essential-guide-to-qualitative-in-organizational-research

23 –––– Preserving, Sharing and Reusing Data fromQualitative Research: Methods and Strategies ––––––Louise Corti, Paul Thompson and Janet FinkIn this chapter we explore methodological, ethical and theoretical considerations relating tothe secondary analysis of qualitative data. There is a well-established tradition in social scienceof secondary analysis of quantitative data, and there is no logical intellectual reason why thisshould not be so for qualitative data.We start by exploring the ways in which data materials from qualitative research can bemade available so as to make them useful for the secondary analyst. Here we discuss issuesrelating to the preparation of research data for subsequent reuse, touching on the conduct offieldwork, the organization and documentation of data materials, and the legal and ethicalissues surrounding access to qualitative data such as confidentiality and informed consent.Last we describe ways in which data sources can be used and have been reused and discussthe strengths and weaknesses of these various approaches. By drawing upon research materialfrom The Last Refuge (1962), Peter Townsend’s study of institutional care, we illustrate thepotential which archived data holds for the analysis of such diverse topics as the powerdynamics within institutions, the spatial organization of the workplace, and the relationshipbetween research and policy.THE CASE FOR THE REUSE OF QUALITATIVE DATA ––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––Archived qualitative data are a rich and unique yet often unexploited source of researchinformation that can be reanalysed, reworked, compared with contemporary data, and thatwill, in time, form part of our cultural heritage as historical resources.For British sociological research the decades since 1950 have witnessed anunprecedented flowering: in the growth of its influence, in the spread of its themes, and inthe development of its quantitative and qualitative methods. From the 1960s into the 1970ssociology was not only an exceptionally popular subject with students, but was also givenmore national research resources than at any time before or since. This enabled socialresearchers to carry out studies of a thoroughness unlikely ever to be equalled. Just oneexample is Peter Townsend’s in-depth investigation into the nature and status of long-stayinstitutions in postwar Britain, The Last Refuge (1962).This great wave of research activity has left us with a double heritage. The first is thedevelopment of crucial ideas – such as the role of the extended family in the cities, or of the‘moral panic’ – which remain part of the mainstream of current sociological thinking. Thesecond is a rich residue of original research data, much of which in the UK is nowpermanently archived as a resource for social researchers in the future.