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There is much debate over the number of interviews needed to reach data saturation for themes and metathemes in qualitative research. The primary purpose of this study is to determine the number of interviews needed to reach data saturation for metathemes in multisited and cross-cultural research. The analysis is based on a cross-cultural study on water issues conducted with 132 respondents in four different sites. Analysis of the data yielded 240 site-specific themes and nine cross-cultural metathemes. We found that 16 or fewer interviews were enough to identify common themes from sites with relatively homogeneous groups. Yet our research reveals that larger sample sizes-ranging from 20 to 40 interviews-were needed

ObjectiveProgress towards equitable and sufficient water has primarily been measured by population-level data on water availability. However, higher-resolution measures of water accessibility, adequacy, reliability and safety (ie, water insecurity) are needed to understand how problems with water impact health and well-being. Therefore, we developed the Household Water InSecurity Experiences (HWISE) Scale to measure household water insecurity in an equivalent way across disparate cultural and ecological settings.MethodsCross-sectional surveys were implemented in 8127 households across 28 sites in 23 low-income and middle-income countries. Data collected included 34 items on water insecurity in the prior month; socio-demographics; water acquisition, use and storage; household food insecurity and perceived stress. We retained water insecurity items that were salient and applicable across all sites. We used classical test and item response theories to assess dimensionality, reliability and equivalence. Construct validity was assessed for both individual and pooled sites using random coefficient models.FindingsTwelve items about experiences of household water insecurity were retained. Items showed unidimensionality in factor analyses and were reliable (Cronbach’s alpha 0.84 to 0.93). The average non-invariance rate was 0.03% (threshold <25%), indicating equivalence of measurement and meaning across sites. Predictive, convergent and discriminant validity were also established.ConclusionsThe HWISE Scale measures universal experiences of household water insecurity across low-income and middle-income countries. Its development ushers in the ability to quantify the prevalence, causes and consequences of household water insecurity, and can contribute an evidence base for clinical, public health and policy recommendations regarding water.

Water is at the core of the most difficult sustainability challenges facing humans in the modern era, involving feedbacks across multiple scales, sectors, and agents. We suggest that a transformative new discipline is necessary to address many and varied water-related challenges in the Anthropocene. Specifically, we propose socio-hydrology as a use-inspired scientific discipline to focus on understanding, interpretation, and scenario development of the flows and stocks in the humanmodified water cycle across time and space scales. A key aspect of socio-hydrology is explicit inclusion of two-way feedbacks between human and water systems, which differentiates socio-hydrology from other inter-disciplinary disciplines dealing with water. We illustrate the potential of socio-hydrology through three examples of water sustainability problems, defined as paradoxes, which can only be fully resolved within a new socio-hydrologic framework that encompasses such two-way coupling between human and water systems. Need for a Water Focus on Sustainability ScienceWater represents a key aspect of sustainability challenges facing humans in the Anthropocene [Maass et al., 1962;Falkenmark and Rockström, 2004]. Human appropriation of water resources and modification of landscapes exert an accelerating influence on water-cycle dynamics from local-to global scales and decadal-to century timescales [Vörösmarty et al., 2000]. Human actions scale up in surprising and unpredictable ways to generate a suite of diverse water sustainability challenges that must be incorporated into new approaches to water science and management.Examples of wicked problems that continue to vex scientists and policy makers include: trade-offs among ecosystems, hydropower, and livelihoods in the transnational Mekong Basin [Ziv et al., 2012]; effects of human settlements in flood-prone areas on increased flood risk and fatalities in Africa [Di Baldassarre et al., 2010]; and expanding hypoxic zones in the Gulf of Mexico resulting from nutrient loading in the agricultural headwaters of the Mississippi River [Turner and Rabalais, 2003]. Due to the urgency of these problems, contemporary scholarship should draw from natural sciences, social sciences, and the humanities, to better understand the dynamics arising from the two-way coupling between water and humans in each case.There have been calls for a transformative new water discipline that integrates the multiple perspectives needed for confronting water challenges in the Anthropocene. For example, we should build upon the tradition in hydrology to study relatively pristine systems, in which human actions tend to be incorporated simply through parametric approximation [Wagener et al., 2010], with richer understanding of coupled human-water system dynamics [Fishman et al., 2011]. Likewise, humanistic approaches to the study of water-law, philosophy, history, and ethics-can be further integrated with scientific knowledge [Wescoat, 2013]. The most effective way to create such a new discipline is to frame it a...

The connection between scientific knowledge and environmental policy is enhanced through boundary organizations and objects that are perceived to be credible, salient, and legitimate. In this study, water resource decision-makers evaluated the knowledge embedded in WaterSim, an interactive simulation model of water supply and demand presented in an immersive decision theater. Content analysis of individual responses demonstrated that stakeholders were fairly critical of the model's validity, relevance, and bias. Differing perspectives reveal tradeoffs in achieving credible, salient, and legitimate boundary objects, along with the need for iterative processes that engage them in the co-production of knowledge and action.