Conference Proceedings - School of Nursing & Midwifery - Trinity ...

School of Nursing & Midwifery, Trinity College Dublin: 8 th Annual Interdisciplinary Research Conference
Transforming Healthcare Through Research, Education & Technology: 7 th – 9 th November 2007
Conference Proceedings
the basis of his or her observed performance in specific situations,
and second, they make definite judgments that the behavior
observed makes a significant contribution, either positively or
negatively (1). As a means of probing participants’ assumptive
worlds, the CIT is rooted in the phenomenological research tradition
and presumes that participants’ general assumptions are embedded
in, and can be inferred from, their specific descriptions of particular
events (8: Brookfield, 1990b). The CIT is a tool that can be easily
adapted to any qualitative inquiry as it attempts to glean
participants’ real life experience.
CITs’ differ from other forms of qualitative inquiry. Even
though qualitative inquiry addresses human affairs, the action
behind the method employed varies. CITs’ are short, retrospective
excerpts of an event in a participants’ life. Interviews are always
verbal reports, with probing to elicit an expanded response from
participants. Focus groups are composed of several individuals who
are being ‘interviewed’ within a group interaction. CITs’ are
individually completed with no probing from the researcher. CITs’
should be considered a methodological data instrument that can be
utilized in any qualitative inquiry to educe data. Additionally, CITs’
should be analyzed according to the specific type of qualitative
study being conducted, be it phenomenological, naturalistic, case
study, descriptive or ethnographic. There is no difference in the
analysis of data obtained from a CIT in any form of qualitative
inquiry.
Advantages and Limitations
The account is usually a description, rich in emotional color and with
details of associations that are not strictly relevant to the action
being retold (9: Urquhart, et al). The design allows information to
be obtained quickly, requiring only simple types of judgments and
responses from participants, usually in only 15-20 minutes; it is a
flexible tool and can be easily adapted to meet the requirements of
individual research studies; and the CIT can be collected via a
variety of methods (including face-to-face interviews, telephone
interviews, workshops, group interviews, systematic record-keeping
and direct observation (10: Kemppainen, 2000) as well as a selfadministered
e-mail attachment. Given the various forms of
administration, CITs’ can be considered very versatile. The
researcher can read the CIT to participants; hand out copies of the
CIT to participants and have participants write their responses;
make observations based on the CIT question and record their own
observations or send a copy of the CIT via email attachment and
ask participants to respond via computer email.
It is a form of story-telling, as the participant is sharing their
singular experience as a story to the researcher. It ensures that all
participants focus upon the same issues, given the general aim of
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