Qualitative Decisions in Quantitative Text Analysis Research

• Published in: Sociological methodology Vol. 42; no. 1; pp. 88 - 90
• Main Author: Popping, Roel
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Los Angeles, CA Sage Publications 01.08.2012; SAGE Publications; American Sociological Association
• Subjects: Commentaries; Content analysis; Data analysis; Decisions; Grammar; Latent content; Qualitative analysis; Quantitative analysis; Research methods; Semantics; Sociological methodology; Studies; Text analysis; Text analytics; Texts; Voice recognition; Words
• ISSN: 0081-1750; 1467-9531
• DOI: 10.1177/0081175012460854

Traditional forms of quantitative text analysis are based on counting the occurrence or co-occurrence of concepts indicated by words or phrases. Today more and more attention is given to what is said exactly in a sentence, especially in a clause. For this approach, the semantic grammar is relevant, indicated as Subject-Verb-Valence-Object. To catch the meaning of such texts interpretation is necessary, and qualitative decisions come into the picture. The paper on event counts by Franzosi, De Fazio, and Vicari does not give attention to this fact. It refers to only one problem: Although there can be good reasons to use sentences in passive voice, they are nevertheless hard to read. A sentence in passive voice can be rewritten in active voice; a coder only has to recognize the passive voice. Generally the manifest content is considered, but the investigator might also be interested in the latent character of a message, in the "behavioral and situational" contexts of content (George 1959:27).