Codes and coding
We have talked about the process of coding at a number of points in this textbook. It is discussed as a part of doing content analysis of available data in Chapter 8, as a part of making structured field observations in Chapter 9, and as a part of quantitative data analysis in Chapter 14. Coding is also used as a form of data analysis with qualitative data, and it has some similarities to coding done in other contexts. Coding refers to the categorizing of observations into a limited number of categories. However, coding in most qualitative data analysis is distinct from these other forms of coding in at least three important ways. First, it is not an effort to quantify the data or create a set of numerical categories, as is often the case with other types of coding. Coding in qualitative analysis reduces and simplifies the data, but it does so by retaining words and their essential meanings. Second, codes and coding schemes in qualitative analysis are created at least partly from the data itself during the process of data collection; in other words, the data creates the codes. The quantitative coding schemes are more typically derived from some preexisting theoretical stance and then an effort made to see if the data “fit” the coding scheme. Third, the purpose of coding in qualitative analysis is different. In quantitative research, coding is usually a part of the process of measurement: The coding categories constitute the operational definition of the underlying variable. Although this is true, to an extent, in coding in qualitative research, qualitative coding goes beyond measurement; it is also an integral part of conceptual development and theory building. So, as you will see, the process of coding in qualitative research spans both the realms of measurement and of the more abstract process of developing concepts and theories.