13 Research methods, statistics, critical review and evidence-based practice13.7 Qualitative research
13.7.4.7 Reflexivity and bracketing
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Written by Resident Doctor Committee · Published
Reflexivity
Reflexivity is the qualitative researcher's examination and reporting of how their own background, identity, role, assumptions and relationships shape data collection, interpretation and analysis.
Personal reflexivity covers relevant experience, seniority, power and emotional reactions; a psychiatrist interviewing detained patients may be linked with decisions about leave.
Epistemological reflexivity examines how the framing of the question and the analytic approach shape what can be found.
Reflexivity is most useful when it runs through the study and informs decisions, rather than as a retrospective paragraph.
Reflexivity and validity
Reflexivity is an accepted means of establishing validity (credibility) in qualitative research, alongside triangulation, respondent validation and deviant case analysis.
Failing to report the researcher's reflexivity is a recognised limitation of a qualitative study.
A demographic list or a generic claim of reflexivity is not enough; the reflection should be linked to specific decisions about method.
Bracketing
Bracketing, taken from Husserl's phenomenology (epoché), is the researcher's deliberate suspension of their own preconceptions and assumptions about a phenomenon, so that findings reflect participants' experience.
Bracketing does not erase what the researcher knows; it identifies assumptions and holds them open to question.
Bracketing differs from reflexivity: bracketing sets the researcher's preconceptions aside, whereas reflexivity is ongoing, reported reflection on how the researcher shapes the study.
How bracketing is done
Bracketing is carried out through reflexive practices.
Practice | Timing or purpose |
|---|---|
Reflexive journal | Begun before the research question is fixed |
Interview with an outsider | Exposes hidden assumptions |
Analytic memos | Kept during analysis |
Bracketing across traditions
Tradition | Status of prior understanding | Asked of the researcher |
|---|---|---|
Descriptive phenomenology (Husserl; systematised for psychology by Giorgi) | Taken-for-granted assumptions can obscure experience | Disciplined suspension and reflection |
Interpretative or hermeneutic phenomenology (Heidegger, Gadamer) | Prior understanding contributes to interpretation | Examine and revise it openly |
Grounded theory and most applied health research | Assumptions can shape collection and analysis | Appropriate reflexivity |
Interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) accepts that interpretation is happening, so a claim to have removed every preconception is unconvincing.