QSR NVivo 7

1. QSR NVivo 7 Lyn and Tom Richards, founders, QSR International This is a very brief overview of the main parts of a project in NVivo 7, and the processes supported. It is designed to accompany demonstration of the software.

2. Why NVivo Seven? • Totally new & redesigned software • So not just NVivo three • Updates NVivo 2 and the NUD*IST line (N6) • So it’s seven • Designed for the future, not a re-vamp of past versions, styles and approaches • Early adopter of new technologies • Ready for new 3-D “Longhorn” OS • Annual major upgrades from now on • Free for site licences and maintenance agreements

3. So what’s it look like? Familiar? Orderly? Normal? It’s meant to! And… Manageable! Customize it, to suit your style.

4. New Screen Layout Projects Simple navigation, Microsoft Outlook style, between the main parts of a project Navigation Bar with Group Buttons Each project part has its own folder (you can create your own to order items)

5. Project Security and Integrity Projects • All data in a project, including all Sources, are kept in a single securely encrypted database file. • So porting and backing up is trivial. • No chance of others tampering with documents, no need for insecure doc file update log files… • In fact, absolute project database integrity, even through computer crashes.

6. Save and Undo Projects Saves are not automatic, but reminders are. Why? UNDO! At last, the qualitative researcher’s pace and process is protected. Dropdown list shows last five actions.

7. So a project will look like this Examples that follow use the Sample Project that ships with the software… C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\ Documents\NVivo 7 Samples

8. What are your data sources? Sources Sources comprise Documents, Externals and Memos Make a new document and edit in NVivo Plus folders you create or import straight from Word

9. Use Externals to bring other data in • Create and link to external files • Format for coding • Edit to include any illustrations or links to tape segments etc.

10. And your concepts and ideas? Nodes and Coding Nodes – five sorts of containers for categories and coding • Free Nodes (unordered) • Tree Nodes (for category/subcategory cataloguing) • Cases (for interviewees, people, places etc.) Represent people, places, topics, concepts - entities • NVivo 7 introduces a thoroughly new sort of node: RelationshipsNot representing entities, but making statements. • And the final sort of node? Matrices (tables of qualitative crosstabs, in which the data for each cell is coded at a node.)

11. First - free and tree nodes Nodes and Coding Create them “down” from design or “up” from the data. Cut, copy, merge, paste to design the node system, using trees to catalog ideas

12. Coding at nodes Nodes and Coding Code by drag and drop or many rapid methods

13. Viewing coding at nodes Nodes and Coding View coding in 7 live stripes on source or node content and new Coding Density stripe showing all nodes.

14. Cases – to hold what you know Nodes and Coding • In your study, what is a case? • Make a case node and code all material it. • Auto-coding does this • Cases can have values of attributes • Attributes store information about those people, places, organizations…

15. Attributes - of Cases Classifications • Attributes (like Gender) are properties you create for Cases • View as tables (“Casebooks”) of Case Nodes versus Attributes • Assign a value for the Attribute to each Case Node • Casebooks can be imported and exported, e.g. to Excel™ or SPSS™

16. Relationships – making statements Nodes and Coding • A relationship joins two Project Items • A relationship makes a statement: • ‘volunteering requires time’ • ‘family values encourage motivation to volunteer’ • Code the relationship with the evidence for the statement it makes

17. What’s so new about Relationships? Nodes and Coding • Relationships can be (and can code evidence for) • Descriptions, analytical claims, hypotheses, properties of things, etc. • Display them in networks or groups in the Modeler • Complex theories, event & process nets, structures and organizations

18. Sets are more flexible Sets • Sets can now contain a mixture of Sources and Nodes (including Case Nodes). • Use them for temporary and changing collections e.g. ‘To review’ • Use them as scopes for Query searches • Collect them as outputs of Queries (for further study and Querying) e.g. ‘Women who report excellent marriages’

19. And links come in three sorts Links Three types of links • Annotations are similar to comments in MS Word™ • Can list & inspect them globally • Can optionally be text-searched • See-Also Links • to any Sources or Nodes or other project item • or to any passage in any Source • Memo Links • any Source or Node can have its own Linked Memo.

20. Find - locates Project Items The Find Tool • Look for them by name • The Advanced Find option can handle complex criteria for finding project items

21. Query – in plain language Query • Queries are ways of locating specific content • Queries can be saved for future use • Re-run them later when data have changed – command files effect • Edit them to make a similar but different search • Four sorts of query – text, coding, matrix and compound.

22. Text Search - like Web search engines Query Check here to save the query Looking for either of 2 text items Can choose if text-search Annotations too Set the scope of the search Stemmed search?

23. Many options for Query results Query What to do with the results? If you just preview, you can go on to save as a node, etc. Including some context with finds (spreading) can be a good idea, especially for text search

24. The hidden power of Text Search Read Help on Text Search Queries to learn about the hidden power of Text Search: • Items with finds are listed with a relevance weighting • Boolean search: e.g. for items containing “social interaction” but not “community”. • Use wildcards * and ? (like in Word™) • Proximity (how close do you want “fear” and “threat” to be in a search item?) • What weighting do you want to give different words?

25. Coding Query: Simple & Advanced Query • “Simple” looks for coding of one node in the search scope. • “Advanced” allows the statement of many criteria in a natural English way.

26. Matrix Queries – see it in tables Query • Choose the rows for the table… • Then the columns… • Then how rows and columns are related in cells… • Then Run to make the table

27. The result is a Matrix that’s live Query • Show counts of Sources, words… • Inspect a cell’s content – it’s a Node • Export numerical table as Excel or tab-separated file • Good one? Store as Matrix Node for future use.

28. Models Models • New format, new functions – can include connectors, images. • Live to data. Add associated items. (Use Find to select if there are many!)

29. Making layered models Models • Use groups to layer models • Add associated items to show patterns of analysis

30. Print Reports or export Reporting projects

31. Coding Comparison Reports Reporting projects • Compare coding by two coders in two identical documents

32. What of your legacy QSR Projects? Merging Projects • Opens N4, N5 and N6 projects, and NVivo 1 and 2 projects. • Converts them to NVivo 7 projects • Option to make Cases of all Documents (since Cases are more central in NVIVO 7)

33. Multiple Projects Merging Projects • Run multiple projects together • Copy/paste content between projects • Project merging is done by import of one project into another – and you can import just the structure (e.g. all nodes but no content) or the entire project.

34. Where to go next? Of course, there’s Help • Help! Online includes interactive “movies” of Getting Started tutorials. Using NVivo advice is integrated online in the Help files, Working with your Data • Please use Help! • The QSR website has contact details of trainers and consultants around the world, a wonderful network of help and expertise.

35. And full teach-yourself tutorials… • 10 tutorials for NVIVO 7 are free on the web at • www.sagepub.co.uk/richards • or for a pdf, www.lynrichards.org. • They go with the 10 chapters of Handling Qualitative Data by Lyn Richards (London, Sage, 2005). • Use them alone or with the book. • Work from the web or print out the .pdf file.

36. And there’s the Forum – please use it! • The QSR Forum offers web-based discussion answering questions and providing ideas and research strategies. http://forums.qsrinternational.com. • Please use it! Post your comments, suggestions and experiences with NVivo 7, and learn from others’ comments and experiences.

37. Come to the conferences International conferences on use of QSR software. Strategies in Qualitative Research using QSR software, University of Durham, 13-15 Sept, 2006. http://www.qual-strategies.org. Call for papers out now: deadline June 1st.

38. And finally, our thanks - to • You for coming; • CAQDAS organisers for their work in creating this event; • Everyone who uses and feeds back on the software; • Qualitative researchers, for the challenges of making software that will work with their methods. Contacts? For licenses, sales, information, etc about the software, info@qsrinternational.com To report problems in the software, go to Support on the website. For us personally; lyn@lynrichards.org