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13 - CONTENT ANALYSIS

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 June 2012

Paul S. Gray ,
John B. Williamson ,
David A. Karp  and
John R. Dalphin
Paul S. Gray
Affiliation:
Boston College, Massachusetts
John B. Williamson
Affiliation:
Boston College, Massachusetts
David A. Karp
Affiliation:
Boston College, Massachusetts
John R. Dalphin
Affiliation:
Merrimack College, Massachusetts
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Summary

INTRODUCTION

Content analysis is a systematic attempt to examine some form of verbal or image communication such as newspapers, diaries, letters, speeches, movies, or television shows. Usually this communication already exists, and the researcher wants to discover its implications for the study of human behavior. Content analysis can be either inductive or deductive theoretically, but it is primarily quantitative because the examination of communication usually occurs through counting its content. Like other quantitative techniques, the most creative part of the method is concentrated toward the early stages of research design, when the categories to be used for counting have to be defined. In developing their ingenious data collection tools, practitioners of content analysis demonstrate their research imagination.

The analysis of communication content has a long tradition in the social sciences. It has revealed significant information about the values of both communicators and their audiences. This chapter summarizes the major elements of this methodology, offers some examples of its application, and discusses some of the reliability and validity issues that arise for the investigators who use it.

Consider the following example from the work of Simon Davis (1990), who analyzed personal advertisements to see what motivates mate selection. Do men and women differ in the factors seen as important in choosing a partner? Davis pursued this question by looking at the “personals” section in a major daily newspaper.

Type
Chapter
Information
The Research Imagination
An Introduction to Qualitative and Quantitative Methods
 , pp. 283 - 304
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2007

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