POLSCI 2NN3 Lecture Notes - Lecture 12: Content Analysis, Qualitative Research, National Post

• School: McMaster University
• Department: Political Science
• Course: POLSCI 2NN3
• Professor: Tim Fowler

Document Summary

Note: you can analyze some quantitative data with content analysis but, it does tend to be more based in qualitative analysis. Content analysis is a detailed, careful, systematic examination and interpretation of a particular body of material in an effort to identify patterns, themes, assumptions and meanings. The content in question can be anything produced by people for various purposes. We typically focus on forms of human communication (written documents, photographs, film, video, audio tapes, street signs, graffiti) Content analysis is designed to code the content data as a form that can be used to address the research question. You take your raw data, and you apply a coding technique to it that you can use to help analyze it. Content analysis also provides a means by which to study processes which can occur over a long period of time. We might want to look at trends in society.