What criteria do unemployed younger baby boom women use to evaluate or define vocational
alternatives?
Trait and factor theories (various), Social cognitive career theory, Happenstance learning
theory
The theory-driven subsidiary questions supported the foundational central research question. After establishing the phenomenological focus of the research, through the central question, this researcher cautiously probed for the themes if the women expressed experiencing the phenomena in that manner.
Conceptual framework as hierarchy. In the final stage of the research, the data are analyzed and interpreted. The analysis steps of IPA generate a hierarchy of themes that emerge from the recursive analysis of the transcripts. Initial understanding begins in a general manner. Gilligan’s (1982) application of inner voice stipulates the connection of unconscious messages to meaningful understanding of female identity. Specifically, interpreting the transcripts to
understand meaningful elements related to development suited the purpose of the present
inquiry. Similarly, the recognition of subjective knowledge as epistemology of women (Belenky et al., 1986) supported the analysis plan to consider the content, linguistic, and conceptual levels of understanding the transcripts (Smith et al., 2009). The type of analysis specific to IPA
afforded the researcher the possibility to consider the themes as evidence of the career counseling theories: Gottfredson’s (1981) theory of circumscription, compromise, and self- creation; Super’s (1957) life-span, life-space theory; Lent et al.’s (2000) social cognitive-career theory (SCCT); and Krumboltz’s (2009) happenstance learning theory. The analysis plan provides a macro and micro appreciation of the theoretical foundations. Further information about the analysis plan is outlined after explication of data collection.
Data Collection Instruments
The present study utilized three data collection instruments: a demographic form to complete prior to the interview, a career lifeline, and a semi-structured interview protocol. First names were collected to sort and code the responses to use for verification of the transcript, but each participant was also assigned a neutral identifier (i.e., pseudonym) for subsequent published work. Once the research participant approved the final transcription of the interview, the neutral identifier replaced the participant’s name. The original interview files are stored in a password protected computer, locked in a private office at the researcher’s home. The files will be stored
for three years then destroyed, utilizing a method approved to maintain confidentiality of the research participants.
Demographic survey. Demographic questions included confirmation of the birth year, length of current unemployment in months, and race/ethnicity. A multiple choice question with fill-in collected the highest level of education completed: General Education Diploma (GED) date or graduation date, number of years completed post-secondary education, and identification of certificates, diplomas, or degrees earned with the date. Additional relevant demographic information included the number of dependents in the household and the marital status of the research participant. The demographic data provided descriptive statistics. The demographic variables have been significant in previous studies of career decision making and added to the rich detail of the interpretation. The literature review suggests nomothetic explanation between socioeconomic status and career decision making (Whitmarsh & Wentworth, 2012), among others. Qualitative research is regarded more idiographic, which may be apparent from the interpretation of the transcripts.
To be eligible for the study, women must be born between January 1, 1955 and
December 31, 1964. The distribution of the birth year and race/ethnicity provided descriptive information about the sample. The younger baby boom generation is not a homogeneous group (Eggebeen & Sturgeon, 2006; Stewart & Torges, 2006). Understanding and interpreting the themes of the interviews included gathering the demographics that influence the experience of generational factors and career decision making.
Career lifeline. Each participant chose where to begin her career lifeline based on the subjective identification of having a “career” including career(s) up to the present time. For the purposes of the research, career is defined as a series of “occupations in the life of an individual”
(Super, 1957). Each research participant plotted the career and life course including particular choice points in the career. At each choice point, the research participant was asked to remember thoughts, assumptions, feelings, and the transition that accompanied the decision point. The aim of the lifeline was to support each participant’s self-reflection prior to the interview and to prime her thinking about previous career decisions. The lifeline encouraged the research participant’s introspection about the past career decisions in order to build rapport with the interviewer expeditiously. Amundson et al. (2010) used a similar instrument to record the previous history of career changes for individuals in their qualitative career decision making study. The career lifeline remained the property of the research participant. The interview captured the result of the career lifeline and eliminated the need to collect a written copy.
Interview protocol. Research participants were interviewed using semi-structured interviews with an interview protocol listing a number of predetermined questions and probes. The researcher was free to use the probes to explore for thick descriptions or explain a term like
career based on the research participant’s vocabulary (Berg, 2007). Smith et al. (2009) suggest
particular tips for phenomenological focus interviews. For example, the researcher may need to