A critical evaluation of the use of interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) in health psychology

Abstract

With the burgeoning use of qualitative methods in health research, criteria for judging their value become increasingly necessary.Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) is a distinctive approach to conducting qualitative research being used with increasing frequency in published studies. A systematic literature review was undertaken to identify published papers in the area of health psychology employing IPA. A total of fifty-two articles are reviewed here in terms of the following: methods of data collection, sampling, assessing wider applicability of research and adherence to the theoretical foundations and procedures of IPA.IPA seems applicable and useful in a wide variety of research topics. The lack of attention sometimes afforded to the interpretative facet of the approach is discussed. KEYWORDS:interpretative phenomenological analysis; health psychology; qualitative methodology 3 WHAT IS INTERPRETATIVE PHENOMENOLOGICAL ANALYSIS (IPA)?Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) has been developed as a distinctive approach to conducting qualitative research in psychology offering a theoretical foundation and a detailed procedural guide. As such, it has been utilised in a burgeoning number of published studies (Chapman & Smith, 2002). The intellectual origins of IPA and the history of its development as a new technique for qualitative health psychology are beyond the scope of this article. The interested reader is referred to Smith (1996) and Smith, Flowers and Osborn (1997) for an exploration of the historical and theoretical foundations to the approach. It is sufficient to note here that the approach has its origins in those fields of inquiry, such as phenomenology and symbolic interactionism, which hold that human beings are not passive perceivers of an objective reality, but rather that they come to interpret and understand their world by formulating their own biographical stories into a form that makes sense to them. The aim of IPA is to explore in detail the processes through which participants make sense of their own experiences, by looking at the respondent"s account of the processes they have been through and seeking to utilise an assumed existing universal inclination towards self-reflection (Chapman & Smith, 2002;Smith et al., 1997). Thus, IPA research has tended to focus on the exploration of participants" experience, understandings, perceptions and views 4 (Reid, Flowers & Larkin, 2005). The "processes" referred to here include all these aspects of self-reflection, and refer to the way in which IPA assumes that participants seek to interpret their experiences into some form that is understandable to them.IPA is phenomenological in that it is concerned with individuals" subjective reports rather than the formulation of objective accounts (e.g. Flowers, Hart & Marriott 1999), and it recognises that research is a dynamic process (Smith, 1996). Whilst the researcher attempts to access "the participant"s personal world" (page 218) insofar as this is feasible, IPA acknowledges that "...

An exploration of the extent and nature of reconceptualisation of pain following pain neurophysiology education: A qualitative study of experiences of people with chronic musculoskeletal pain

“…While the themes presented provide a comprehensive description of the data we collected, we did not continue to recruit to search for more. This is in keeping with IPA methodology [30]. Thus, there may be more issues in this field that have not emerged.…”

A qualitative exploration of people's experiences of pain neurophysiological education for chronic pain: The importance of relevance for the individual

“…This was a qualitative study using an approach based on Interpretive Phenomenology Analysis (IPA) that enabled a detailed exploration of the processes through which participants make sense of their own experiences (Brocki & Wearden, 2006). Ethical approval was granted by the XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX Health Research Authority of the National Research and Ethics Service (NRES) (REC reference: 12/YH/0409).…”

“…This study aimed to recruit 10 participants as the literature suggests that this is an appropriate number to facilitate a detailed interpretative account using an IPA framework (Smith et al, 1999;Reid et al, 2005;Brocki & Wearden, 2006).…”

Posttraumatic stress symptomatology and appearance distress following burn injury: An interpretative phenomenological analysis.

“…Consequently we chose to use interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA: Smith, 1996;Smith, Flowers, & Larkin, 2009;Larkin & Thompson, 2012). IPA has become an established approach to qualitative research within clinical and health psychology (Biggerstaff & Thompson, 2008;Brocki & Wearden, 2006) because it was developed with the specific aim of getting close to individual meaning making experience whilst acknowledging and allowing room for interpretation and enabling those involved in the study to draw upon psychological theory.…”