Induction, Deduction and Cyclical Movement: A Review of Qualitative Research Methods

As an early career qualitative researcher, I regularly revisit previously read books and articles and explore new how-to texts as a way of reflecting on and evaluating the quality and appropriateness of my (and others') fieldwork and written work. Monique Hennink, Inge Hutter, and Ajay Bailey's (2011) Qualitative Research Methods functioned as a new how-to book for me to explore. Hennink et al. (2011) write for novice and accomplished qualitative researchers (and everyone in-between) and note that the structure of the book allows researchers with different skill levels to pick-up and dive-in at any chapter; they recommend that novices begin with chapter two and others select chapters that address their interests, needs, and level of experience. For seasoned researchers with specific needs (i.e., a refresher on conducting focus groups), this "diving-in" approach will not leave them feeling isolated from the essence of the book or the research tasks discussed in other chapters. The authors reference the content from preceding and subsequent chapters throughout each section, directing readers who require more information to do things such as, "see chapter two for more details on these" and "see chapter four on the ethical guidelines." In hopes of using the book to reflect on and guide all of the steps of my next research project, I began with the first chapter. Here the authors introduce the framework for the book, which corresponds with their approach to conducting qualitative research. (It should be noted that the book is structured around the authors' approach to qualitative research. There are other paradigms with different ideas of how inquiries should proceed). The book is structured around the cyclical nature of qualitative research, the qualitative research cycle and its subcycles, which include the design cycle (chapters three and four: the design cycle and ethical issues, respectively), the ethnographic cycle (chapters five through eight: participant recruitment, interviews, focus groups, and observations, respectively) and the analytic cycle (chapters nine through 11: data preparation and coding, analysis, and writing, respectively); each subcycle has its own set of tasks. In describing qualitative research in circular terms, the book emphasizes the interlinkages between all of the tasks of the qualitative researcher. In this introductory chapter Hennink et al., (2011) also bring readers' attention to their use of inductive and deductive reasoning; the authors note that there is a frequent interplay between these types of reasoning within each of the three subcycles. The authors recognize that most readers will associate induction with qualitative research; however, they make a point to highlight the role of induction and deduction in each of the subcycles. For example, in the design cycle, the authors describe the initial stages of participant recruitment as being deductive in nature (defined a priori, informed by published literature and existing theories, etc.). However, additional participants may be identified through key informants and interview responses during initial data collection and "this inductive refinement of the study population allows researchers to ... identify new 'information-rich' participants" (Hennink et al., p. 87). Without exhaustively detailing what is contained in the book's remaining 10 chapters, in the remainder of this section, I want to highlight the strengths of the book and elements of the chapters that make it an accessible text and go-to guide. The authors describe a lot of steps and material in their 300 page book. To cover this material, they use straightforward language and uncomplicated descriptions while pointing interested readers to other, more in-depth perspectives and accounts. Each chapter's end contains two sections on "further reading." In these sections, the authors list books and articles that are relevant to the tasks and ideas covered in the respective chapter and highlight exactly what components receive strong coverage in these referenced texts. …