An Analysis of the Grounded Theory Method and the Concept of Culture

Abstract

Researchers increasingly include multicultural respondents in qualitative research studies. The grounded theory method, a currently popular qualitative methodology, seeks to interpret data for theory development. However, analysis of respondents from a culture(s) significantly different from the researcher's culture requires special attention to methodological issues. Requirements for conducting a grounded theory analysis with respondents from varying cultural orientations include personal or professional experience in the respondent's culture, professional literature of the respondent's culture around the phenomenon of interest, data analysis conducted in the language of the respondents, and a constant comparison of emerging concepts from the cultural perspective of the respondents. Only by attending to the cultures of the respondents and of the researchers can the social sciences create sufficiently rich inductively derived grounded theory.