Victoria Clarke

Using thematic analysis in psychology

Thematic analysis is a poorly demarcated, rarely acknowledged, yet widely used qualitative analytic method within psychology. In this paper, we argue that it offers an accessible and theoretically flexible approach to analysing qualitative data. We outline what thematic analysis is, locating it in relation to other qualitative analytic methods that search for themes or patterns, and in relation to different epistemological and ontological positions. We then provide clear guidelines to those wanting to start thematic analysis, or conduct it in a more deliberate and rigorous way, and consider potential pitfalls in conducting thematic analysis. Finally, we outline the disadvantages and advantages of thematic analysis. We conclude by advocating thematic analysis as a useful and flexible method for qualitative research in and beyond psychology.

What can ‘‘thematic analysis’’ offer health and wellbeing researchers?

The field of health and wellbeing scholarship has a strong tradition of qualitative research*and rightly so. Qualitative research offers rich and compelling insights into the real worlds, experiences, and perspectives of patients and health care professionals in ways that are completely different to, but also sometimes complimentary to, the knowledge we can obtain through quantitative methods. (Published: 16 October 2014) Citation: Int J Qualitative Stud Health Well-being 2014, 9 : 26152 - http://dx.doi.org/10.3402/qhw.v9.26152

‘We’re not Living on Planet Lesbian’: Constructions of Male Role Models in Debates about Lesbian Families

The notion that children (especially boys) need male role models has been used in the past to attack lesbian parents in custody cases, and more recently in debates about donor insemination, adoption and fostering. We are interested in how lesbian parents and their supporters respond to arguments about the necessity of male role models. We analyse data from popular television talk shows and television documentaries using a discursive approach and identify common strategies used by lesbian parents to deal with the argument that their children are ‘missing out’ because of a deficit in their family structure. We then consider the responses of opponents of lesbian parenting to these strategies. What these responses reveal is that lesbian parents and their opponents construct and work with very different definitions of male role models. We show that the contributions both of opponents of lesbian parenting and of lesbian parents themselves to media debates attend to and sustain traditional understandings of gender and sexual development.

Bisexual women’s understandings of social marginalisation: ‘The heterosexuals don’t understand us but nor do the lesbians’:

Drawing on interviews with 20 self-identified bisexual women, this paper contributes to the limited psychological literature on bisexual women by exploring their experiences of social marginalisation. These (mainly white and middle class) British bisexual women reported that they did not feel at home in either lesbian or lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender communities, nor in the wider (heteronormative) society. They identified a number of understandings – bisexuality as a temporary phase on the path to a fully realised lesbian or heterosexual identity and bisexuals as immature, confused, greedy, untrustworthy, highly sexual and incapable of monogamy – which they reported as arising from lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender communities and the wider society. The women refuted these accounts which they stated did not reflect their experiences of bisexual identity and which positioned bisexuality as invisible and invalid.

Lesbian and gay parents on talk shows: resistance or collusion in heterosexism?

In this paper we explore popular television talk show debates about lesbian and gay parents. We show that the heterosexist framing of these debates compels lesbian and gay parents and their supporters to produce defensive and apologetic arguments that normalise lesbian and gay families. Lesbian and gay parents end up reinforcing the legitimacy of antilesbian/gay fears in the very act of demonstrating that they are groundless. We identify six themes in pro-lesbian/gay discourse on talk shows: (i) „I‟m not a lesbian/gay parent‟; (ii) „we‟re just the family next door‟; (iii) „love makes a family‟; (iv) „god made Adam and Steve‟; (v) children as „proof ‟; and (vi) the benefits of growing up in a lesbian/gay family. Our analysis focuses on the broad, ideological functions and effects of these themes. We conclude the paper by outlining an alternative agenda for talk show debates about lesbian and gay issues.

“It shouldn’t stick out from your bikini at the beach”: Meaning, gender, and the hairy/hairless body

Women’s and men’s bodies and sexuality can be understood as socially situated and socially produced. This means they are affected by, and developed in relation to, patterned sociocultural meanings and representations. We aim here to understand a recently emergent, and potentially gendered, body practice—pubic hair removal—by examining the meanings people ascribe to pubic hair and its removal. Extending the widespread hairless bodily norm for Anglo/Western women, pubic hair removal is an apparently rapidly growing phenomenon. Men, too, are seemingly practicing pubic hair removal in significant numbers, raising the question of to what extent pubic hair removal should be understood as a gendered phenomenon. What we do not yet know is what people’s understandings and perceptions of pubic hair are, and how they make sense of its removal. Using a qualitative survey, the current study asked a series of questions about pubic hair and its removal, both in general and related to men’s and women’s bodies. In total, 67 participants (100% response rate; 50 female; mean age 29, diverse ethnically, predominantly heterosexual) completed the survey. Thematic analysis identified five key themes in the way people made sense of pubic hair and pubic hair removal that related to choice, privacy, physical attractiveness, sexual impacts, and cleanliness. Meanings around pubic hair and its removal were not consistently gendered, but it was still situated as more of an issue for women. With potential impacts on sexual and psychological well-being, sexuality education provides an important venue for discussing, and questioning, normative ideas about pubic hair.

V. Clothes Maketh the Queer? Dress, Appearance and the Construction of Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual Identities:

In this short report of an exploratory qualitative study, we consider whether a small group of younger British lesbians, gay men and bisexuals felt under pressure to conform to lesbian/gay appearance norms and used their clothing and appearance to actively construct and manage a visual identity as lesbian, gay and bisexual (LGB). One of the exercises the first author regularly uses when teaching about the sociocultural construction of LGB identities involves students brainstorming their associations for the words ‘lesbian’, ‘gay man’ and ‘bisexual’. For many students, the word ‘lesbian’ conjures up associations like ‘ugly’, ‘butch’, ‘masculine’, ‘short hair’, ‘dungarees’ and ‘comfortable shoes’ (see Peel, 2005). Whereas gay men are allied to style, fashion, grooming and effeminacy (witness all the ‘makeover’ television shows featuring gay men – Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, How Not to Decorate). In short, many students have a clear image of the (stereo)typical lesbian and gay man. By contrast, students typically identify (a smaller number of) associations for the word ‘bisexual’ (such as ‘confused’ and ‘greedy’), but have no clear image of the typical bisexual. The centrality of the visual to lesbian and gay identity is readily apparent in popular cultural sources, such as Queer (Gage et al., 2002), that document the ways in which lesbians and gay men have used dress, hairstyling, jewellery, tattoos, piercings and other adornments to signify their sexual identity (or preferences). Although appearance norms have changed throughout history (Edwards, 1997; Faderman, 1991), it has been argued that dress and appearance constitute a primary way of asserting and displaying a lesbian and gay identity (Holliday, 2001). Lesbians and gay men use clothing and adornment to create a sense of group identity (separate from the dominant culture), to resist and challenge normative (gendered) expectations, and to signal their sexual identity to the wider world or just to those ‘in the know’ (Rothblum, 1994; Traub, 2003). At the same time, strategies of passing have made use of the semiotic codes woven into clothing (Skidmore, 1999). Giving the centrality of visual identity to lesbian and gay culture and communities, and the role of dress and appearance as key signifiers

‘Stereotype, Attack and Stigmatize those Who Disagree’: Employing Scientific Rhetoric in Debates about Lesbian and Gay Parenting

In this paper, I explore the controversy surrounding lesbian and gay parenting within psychology, focusing on the rhetoric with which ‘authoritative’ accounts of lesbian and gay parenting are produced. Both ‘advocates’ and ‘enemies’ of lesbian and gay parenting have used what Celia Kitzinger (1990) has dubbed the ‘rhetoric of pseudoscience’ to preserve the scientific integrity of their research while, at the same time, undermining the credibility of their opponents’ findings. Authors engage in the rhetoric of pseudoscience when they attempt to persuade readers that a piece of research is bad science and that its results, therefore, cannot be taken seriously: they highlight (among other things) flaws in the methodology and the bias and political motivation of the researchers (Kitzinger, 1990). In the light of recent debates about the merits of essentialism and social constructionism in lesbian and gay psychology (e.g. Dickins, 1999; Kitzinger, 1999; Rahman, 1999), I consider the (political) costs and benefits of using science and scientific rhetoric.

Lesbian and Gay Marriage: Transformation or Normalization?

Although there are still a number of vocal anti-marriage critics (e.g. Robson, 1998; Warner, 1999), most lesbians and gay men writing about marriage support the extension of marriage rights. It is hardly surprising, then, that the three books I review here all construct strong arguments in favour of lesbian and gay marriage. In the remainder of this essay, I provide a summary of the books, and then outline some of the arguments they develop in support of lesbian and gay marriage. These arguments are: domestic partnerships are an illegitimate alternative to marriage; lesbian and gay marriage will diminish social prejudice, provide access to rights currently denied to lesbians and gay men, not encourage distinctions between good and bad gays and transform traditional gender roles; and fears about normalization are misplaced.

‘I am who I am’? Navigating norms and the importance of authenticity in lesbian and bisexual women's accounts of their appearance practices

This article explores how lesbian and bisexual women negotiate pressures to look like an authentic lesbian and an authentic individual in their accounts of their clothing and appearance practices. Thirty women responded to a ‘paper-and-pen’ qualitative survey about lesbian and bisexual womens dress and appearance. Two main themes were generated from the data: ‘norms and conformity’ and ‘freedom and authenticity’. Conformity to appearance mandates raised questions about individual authenticity; the women negotiated this dilemma either by presenting their conformity as active and strategic, a means to an end (subverting normative assumptions of heterosexuality, being recognised by other non-heterosexual women) or as an almost unconscious expression of their inner dyke. For feminine and other non-conforming women, their lack of conformity raised questions about their authenticity as a non-heterosexual woman (and their feminist credentials), and some of these women negotiated this dilemma by presenting their femininity as a subversion of heteronormative assumptions by showing that any woman can be a lesbian. We conclude this article by highlighting the potential for over-reading sexuality in accounts of sexuality and appearance practices.