Document Analysis

Document Analysis

1. Advantages and Limitations

   • Efficient method
   • Cost-effectiveness
   • Exactness
   • Insufficient detail
   • Low retrievability

2. What is ?

   • Document analysis is a systematic procedure for reviewing or evaluating documents—both printed and electronic (computer-based and Internet-transmitted) material.
     • what kind of documents?
       • IT include advertisements; agendas, attendanceregisters, and minutes of meetings; manuals; background papers; books and brochures; diaries and journals; event programs (i.e., printed outlines); letters and memoranda; maps and charts; newspapers (clippings/articles); press releases; program proposals, application forms, and summaries; radio and television program scripts; organisational or institutional reports; survey data; and various public records.

3. You can use it in combination with other qualitative research methods as a means of triangulation.

   • Aplication
     • Document analysis is particularly applicable to qualitative case studies / intensive studies producing rich descriptions of a single phenomenon, event, organisation, or program (Stake, 1995; Yin, 1994)
   • Specific uses of documents
     • Documents can provide data on the context within which research participants operate
     • Information contained in documents can suggest some questions that need to be asked and situations that need to be observed as part of the research.
     • Provide supplementary research data
     • Provide a means of tracking change and development.
     • Documents can be analysed as a way to verify findings or corroborate evidence from other sources.

4. Analyasing

   • skimming (superficial examination)
   • What is ?
     • Content analysis is the process of organising information into categories related to the central questions of the research.