I used to conduct qualitative-heavy research projects pretty much all day every day. Key informant interviews, bellwether interviews, document review, focus groups, you name it…
…so I know from personal experience that 99.9% of qualitative reports look like this:
Which is fine, unless you want someone to, ya know, actually read your report.
Here are 6 ideas for presenting qualitative data in reports, slidedocs, presentations, handouts and more.
Word Clouds
Dataviz novices love to love word clouds while dataviz experts love to hate word clouds. I’m not talking about the we have no idea how to analyze text so let’s throw it in Wordle word clouds.
Word Clouds for One-Word Descriptions
In a lot of interview projects, colleagues and I have purposefully included a question in the interview protocol like, “What one word you use to describe….”
Examples: “Hey Mr. Policymaker, what one word would you use to describe public opinion towards poverty in the United States?” or “Hey Mrs. Principal, what one word would you use to describe the grant’s implementation during Year 1 in your charter school?”
The rest of the interview is obviously focused on loooooooong responses, and fuller descriptions, and plenty of examples. But for one or two moments during the conversation, it’s nice to pause and throw in a semi-qualitative short question.
Here’s an example from Students First:
Thousands of ppl have described their favorite teacher using only one word. Here are a few of them. #ThankATeacher pic.twitter.com/dVIhVCBlPW
— StudentsFirst (@StudentsFirst) May 5, 2014
Word Clouds for Before/After Comparisons
Word clouds are also great for before/after comparisons, like these tweets describing breakups. Does your study involve pre/post tests with a few open-ended questions? Do you interview participants at multiple intervals during the study? You could adapt this technique for nearly any time series design.
What our breakups look like on Twitter http://t.co/yRZ8fBgRxx Before and after: pic.twitter.com/XQg7JKMar5 — Motherboard (@motherboard) September 23, 2014
Showcasing Open-Ended Survey Data Beside Closed-Ended Data
What’s better than quantitative data? Or better than qualitative data? Quantitative and qualitative data combined.
Use this technique when your survey has both closed-ended and open-ended questions. Tie the responses together in one chart to add much-needed context. In this example, a survey asked nonprofits to describe what it was like to work with an evaluator. Then, the survey asked them why their experiences were good or bad. Who cares if 33% of nonprofits had excellent experiences but we don’t have examples that describe why? Rather than simply listing out the open-ended responses in your appendix, showcase them beside your stacked bar chart.
Read more about this technique in this post written by Johanna Morariu and I last year.
Photos Beside Participants’ Responses
For your non-anonymous reporting, how about inserting photos of the interviewees next to their ideas?
Strategies for use of #interpreter services in hospitals http://t.co/EpvPyvNcMZ, from @abtassociates @NHeLP_org &more pic.twitter.com/O8V05h3DoM
— Sabriya Rice (@sabriyarice) September 2, 2014
Icons Beside Descriptions and Responses
Icons are so easy to use that there’s really no excuse for not using them to break up long sections of text.
Islamic State is one of the world’s richest terror groups. Here’s why: http://t.co/C0DsXqHkfD pic.twitter.com/ikNThUwNhb — Wall Street Journal (@WSJ) August 28, 2014
Another great use of icons comes from the Washington Post’s story about how animals are faring after the BP oil spill. Isn’t it remarkable how icons and bold subtitles help to break up a chunk of text?
Diagrams to Explain Concepts and Processes
The evaluator’s go-to diagram is the logic model. But you can create diagrams for other aspects of your research project, too, like this diagram explaining what type of protective gear is keeping doctors safe from Ebola:
Breaking down the protective gear helping keep doctors safe from Ebola http://t.co/bQUDqFoD1X pic.twitter.com/tDjkiSLFvs
— Washington Post (@washingtonpost) September 15, 2014
Graphic Timelines
Regular text-based timelines + diagrams, photos, and other images = graphic timelines. Timelining is especially valuable in developmental evaluation where you’re tracking a program, initiative, or campaign as it unfolds.
Interactive Timelines
This timeline from the New York Times includes an assortment of qualitative and quantitative information: dates, milestones, # of rockets, and # of casualties. My screenshot doesn’t do it justice; head over to the New York Times website to explore the interactive version.
Static Timelines
Maybe you’re not the New York Times, I get it. Anyone can design a static timeline from the comfort of their PowerPoint slide.
A Graphic Timeline of the 21st Century Conservation Service Corps http://t.co/GmpTR3qfqv #21CSC #conservation pic.twitter.com/nGydFtkXkC — The Corps Network (@TheCorpsNetwork) August 12, 2014
How are you visualizing data from text, interviews, and focus groups? Please link to your favorite resources below.
Jeffrey Showman
Sep 25, 2014 -
Barbara Felver, data visualization specialist in the Research and Data Analysis (RDA) Division of Washington State’s Dept. of Social and Health Services does a great job illustrating a variety of quantitative and qualitative data for research and survey reports. For example, see her work in this year’s foster parents’ survey: http://www.dshs.wa.gov/pdf/ms/rda/research/11/207.pdf
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Patricia Rogers
Oct 13, 2014 -
Thanks for a great overview of options for displaying qualitative data – and terrific examples. We will expand the options on the BetterEvaluation.org catalogue of options.
Heike Wintershoff
Oct 24, 2014 -
Thanks for sharing. To combine pictures and written information makes it easy to cpature even complex data.
Sergey Yatsenko
Jan 18, 2015 -
HOW DISPLAYING QUALITATIVE DATA WITH NEW MINDSIGHT FROM THOUGHT LEADER for the understanding.
Sondra LoRe
Apr 17, 2017 -
Fantastic Ann! Because qualitative research makes my heart beat fast with joy; I love to see more attention being paid to data vis of such rich information. Thank you, thank you for helping to spread the word that qual is beautiful too!
Elvira A. Diaz
Apr 26, 2017 -
These are great tips that embrace the “visual learner” among the diverse audience of targeted recipents of qualitive research findings.
Nicki
May 22, 2017 -
Incredibly helpful! I manage focus group feedback and started trying to give a visual to the vast breadth and variety of the qualitative input!
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