European Journal of Dental Education ISSN 1396-5883

Doing qualitative research in dentistry and dental education

S. Edmunds1 and G. Brown2
1
University of Westminster, London, UK,
2
University of Nottingham, Nottingham, UK

Keywords Abstract
qualitative research; dental education; dentistry;
methodology; pedagogy. The purpose of this paper is to assist dental researchers to develop their expertise in
qualitative research. It sketches the key characteristics of qualitative research; summa-
Correspondence rises theoretical perspectives; outlines the core skills of qualitative data collection and
Dr Sarah Edmunds the procedures which underlie three methods of qualitative research: interviewing,
University of Westminster focus groups and concept maps. The paper offers some guidance on writing qualitative
Department of Psychology research and provides examples of qualitative research drawn from dentistry and dental
309 Regent Street education.
London W1B 2UW, UK
Tel: +44(0)207 911 5000 ext 2170
Fax: +44(0)207 911 5106
e-mail: s.edmunds1@westminster.ac.uk

Accepted: 15 December 2011

doi:10.1111/j.1600-0579.2011.00734.x

research nor with the detailed differences in methods (6, 7).

Qualitative methods
Qualitative methods encompass open-ended questions in ques-
tionnaires, interviews, focus groups, electronic discussions,
observation of practical procedures, presentations and analyses
of written documents. These methods in dentistry and dental
education are becoming recognised as powerful research tools
(1). They are important as adjuncts to the familiar methods of
quantitative research and as methods in their own right (2, 3).
In dentistry, qualitative methods may be used to explore the
anxieties or attitudes of patients, expert patients or members of
dental specialities towards modes of treatment. In the broad
domain of dental education, they may be used to investigate
the relationships between professional groups, such as dentists
and the dental team, between professional groups and manag-
ers and to reveal attitudes towards policy, organisation, man-
agement and new practices. Within this broad domain,
qualitative methods can be used to explore the special field of
dental pedagogy and its concerns with teaching, learning and
assessment in the contexts of courses and clinical education.
This paper provides a sketch of the major characteristics of
qualitative research and some guidelines on conducting qualita-
tive research in dentistry and dental education. It is not a
review of the use of qualitative methods in dentistry (3–5); it is
not concerned with the esoteric arguments in qualitative
Rather, it provides a guide to qualitative research and its major
methods for use by dental researchers.
Characteristics of qualitative research
Qualitative research may be described as arts-oriented rather
than scientifically oriented. It is primarily concerned with
words and their meanings in different contexts whereas quanti-
tative research is predominantly concerned with numbers and
their significance. Summarising themes, rather than counting
and measuring, is the keystone of qualitative research. Instead
of testing hypotheses through the use of experiments or surveys
and applying statistics or mathematics to the data collected,
qualitative researchers collect and analyse the themes in obser-
vations, transcripts or documents. Often qualitative researchers
work with small samples of participants. They do not make
bold claims based on the statistical generalisability of their find-
ings. Instead, the reader is free to decide whether the findings
of the research ring true for them (8).
The above characteristics of qualitative research may pose
threats to dental researchers who believe that there is only one
‘true’ (quantitative) way of doing research, to teachers of den-
tistry who do not wish to change their approach and to school
administrators or hospital managers who are reluctant to

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Edmunds & Brown
change the structure of degree programmes or the organisation
of clinical education. Yet, these characteristics can be beneficial
as qualitative research often reveals insights which standard
quantitative methods do not capture. These insights may be
about thoughts, feelings, attitudes or anxieties of staff (faculty),
students or patients. For example, the inner feelings of patients
suffering from oral cancer are not easily revealed in large-scale
epidemiological surveys but are revealed in qualitative studies
(9). The insights may provide information or perspectives
which a researcher had not considered. These insights can then
be published in their own right or used as the basis of a larger
quantitative or ‘mixed methods’ survey (10–13).
It would be wrong to leave this account without pointing
out three features of qualitative research which are often mis-
construed by dentists who are more familiar with ‘scientific’ or
more precisely, positivist approaches. The first is that quantita-
tive researchers sometimes think that qualitative researchers are
not concerned with rigour they are, but in line with their view
that words and their meaning are more important than num-
bers and their significance, few are concerned with the minutiae
of statistical generalisability, reliability and validity. Their crite-
ria of rigour include transparency, triangulation, clear exposi-
tion of procedures findings and analyses, validation of the data
collected by the respondent(s), providing background details of
relevant aspects of the belief system of the researcher and,
where appropriate, placing the findings in a theoretical context
or earlier research (14). Many of these broad criteria are in line
with those of quantitative researchers.
The second and related misconception is that quantitative
and qualitative researches are methodologically entirely separate
domains. In fact, qualitative researchers, particularly those
using grounded theory, require coding, counting and some-
times measurement. Quantitative researchers in discussion sec-
tions of articles often offer insights and speculations which
might be classified as qualitative. In both forms of research
what matters most is the nature of the research problem and
choosing methods which fit the research problem. It could be
argued, therefore, that qualitative and quantitative research
should be seen as complementary rather than oppositional
approaches to research.
Theoretical perspectives
The third theoretical feature is more challenging. Qualitative
and quantitative research differ philosophically as well as in
their understanding of what ‘knowledge’ actually means (15).
Quantitative research is based on the assumption that there is
an objective, real world independent of our perception and it is
knowable. Quantitative researchers consider knowledge of that
world should be studied using observational or experimental
methods based on measurement and probabilities (positivism)
(16), and these will lead to a better understanding of the nature
of the real world. Most qualitative researchers in the health sci-
ences do not deny the existence of a ‘real’ world, but they do
assert that we construct our own meanings of that world and
its objects, and those meanings are shaped by our experience,
history and culture. The collective term for this assumption is
constructivism (17). For example, what novices and experts see
in an oral radiograph may differ; what was regarded as good
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Doing qualitative research
dentistry in the 19th Century is not usually regarded as good
dentistry today; the meanings (perceptions) attached to a par-
ticular type of dental surgery may be different for dentists,
nurses, technicians and patients. To add to the confusion, some
qualitative researchers point out that what is regarded as
‘objective’ is sometimes merely inter-subjective agreement (18).
Constructivism is much more complex and diffuse than pos-
itivism, and there are wide variations in the paradigms and
belief systems held by qualitative researchers and the methods
they use.
Dentists and dental educators new to qualitative research are
likely to start with a problem or question which they wish to
investigate and not to consider underlying theoretical
approaches. Nonetheless, consideration of the broad theories
beneath any qualitative research study can be useful as this pro-
vides a framework within which the quality and rigour of the
study and its core research questions can be considered.
Table 1 provides a description of theoretical approaches, com-
mon methods and examples of studies in dentistry and medi-
cine. It should help those new to qualitative research who wish
to orient their study within a theoretical approach. However,
readers are warned that there are arguments in the literature
about the extent to which theoretical approaches have a direct
correspondence to particular qualitative methodologies and
methods (19).
We outline below the core skills and methods of qualitative
data collection and analysis which are common in oral health
science research.
The core skills of qualitative data
collection
Regardless of the perspective taken by a qualitative researcher,
the fundamental principle underlying most data collection in
qualitative research is ‘Ask open questions and listen actively’.
The exceptions to this principle are qualitative observation and
documentary analysis. In qualitative observations, observers
note what they see and hear (26). In qualitative documentary
analysis, the researcher interrogates the text and identifies the
underlying themes, not merely its ostensible purposes. It is also
worth noting here that open-ended questions tacked to the end
of structured questionnaires usually have low response rates
and rarely yield valuable information.
Open questions
Open questions give participants freedom to express their own
opinions or reveal their knowledge. In interviews, they can be
roughly classified as spontaneous or guided. Spontaneous ques-
tions are those that spring to mind. They can obtain unex-
pected and valuable information. Guided questions are
deliberate steers in an interview or discussion but they are not
leading questions. ‘What are your views on invisalign and stan-
dard braces?’ is an example of a guided question which could
be asked of orthodontists or of teenagers. (The question will
have a different meaning to these different participants.) ‘Do
you actually prefer invisalign to standard braces?’ is an example
of a leading question. Guided questions can be standardised
and thereby provide some control of the data collection. But
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TABLE 1. Theoretical approaches in qualitative research
Theoretical
approach Description
Ethnography The study of social interactions,
behaviours and perceptions that
occur within groups, teams,
organisations and communities(20). It
is argued that observation of a group
or organisation over a long term,
leads to the identification of the
webs of meanings or schemas of the
‘insiders’ views (21)
Phenomenology Aims to provide accounts that offer
insight into the ‘lived’ experience of
individuals. To understand this
experience of a person or group, one
needs to put aside one’s own
pre-conceptions and focus on what
experiences mean to the participants
involved (19)
Grounded Theory Aims to generate a higher level of
understanding about social
interactions or experiences that is
‘grounded’ in, or derived from, a
systematic analysis of data. Grounded
theory is appropriate when the study
aims to explain a process, not to test
or verify an existing theory. The
original and rather tortuous theory of
Glaser and Strauss (30) now has
many variants (31, 32)
Qualitative Strictly speaking not a theoretical
Observational approach but rather a method that
Research can be linked to many approaches
(35). Qualitative observation can
report what people say and do rather
than just what they say they do. It is
the systematic watching and listening
to people and events in ‘natural’
settings’ rather than in controlled
experiments
Narrative Methods of recording, analysing and
Research interpreting the stories of participants
(Narratology) so as to make sense of participants’
experiences. It is assumed that the
analysis of the content, structure and
context of the stories will reveal
common themes and meanings (36)
112
Methods
Often uses a combination of
observations and interviews. Analysis
involves triangulation (comparison
between data sets) to enhance
quality of the findings
Often uses one-to-one interviews
which are transcribed with the
paralinguistic cues included (um’s
er’s hesitations, stumbles, emphases)
Typically uses one-to-one interviews
and focus groups. Documentary
analysis can be used. Data collection
and analysis is an iterative process,
and the theory is evolved as further
data are collected. The data may be
analysed using ‘open coding’ or
‘closed coding’ (Cf framework
analysis)
Over the long term, it may involve
covert participant observation as in
ethnography, but it can also be used
in brief encounters in which the
observer is a covert participant or
simply a known observer. These
natural settings might include
patients’ waiting rooms, wards,
operating theatres, laboratories,
clinics, departmental meetings
The basic method consists of
recording the story, as told by the
participant(s), with only a few
prompts from the researcher about
the storyline, the participant’s
perceptions of the characters
involved and the particulars of the
setting. There are different
approaches to interpreting the stories
(37, 38) but all share the
commonality of analysing the reports
of the sequence of personal events
and related ideas
Edmunds & Brown
Example studies
Balmer et al. (22) investigated bedside
teaching in general paediatrics as a
social phenomenon and explored
change over time in both the
meaning of rounds and the context
in which rounds take place.
Observations were made of normal
ward activities over 8 months, and
interviews were carried out with
physicians, junior doctors and
medical students. Inductive thematic
analysis was conducted. For further
example studies see (23–26)
Examples are the studies by Wolf et al.
(27) of chronic orofacial pain; Roing
et al.’s (9) study of patients’
experience of oral cancer; Bowers
and Wilson’s (28) study of dental
hygienists training; and Jahangiri’s
study of the characteristics of
effective classroom teachers as rated
by students and professionals (29)
There are many examples of the uses
of grounded theory in dentistry and
dental education (33, 34) but, as yet,
no comprehensive review of their
uses
We have not discovered any published
reports of qualitative observation
research in dentistry but it could
provide useful insights into skills,
procedures and relationships in
dental education and professional
practice
The approach has not yet been used
extensively in dental research but it
has rich potential for, for example,
exploring patients’ experience of oral
health care and trainees’ stories of
their training years. Critical incident
techniques can be regarded as a
special form of narrative research
(33). Examples of dental stories can
be found at http://www.healthangle.com/
topics/dental/stories and
http://dentalphobiastories.tripod.com
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Edmunds & Brown Doing qualitative research

TABLE 2. Dimensions of questions TABLE 3. Examples of probing questions

Open – closed
Recall – thought } For all qualitative investigations
Why did you do that? Looking back, can you see
any connections?
Encouraging – threatening Do you still think that? How do you see it now?
Clear – confused
} Particularly important in
oral-based investigations
Can you give me an example of that? What made you change
your mind?
You say it is an x, what kind of So, what’s different?
an x was it?
one must be careful: a change in emphasis of a word can Could you provide more detail on that? What seems to have stayed
change the perceived meaning of the question and consequent the same?
responses of participants. Tell me a little more… What’s so different now?
Questions can be categorised along four dimensions, which What did you enjoy? Why did you feel that way?
are given in Table 2. The dimensions can be used to check with What was difficult for you? What do other students think?
a few critical friends if the questions are likely to provide inter-
esting lines of enquiry. These dimensions are relative to the
background of the participants. What is a simple recall ques-
tion to a dental postgraduate may be a thought question to a
first-year dental undergraduate. Researcher talks Participant talks
The sequence of questions is important in qualitative
Participant listens Researcher listens
research. Usually, it is better to begin with open questions, and observes and observes
which the participants can answer easily, and then proceed to
more challenging or sensitive questions and end with summa-
rising questions which maybe closed questions and a thanks. Fig. 2. Two-way process of active listening.
This approach gives the participants confidence not only in
themselves but in the researcher so they leave the interview or
focus group with a feeling of satisfaction. listens to what the other says. Two recent publications provide
It is important to consider possible follow-up questions one further details of the styles and processes of listening (39, 40).
might ask, as well as broad, open questions. A useful sequence
is given in Fig. 1.
Main methods of qualitative data collec-
Examples of probing questions one may use in interviews or
tion
discussions are given in Table 3.
Prompting questions give participants a range of choices Of the many methods of data collection in qualitative research,
such as ‘Is it because it’s boring? Too difficult? Too easy? Not rel- three are of particular value in research in dental education
evant? You don’t see the point of it? Any of these?’ One should and dentistry. These are interviews, focus groups and concept
use prompting questions sparingly in open interviews. (Some maps. All require a clear specification of the research question
purists think they should never be used.) Providing a broad and careful design of the procedures.
range of choices are offered, prompting questions can stimulate Interviews, group interviews and focus groups (41) are based
the participants to think. on open questions and active listening. Both can yield rich
information for use in their own right, as a preliminary to a
larger-scale research, or as in-depth exploration of themes
Listening actively
which emerged from a large-scale survey.
As in the dental consultation, active listening is important in
qualitative research. Listening actively involves attending to
Interviews
what is said and not said. Hesitations, stumbles and tone of
voice convey meaning in telephone and face-to-face interviews. Qualitative interviews may be described as ‘conversations with
In face-to-face interviews, body language conveys additional a purpose’: they are not interrogations. The conversation may
cues. These cues are part of the two-way process (see Fig. 2). be meandering and seemingly casual, or the conversation may
In a smooth conversation or discussion, there is a steady be based on a sequence of open questions. The purpose of the
flow of turn-taking. This flow and its cognitive processing can open questions is to obtain answers to broad research ques-
be disrupted if either the researcher or participant talks too tions. The interviews may be face to face, video linked, online
slowly or too quickly or if neither researcher nor participant or by telephone. Skype is useful for video interviews, but these

Open Participant’s Probing Prompting

Pause question (if
question response question
necessary)

Fig. 1. Sequence of questions.

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Doing qualitative research
are currently not easily recorded. Face-to-face interviews pro-
vide the richest data, and they are the preferred mode of opera-
tion. Interviews based solely on highly structured forms which
require only box-ticking are a waste of resources: one might as
well distribute a structured questionnaire. For examples of the
use of qualitative interviews in dental research and dental edu-
cation, see Victoroff and Hogan (42) and Ayers et al. (43).
Focus groups
Focus groups are focussed discussions: they are not group
interviews. In group interviews, the conversation is primarily
between the interviewer and each of the participants in turn. In
focus groups, conversation is mainly between participants with
input from the interviewer when required to guide its direc-
tion. Fig. 3 highlights these differences.
Focus groups are usually face-to-face events although it is
possible to organise video-linked focus groups if one wants to
involve participants from different geographical areas. The
composition of a focus group is, ideally, determined by the
purpose of the research. Hence, the group may be homogenous
(e.g. all bright students, all General Dental Practitioners), heter-
ogeneous (from different dental departments or schools), well
established (have worked together on an in-depth project),
experts or novices (experienced dentists, trainees). The recom-
mended size for each focus group is usually 4–8 participants.
More than eight participants present audio-recording difficul-
ties and reduce the air-time for each participant. It is better to
have two or three smaller focus groups than one large one. The
time allocation for a focus group is usually 1–1.5 h, depending
on the topic and the number of questions one uses. Sometimes
it is useful to have two leaders, known as facilitators or moder-
ators, per focus group so that one can guide the discussion
whilst the other observes and takes notes.
For a focus group to be successful, the researcher must be
able to stimulate interaction between the participants. Sugges-
tions for structuring and facilitating a focus group are given in
(40) and (44). Essentially, these are the following: think care-
fully about the opening, the key questions, your responses to
the discussion of the participants, the closing of the focus
Fig. 3. Differences between a Group Interview and a Focus Group.
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Edmunds & Brown
group and allow for some digressions by the participants from
the main themes.
Focus groups provide rich data in many contexts, but they
are open to manipulation by an unscrupulous facilitator and
they are not appropriate for dealing with highly sensitive issues.
Trust between participants and between participants and the
facilitator is vital to their success. Self-disclosure is not always
forthcoming in focus groups. Dominant participants (power
talkers) can sway the expressed views of a group. If the power
talker takes a particular view, then others are likely to agree
even if they disagree (and sometimes say so after a focus
group). Examples of the use of focus groups in dental research
and dental education are given by Gallagher et al. (45), Ashley
et al. (46), Bearn and Chadwick (47) and Brondani et al. (48).
It is preferable to record data from interviews and focus
groups in an audio format. Taking detailed written notes can
be distracting for the researcher and threatening for the partici-
pants. Audio- or video-recordings provide opportunities for re-
visiting the data, but one must ensure that the data are
recorded accurately. Swearing afterwards may be cathartic but
it will not bring back the data. Digital recordings of audio data
permit downloading to PCs or Macs so it can easily be copied,
stored, edited, transmitted or transcribed.
Concept maps
Concept maps are visual representations of the perceived link-
ages between ideas, topics, procedures or arguments (49). The
maps may be generated by individuals or groups and subse-
quently refined. They may include brief notes to explain or
describe the linkages between the concepts. Their structure is
dependent upon the topic being explored and the depth of
knowledge of the explorer. Concept maps can be used to com-
pare the different constructions of a topic by traditional and
non-traditional students, experts and novices, to compare
changes in knowledge from before and after an intervention, or
simply to ascertain the initial constructs of students entering a
course or going on a clinical placement (50–54).
There are plenty of computer programmes which supposedly
will produce concept maps or their near relations cognitive or
mind maps. For example, programmes can be downloaded
from http://cmap.ihmc.us/conceptmap.html to http://freemind.
sourceforge.net. But computer programmes can be constricting
and some training in generating mind maps is necessary for the
outcomes to be useful in research.
Qualitative data analysis and
presentation
Analysis of focus groups and interviews
The first step in data analysis of interviews and focus group
discussions is transcribing the data. One can transcribe merely
the words; the words, hesitations and stumbles (paralinguistic
cues); and the words, hesitations, stumbles plus indications of
non-verbal behaviour. Of these approaches, the second is usu-
ally preferable as one gains more meaning from the transcript.
A third category can be very time-consuming. It will require
the assistance of an expert in video analysis and several
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Edmunds & Brown
viewings of the video-recordings. If you audio-record the inter-
view including hesitations and stumbles, then allow approxi-
mately 5 · n (where n is the number of minutes of the
interview or focus group) for the transcription by an experi-
enced typist. If you are using complex techniques of linguistics
or conversational analysis (12) for transcriptions of audio-
recordings, then allow at least 10 · n. If you video-record an
interview to explore the non-verbal plus paralinguistic cues,
then allow at least 20 · n.
The second step is to draw out the themes from the tran-
scripts or documents. A common method of doing this is to
identify the tiny themes in the data, then group the tiny
themes into categories and then group the categories into
major and, perhaps, minor themes. This final categorisation
might include positive and negative aspects of a theme. This
method is referred to as thematic analysis or thematic content
analysis (55, 56), and it is commonly used in grounded theory
research and in research which is not linked to a particular per-
spective. When the researcher uses a deliberately designed
sequence of open questions, the process is sometimes known as
framework analysis (57, 58). In dental research, framework anal-
ysis is sometimes the most practical research method as com-
pletely open interviews can be very time-consuming, and they
may not provide sufficient relevant information to the problem
in hand.
Computer-assisted qualitative data analysis (CAQDAS) pack-
ages are available for analysing qualitative data. Online
resources are available at http://onlineqda.hud.ac.uk, and free
CAQDAS package can be downloaded from http://www.
pressure.to/qda.
However, CAQDAS packages have limitations, they can be
cumbersome to use, and a computer-based approach is not
always sensitive to perspectives and nuances expressed in the
responses to open-ended questionnaires and interviews. For
small samples, it is easier to analyse by hand: reading, catego-
rising, checking and re-categorising if necessary. Beware of
having too many categories or themes in the final analyses.
Analysis of concept maps
There is no standard method of analysing concept maps. But
one can establish a set of criteria on which to judge a concept
map. For example, one can match a participant’s concept map
to a master template and assign a mark for the connections
(and explanations) or one can count the number of accurate,
relevant nodes and strings (connections) in a concept map.
Presentation
When the data have been analysed, one has a choice of how to
present the data. One can:
List the themes and give examples of quotations to illustrate
the theme. These might include positive and negative
responses.
List the themes and count the number of times the theme is
mentioned in the transcripts.
Produce a hierarchy or flowchart of the themes in the data
and describe their relationships
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Produce a map of the themes and describe their relation-
ships (note: in this case, a concept map is used to represent the
outcomes of qualitative analysis rather than as a method of
data generation).
Writing for publication
Like all forms of good academic writing, writing qualitative
research for publication is based on the principle of strong
alignment between the article’s title, abstract, introduction,
statement of research problem, a clear account of the methods
and results and a perceptive discussion of the findings.
However, the structure of a qualitative research paper is usu-
ally less regimented than a quantitative one. First, the purpose
of the study is stated as an aim or research question, precise
hypotheses are not given. In the Methods section, profiles of
participants are provided. If the sample size is small (<10),
demographic and personal characteristics are sometimes given
for each individual. Sample size (power) calculations are not
required as qualitative research does not intend to generalise to
a population. An overview of the interview schedule (list of
questions asked) should be provided. Usually the themes cov-
ered in the interview/focus group are given along with one or
two example questions and their prompts/probes. The tran-
scription procedure is stated and the data analysis method
described. If one is writing for a qualitative journal with a
strong theoretical orientation, it is wise to discuss the theoreti-
cal perspective underlying the method of analysis used and the
rationale for its choice.
The results and discussion in a qualitative paper are usually
more discursive and longer than in a quantitative study. The
results section begins with a brief account of the different levels
of coding used and how these led to the identification of the
main themes. These themes may be merely listed. Some
researchers also report the frequency of themes mentioned by
participants. Or, as indicated earlier, connections between the
themes can be shown in a diagram or mind map. Examples of
quotations or excerpts from interviews or focus groups are
often used to illustrate the themes. It is customary to anony-
mise these excerpts using either a participant code or pseud-
onyms. Other details which could identify an individual should
be omitted from direct quotations.
The discussion in a qualitative paper may be written as a
separate section following the results, or the results and discus-
sion sections may be combined. By combining the sections, one
avoids having to repeatedly describe the content of the themes;
however, a combined section can become long and rambling if
care is not taken with its structure. Check the layout of qualita-
tive articles in the journal you hope to publish in before mak-
ing a decision whether to write separate results and discussion
sections or to combine them.
Standard procedures of informed consent, confidentiality
and anonymity should be used and reported in qualitative
research. Participants should be made aware of the broad con-
tent of any interview or discussion before agreeing to take part,
and given the right to withdraw from the study at any time.
Opinions and experiences described by participants in qualita-
tive research may be very personal, and perhaps threatening to
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Doing qualitative research
authority figures, so it is particularly important that confidenti-
ality and anonymity are preserved.
Publishing pure qualitative research has the advantage that
one has space to discuss the data in-depth and allow any novel
insights into a problem or topic which have emerged to be
explained fully. On the other hand, if one is targeting a journal
which has a predominantly quantitative orientation, then it
may be easier to obtain publication of a mixed methods study.
This combination of qualitative and quantitative methods can
be a powerful approach, which produces stronger and more
persuasive evidence and greater insight than a single research
paradigm. A recent article on selection in undergraduate medi-
cine provides a useful example (59).
In articles based on mixed methods, the rationale for using
this approach should be made explicit and there should,
wherever possible, be a discussion of the links between the sets
of results and their implications. In general, the structure of
reports of mixed methods research provides clear accounts of
the two approaches and their results and indicates whether the
qualitative research preceded or followed the quantitative
research. Qualitative research as a preliminary to quantitative
research can provide more robust questionnaires and interview
schedules. Qualitative research after quantitative research can
provide greater insight and illumination of the results.
Summary and conclusion
This study has outlined the approaches to doing and reporting
qualitative research in dentistry and dental education. It has
indicated the differences and similarities of qualitative and
quantitative research and their complementarity. It has stressed
the importance of using well-defined methods of transcription
and analysis so that themes emerge from the data. Finally, it
has pointed to the potential value of qualitative research for
understanding the inner thoughts and feelings of participants
in qualitative research whether they be students, academic staff,
trainees or practising dentists.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank the referees who prompted us to reflect
upon the purpose and content of this paper. We also thank
our dental colleagues for their feedback on an early draft of the
paper.
References
* indicates particularly useful references for those about to
embark on qualitative research projects.
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