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Chapter Three – Research methods and their use - Page 105
heuristic involves a three-dimensional array, with x and y-axes representing the extent
of the experience of connection and difference respectively, and the z-axis representing
bi-logical depth, in other words the particular mix of asymmetrical and symmetrical
logics at any point in time (see Page 85). This can be applied to samples of interaction,
by examining the ways in which connection, difference and bi-logical depth are being
expressed or manifested in particular instances.
Procedure
My practice has been to study all of my records of the semester, including notes and
copies of clinical transcripts, as well as tape recordings of sessions and a range of
transcriptions of those. In addition, I have been able to reflect on my recall of the
events. As I have carried out this study, I have made further notes of various kinds in
my project logbook, particularly observations and analytic and methodological notes. I
have used the NVivo qualitative data analysis software (Bazeley & Richards, 2000) to
manage this logbook as well as other notes and documents that I have accumulated.
Although some of my notes remain hand-written, I have a store of data in electronic
form that I can rapidly access and utilise. This procedure has yielded the material for the
analysis and interpretation described above.
Analysis and interpretation has followed an iterative process, in that I have been
engaged in a continuing cycling between the data and my reflections on it. After two
hearings of the complete sequence of tape recordings, I selected the five foci that are the
subject of these five chapters. I chose these because I judged them to be ‘Sticky
Moments’, that is, instances, sequences or episodes when there is a form of disruption to
what is consciously intended. Transcripts of these episodes were then variously re-read,
and the analytic and interpretive procedure that I have described above was applied.