Phenomenology

The “life”
experience
Presented by Paul and the Lavenders
Phenomenology helps us to
understand the meaning of people's
lived experience.

A phenomenological study explores

what people experienced and
focuses on their experience of a
phenomena.
Phenomenological research enables you
to explore experiences and sensory
perception (different to abstract
perceptions) of researched phenomenon,
and the formation of understanding based
on these experiences and perceptions.
PURPOSE

1.Either to use your own direct experiences

acquired during the research process to describe
and analyze the phenomenon, in order to produce
in-depth knowledge of the phenomenon;

2.To use other people’s experiences acquired to

describe and analyse the phenomenon, in order to
produce in-depth knowledge of the phenomenon.
What is the Epoché and the Reduction?

Epoché means that we must try to enter a

space of openness to the experience or
phenomenon we are trying to understand
in its prereflective sense.

Reduction means that, once we have

opened ourselves, we try to close in on the
meaning of the phenomenon as it appears
in our experience or in our consciousness.
 TYPES OF
PHENOMENOLOGY
 Phenomenology as a Philosophy

Hermeneutic (interpretive)
Phenomenology
Martin
Heideggar
1927

Post WWII
Positivism conflict

Existential Phenomenology
Transcendental Merleau-Ponty
Phenomenology
and
Edmund Husserl
Jean-Paul
“father”
Sartre
1920
 Transcendental
• Sprouted from post WWII Phenomenology
positivism. Phenomenology Edmund Husserl (1859-1938)
rejects positivism.
• This can be achieved • knowing is always and
through reduction (Epoché) only through a state of pure
consciousness…the mind is
• “transcend” the experience
directed toward objects of
to discover meaning. consciousness that can be
reflected upon.

There is “natural attitude” (our

everyday involvement in the world) and
“phenomenological attitude” (the
philosophical act of pure reflection
(where we suspend the natural
Lived world attitude).
 Transcendental
(descriptive) Phenomenology
• Within the range of unique experiences,
there is a larger, transcending, essential
and unvarying quality of a
phenomenon…that can be discovered!

Unvarying Quality
Of a
Phenomenon
 Hermeneutic (interpretive)
Phenomenology “natural
“The

• Martin Heidegger (1889-1976) attitude” is

integral to
• Hans-George Gadamer and Paul Ricoeur knowing”
• Disagrees with Husserl’s epoche.
• An effort to “get beneath” the subjective “reduction is
experience and find the genuine, impossible!!
objective nature of things. ”

• Focuses on the relationship between the

event and the person, and how meaning
is formed in that relationship.
• Leads to endless possibilities and
endless interpretations.
• Our relationship with things is not the
object/subject relationship.

Being in the world

 "The most
important lesson Existential
that the reduction
teaches us…is the Phenomenology
impossibility of a
complete
reduction."
• Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1908-1961) and Jean-Paul
Sartre (1905-1980)
• Rejects Husserl’s belief of transcendance and
embraces the lived experience, the concrete.
• Aim is not to find a common theme, but the goal is
to "concentrated upon re-achieving a direct and
primitive contact with the world.“
• Describes everyday experience as it is perceived by
the consciousness of individuals.
• This “new” phenomenology rejects the historical
division between the inquirer and the social world
(subject/object)
• This movement marked a return to studying the
direct, lived experience of the “field worker” as a
source of knowledge about the world.
 Phenomenology as a Methodology
two camps-a resurgence in the 1970s

• DESCRIPTIVISTS
• Believe it is possible to
suspend personal opinion to
arrive at a single, essential,
descriptive presentation of a
phenomena
• Think that if there is more than
one reality, that leaves doubt,
ignorance, and a lack of clarity.
• Husserl followers
• INTERPRETIVIST
• There are endless number of
realities.
• Interpretations are all we have,
because description IS an
interpretive process
• Heidegger followers

(Rapport 2006)
 Phenomenology…as a
Methodology
• …is focused on the subjective experience of individuals
or groups.
• …is personal. The world as experienced by the
individual, not relationships between people.
• …uses small, purposive samples of 3-10 participants
that have experienced the phenomenon.
• …attempts to describe accurately a phenomenon from
the person’s perspective.
 Strengths of
phenomenology

• Efficient and Economical (only in terms of

data generation or maybe not at all. . .)
• Direct Interaction with Participants
• Allows the researcher to ask for clarification and to ask
immediate follow-up/probing questions
• Allows the researcher to observe nonverbal responses
which can be supportive or contradictory to the verbal
responses
• Data is in the participants’ own words
 More Strengths
• Synergy: participants react to and build upon the
responses of other participants.
• Flexible research tool
• Applicable to a wide range of settings and individuals.
• Results are easy to understand (in terms of
people’s direct opinions and statements)

Marvin Farber 1966

 Therefore, it is useful for…

• A researcher who wants to understand

human experience.

• finding a universal meaning of an experience.

• The reduction of context specific information to a more

general understanding of the phenomenon is desired.

• A researcher who is willing to become closely entwined

with the research.
 Weakness of
phenomenology
• Findings are difficult to generalize to a larger population
• Small number of participants who are often attained in a convenient
manner
• Individual responses are not always independent of one another
• Dominant or opinionated members may overshadow the thoughts of
the other group members (only if group interviews are performed).
• Data is often difficult to analyze and summarize.
• Researcher may give too much credit to the results (immediacy of a
personal opinion)
• Requires a quality moderator
• It is a “soft science” at best, really it is not science, it is more like philosophy
and religion (Charles Harris, 2006)
• Critics of phenomenology think you cannot describe the unique experiences
AND make generalizations about the experiences at the same time.
Marvin Farber 1966
Disciplines that use
Phenomenology Concepts such as
suffering and well being
• Nursing and the intersubjective
nature of the nurse-
• Education patient relationship
cannot be studied from a

• Psychology paradigm traditional to

the natural sciences.

• Social Sciences Rapport (2006)

• Urban Planning
• Art