7 – Content Analysis
Why Should I Care?
Definitions
Content Analysis: The systematic coding of ideas, themes, images, etc. in media.
Primary Source: First-person account. From the horse’s mouth.
Secondary Source: Histories and Analysis of events based on primary sources.
Manifest Content: Obvious
Latent Content: Between the lines
Usefulness
When people write, speak, paint, or draw, they communicate in many ways. What we read into their work depends on what we are looking for. There are degrees of understanding.
Objects of Measurement
What is data?
Words, visual images, sounds, in audio, visual or video formats
Where is the data?
On written documents such as books, newspapers and magazines, correspondence, email, meeting minutes, field notes.
On other documents of audio and video recordings such as documentaries, movies, song, music videos, posters, advertisements, etc.
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Type of Object |
Yes |
No |
Maybe |
Example |
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Personal Characteristic |
X |
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Socio-Demographic Characteristic |
X |
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Opinion |
X |
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Motivations |
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X |
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Ideology |
X |
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Biases / Prejudice |
X |
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Preferences |
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X |
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Personal History / Background |
XX |
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Family Dynamics |
X |
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Cultural History |
X |
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Perception / Self-Perception |
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X |
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Aptitude /Ability |
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X |
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Behaviour |
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X |
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Level of Knowledge |
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X |
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Sampling
The population refers to the total number of texts, or media, included into the “group” under study.
The sample refers to those documents that will be studied. Hopefully, the sample is 100 percent of the population.
The sampling will be purposive, given that important documents are known to stand out.
Types of Content Analysis
- Quantitative
- Word Count
- Word/Idea Weight
- Time Count (speech)
- Qualitative
- Ideologies
- Issues
- Rhetoric / Style
- Chosen Medium
Instruments
Media, Documents.
Includes analyzing artwork, posters, music, lyrics, poetry, prose, political speeches and memoirs, meeting minutes, journalism and magazine publishing.
Scientific Power
Descriptive: You can associate ideas, arguments, and thoughts to people and places, but you cannot explain why things were said, or done. You can’t go back in time and do an experiment.
Steps
-
195
- Identify topic and population
- Identify sample and “loose” hypothesis
- Identify the type and quantity of documents available
- Identify the type of information you are looking for
- Operational definitions
- Set the sample size and type
- Identify the type of content analysis method to be used
- Develop the coding system.
- Do the counting: read, code and collate data.
- Analyze and Report.
Advantages
- Can be applied to all forms of communication
- Applied to explicit (manifest) and implicit (latent) content
- Can use qualitative or quantitative, or both
Disadvantages
- Sampling can be difficult
- Meaning is hard to code
- Quantitative may lose context
Reporting
Tables & Graphs
Descriptive Text
Synthesis Tables
Revue d'histoire de l'Amérique française, Institut d’histoire de l’Amérique française
Canadian Journal of History, University of Toronto Press
European Review of History: Revue européenne d'histoire, European Association of Young Historians
Journal of American History, Organization of American Historians
Preferred Disciplines
History, Political Science, Geography, Anthropology, Sociology
Other Non-scientific Disciplines
Applications in Journalism, Political Attaché, Arts, Anti-terrorism, Cinema
Not useful for
Economists, Psychologists (again, this can happen)
Reading – p. 187
SAT Scores – SAT: were the exams harder?
Nurses and SARS – SARS: were nurses fairly portrayed?
– Can you code the data?
Scientific Power: High Medium Low
Explanatory Descriptive Exploratory
Think Piece
Write a short proposal of a content analysis research project in line with your project.
Include all the steps of the design process (p. 193).
What are the media/documents you could evaluate?
Would you count elements, or would you use a more qualitative approach?
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