Evaluating the contribution of interpretative phenomenological analysis

Abstract

This paper presents the results of a review of studies employing interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) obtained from three of the major databases: web of science, medline and psychinfo. Between 1996 and 2008, 293 papers presenting empirical IPA studies were published. Trends over time are presented. This is followed by a categorisation of the content area of that corpus. The biggest specific area of research within IPA is illness experience, it forming the subject of nearly a quarter of the corpus. The paper then describes a guide for evaluating IPA research which is used to assess the illness experience papers. Detailed summaries are provided of the papers rated as good. These summaries describe the substantive findings as well as the markers of high quality. The paper finishes with a summary of core features of high-quality IPA work.

Keywords:

• interpretative phenomenological analysis
• illness experience
• qualitative
• quality

Acknowledgements

Thanks to Virginia Eatough and an anonymous reviewer for helpful comments on a previous draft of this paper. Thanks also to Virginia Eatough for help with devising the evaluation guide and to Lymarie Rodriguez for assistance with obtaining the IPA papers in the review. An earlier version of this paper was given as a keynote presentation to the British Psychological Society, Division of Health Psychology Annual Conference, University of Aston, 2009.

Notes

1. Paper 1: Judge 1, G; Judge 2, A+; Paper 2: Judge 1, G –, Judge 2, A.