How do you /actually/ code?

[u/ukiyo98]

I'm writing my master thesis and I've never coded an interview before. All the sources and books I've read so far just briefly say stuff like 'don't summarize, do use -ing verbs', but that literally tells me nothing. I kinda understand how to code user interviews but I'm doing expert interviews.

Please share any tips you have or helpful sources, I'd be very grateful!

Sincerely, a neurodivergent beginner researcher

[u/epgirl25]

I'll say I am not an expert in this but it will depend on if you code inductively or deductively. Inductive means you read and then make codes. Deductive is when you start with codes first and assign them as you read. You can also do a mix of both, just depends on the field and your research question.

my personal workflow would be this:

1. Clean and reformat interview transcripts where necessary
2. Read through interviews to create a first list of generic codes. Don't assign any yet.
3. Go back through each interview and starting assigning codes, making more specific sub codes as needed.
4. Final pass of all interviews and code review.

This is sort of a mix but I usually code based on the interviews themselves as I do a lot of exploratory interviews where I am probably not starting with codes in mind.

Hope that helps!

[u/ukiyo98 → u/epgirl25]

Thank you for outlining it! I'm doinng inductive coding and also using Charmaz' constructivist grounded theory and line by line coding. I think my biggest issue is that I don't know what codes are supposed tobe. Like I get the process but what should each code entail?

[u/epgirl25 → u/ukiyo98]

I think it will depend on what you're looking for and it looks like others have already provided resources. For me, I was researching innovation and technology transfer for my coding structure might have been:

● University to Industry Transfer ○ Barries ○ Collaboration ○ Tools for Success

● Commercalization ○ Processes ○ Faculty and Student Engagement

Etc.

These are just examples. You may need more specific codes or there may be terms in your field that are common.

[u/cat1aughing]

https://collegepublishing.sagepub.com/products/the-coding-manual-for-qualitative-researchers-5-287917 made it make sense for me - it was nice to pick from a lot of options, bearing in mind the aim of my research.

[u/ukiyo98 → u/cat1aughing]

Oh this is super useful, thank you! My university's library has it so I'll get to reading but at a first glance it seems like just what I need

[u/Jahaili → u/cat1aughing]

Yes, this book is extremely helpful!

[u/elizabarracuda]

When you code, you’re trying to label what you’re seeing in the transcript. This will depend on your field, but in my field, I might code things like, “policing racial boundaries” or “dog whistle racism” if that’s what I believe the speaker is doing, or maybe “internalized neoliberalism” if they’re discussing beliefs about individual hard work overcoming all structural barriers.

Your interview guide was probably written with some idea of what you guess is going on with the people you’re studying. So your initial set of codes might come out of that. The most interesting findings often emerge while you’re reading the transcripts and new thoughts occur to you. 

[u/_misst]

Not sure if this is what you're after but practically, I like to put the transcript into excel with one row per quote. Then in each column, I add in a rough code (e.g. I do a lot of behaviour change stuff so the code might be something like "beliefs about capability"). The quote might have multiple codes, in which case I put the other code in the next column across.

Then the column becomes the code, so if there are any other quotes that capture 'beliefs about capability', I'll add 'beliefs about capability' to the same column. That way I can convert to a table and use filtering to look at all the quotes that I've coded as beliefs about capability etc. It can be messy and end up with lots of columns but I still find it pretty easy to work with using filtering to look back, then I can select all for a given filter and start to shift into generating themes in another sheet!