Includes bibliographical references (p. 546-571) and indexes.

Guide to this book -- Qualitative research : why and how to do it -- Qualitative and quantitative research -- Approaches to qualitative research -- Ethics of qualitative research -- Using the existing literature -- Theories underlying qualitative research -- Texts as data in qualitative research -- Designing qualitative research -- The qualitative research process -- Research questions -- Entering the field -- Sampling -- Triangulation -- Collecting verbal data -- Interviews -- Focus groups -- Using narrative data -- Collecting data beyond talk -- Observation and ethnography -- Visual data : photography, film, and video -- Using documents as data -- Qualitative data analysis -- Transcription and data management -- Grounded theory coding -- Thematic coding and content analysis -- Naturally occurring data : conversation, discourse, and hermeneutic analysis -- Using software in qualitative data analysis -- Quality of qualitative research : criteria and beyond -- Writing qualitative research -- State of the art and the future.

Organized around the process of doing qualitative research, the Fifth Edition of the bestseller guides readers through ethics, research design, data collection, and data analysis