qualitative research english education

• Technical Support
• Find My Rep

You are here

Qualitative Research in Education

• Liz Atkins - University of Huddersfield, UK
• Susan Wallace - Nottingham Trent University, UK
• Description

This accessible and practical book is a perfect quick guide for graduate researchers in education. Looking at the interdependence of teaching and research, the authors show that a critical and analytical exploration of policies and practices is a necessary part of what we mean by being a 'professional' in education.

Drawing on the authors' substantial experience of teaching research skills at graduate level, as well as on their own experiences as active researchers, the book will guide you through:

• Discourse analysis
• Visual methods
• Textual research
• Data collection and analysis

This co-authored book is structured around a range of methods applicable to educational research and appropriate for use by practitioners at all stages of their professional development. It takes recognizable, 'real life' scenarios as its starting point for each discussion of method, so that readers are able to start from the known and familiar. As well as exploring theoretical aspects of research method, each chapter provides practical tasks and points for discussion and reflection. These approaches, taken together, are designed to build confidence and encourage reader engagement and enjoyment.

See what’s new to this edition by selecting the Features tab on this page. Should you need additional information or have questions regarding the HEOA information provided for this title, including what is new to this edition, please email [email protected] . Please include your name, contact information, and the name of the title for which you would like more information. For information on the HEOA, please go to http://ed.gov/policy/highered/leg/hea08/index.html .

For assistance with your order: Please email us at [email protected] or connect with your SAGE representative.

SAGE 2455 Teller Road Thousand Oaks, CA 91320 www.sagepub.com

'This book successfully revives Lawrence Stenhouse's seminal work on the 'teacher-researcher' by showing the interconnectedness of teaching and research and stressing the key role of the practitioner-researcher. Its chapters provide comprehensive guidance for researchers at all levels on conducting small scale research in an ethical and reflexive way' -Professor Jerry Wellington, Sheffield

This is a useful book for providing students with useful information to conduct a qualitative study.

Comprehensive text, thorough and clearly laid out. Very useful for supporting PGCE/ SD trainees new to research as well as supporting those who have carried out research before.

This is an excellent text which I will recommend to any of my students undertaking qualitative research. The language is open and clear. Liz Atkins really understands the needs of M level education practitioners.

A great companion for anyone conducting qualitative research in Education. Can recommend this book.

This book covers key methodological issues and qualitative research designs in the educational field. Each chapter includes examples that are particularly useful to understand ‘how’ to carry out research. The activities in each chapter are a good complement to reinforce knowledge and understanding of key concepts. This book is an ideal introduction for master and undergraduate students in Education who are doing or planning to do a small-scale qualitative research. I recommend this book to my second year students and use it as an essential reading at the master level. The examples are brilliant and this is the main reason why I chose to include this book in my teaching.

A rather analytical and easy-to- read book.

Each chapter of the book opens with a useful and clear summary. The additional reflective activities and vignettes offer opportunities for critical thinking and help readers to engage with the material.

This is a genuine title that can help students grasp the skills required for qualitative research. Students not only from Education stream but from other social sciences can benefit from it. I recommend it also for students with Applied Linguistics background at an early stage of research.

Not relevant for Education Leadership and Management field. There are more appropriate books available.

Preview this book

Sample materials & chapters.

Additional Resource 1

Additional Resource 2

Sample Chapter - Chapter 1

For instructors

Select a purchasing option, related products.

This title is also available on SAGE Knowledge , the ultimate social sciences online library. If your library doesn’t have access, ask your librarian to start a trial .

This title is also available on SAGE Research Methods , the ultimate digital methods library. If your library doesn’t have access, ask your librarian to start a trial .

• Tools and Resources
• Customer Services
• Original Language Spotlight
• Alternative and Non-formal Education 
• Cognition, Emotion, and Learning
• Curriculum and Pedagogy
• Education and Society
• Education, Change, and Development
• Education, Cultures, and Ethnicities
• Education, Gender, and Sexualities
• Education, Health, and Social Services
• Educational Administration and Leadership
• Educational History
• Educational Politics and Policy
• Educational Purposes and Ideals
• Educational Systems
• Educational Theories and Philosophies
• Globalization, Economics, and Education
• Languages and Literacies
• Professional Learning and Development
• Research and Assessment Methods
• Technology and Education
• Share This Facebook LinkedIn Twitter

Article contents

Feminist theory and its use in qualitative research in education.

• Emily Freeman Emily Freeman University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
• https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190264093.013.1193
• Published online: 28 August 2019

Feminist theory rose in prominence in educational research during the 1980s and experienced a resurgence in popularity during the late 1990s−2010s. Standpoint epistemologies, intersectionality, and feminist poststructuralism are the most prevalent theories, but feminist researchers often work across feminist theoretical thought. Feminist qualitative research in education encompasses a myriad of methods and methodologies, but projects share a commitment to feminist ethics and theories. Among the commitments are the understanding that knowledge is situated in the subjectivities and lived experiences of both researcher and participants and research is deeply reflexive. Feminist theory informs both research questions and the methodology of a project in addition to serving as a foundation for analysis. The goals of feminist educational research include dismantling systems of oppression, highlighting gender-based disparities, and seeking new ways of constructing knowledge.

• feminist theories
• qualitative research
• educational research
• positionality
• methodology

Introduction

Feminist qualitative research begins with the understanding that all knowledge is situated in the bodies and subjectivities of people, particularly women and historically marginalized groups. Donna Haraway ( 1988 ) wrote,

I am arguing for politics and epistemologies of location, position, and situating, where partiality and not universality is the condition of being heard to make rational knowledge claims. These are claims on people’s lives I’m arguing for the view from a body, always a complex, contradictory, structuring, and structured body, versus the view from above, from nowhere, from simplicity. Only the god trick is forbidden. . . . Feminism is about a critical vision consequent upon a critical positioning in unhomogeneous gendered social space. (p. 589)

By arguing that “politics and epistemologies” are always interpretive and partial, Haraway offered feminist qualitative researchers in education a way to understand all research as potentially political and always interpretive and partial. Because all humans bring their own histories, biases, and subjectivities with them to a research space or project, it is naïve to think that the written product of research could ever be considered neutral, but what does research with a strong commitment to feminism look like in the context of education?

Writing specifically about the ways researchers of both genders can use feminist ethnographic methods while conducting research on schools and schooling, Levinson ( 1998 ) stated, “I define feminist ethnography as intensive qualitative research, aimed toward the description and analysis of the gendered construction and representation of experience, which is informed by a political and intellectual commitment to the empowerment of women and the creation of more equitable arrangements between and among specific, culturally defined genders” (p. 339). The core of Levinson’s definition is helpful for understanding the ways that feminist educational anthropologists engage with schools as gendered and political constructs and the larger questions of feminist qualitative research in education. His message also extends to other forms of feminist qualitative research. By focusing on description, analysis, and representation of gendered constructs, educational researchers can move beyond simple binary analyses to more nuanced understandings of the myriad ways gender operates within educational contexts.

Feminist qualitative research spans the range of qualitative methodologies, but much early research emerged out of the feminist postmodern turn in anthropology (Behar & Gordon, 1995 ), which was a response to male anthropologists who ignored the gendered implications of ethnographic research (e.g., Clifford & Marcus, 1986 ). Historically, most of the work on feminist education was conducted in the 1980s and 1990s, with a resurgence in the late 2010s (Culley & Portuges, 1985 ; DuBois, Kelly, Kennedy, Korsmeyer, & Robinson, 1985 ; Gottesman, 2016 ; Maher & Tetreault, 1994 ; Thayer-Bacon, Stone, & Sprecher, 2013 ). Within this body of research, the majority focuses on higher education (Coffey & Delamont, 2000 ; Digiovanni & Liston, 2005 ; Diller, Houston, Morgan, & Ayim, 1996 ; Gabriel & Smithson, 1990 ; Mayberry & Rose, 1999 ). Even leading journals, such as Feminist Teacher ( 1984 −present), focus mostly on the challenges of teaching about and to women in higher education, although more scholarship on P–12 education has emerged in recent issues.

There is also a large collection of work on the links between gender, achievement, and self-esteem (American Association of University Women, 1992 , 1999 ; Digiovanni & Liston, 2005 ; Gilligan, 1982 ; Hancock, 1989 ; Jackson, Paechter, & Renold, 2010 ; National Coalition for Women and Girls in Education, 2002 ; Orenstein, 1994 ; Pipher, 1994 ; Sadker & Sadker, 1994 ). However, just because research examines gender does not mean that it is feminist. Simply using gender as a category of analysis does not mean the research project is informed by feminist theory, ethics, or methods, but it is often a starting point for researchers who are interested in the complex ways gender is constructed and the ways it operates in education.

This article examines the histories and theories of U.S.–based feminism, the tenets of feminist qualitative research and methodologies, examples of feminist qualitative studies, and the possibilities for feminist qualitative research in education to provide feminist educational researchers context and methods for engaging in transformative and subversive research. Each section provides a brief overview of the major concepts and conversations, along with examples from educational research to highlight the ways feminist theory has informed educational scholarship. Some examples are given limited attention and serve as entry points into a more detailed analysis of a few key examples. While there is a large body of non-Western feminist theory (e.g., the works of Lila Abu-Lughod, Sara Ahmed, Raewyn Connell, Saba Mahmood, Chandra Mohanty, and Gayatri Spivak), much of the educational research using feminist theory draws on Western feminist theory. This article focuses on U.S.–based research to show the ways that the utilization of feminist theory has changed since the 1980s.

Histories, Origins, and Theories of U.S.–Based Feminism

The normative historiography of feminist theory and activism in the United States is broken into three waves. First-wave feminism (1830s−1920s) primarily focused on women’s suffrage and women’s rights to legally exist in public spaces. During this time period, there were major schisms between feminist groups concerning abolition, rights for African American women, and the erasure of marginalized voices from larger feminist debates. The second wave (1960s and 1980s) worked to extend some of the rights won during the first wave. Activists of this time period focused on women’s rights to enter the workforce, sexual harassment, educational equality, and abortion rights. During this wave, colleges and universities started creating women’s studies departments and those scholars provided much of the theoretical work that informs feminist research and activism today. While there were major feminist victories during second-wave feminism, notably Title IX and Roe v. Wade , issues concerning the marginalization of race, sexual orientation, and gender identity led many feminists of color to separate from mainstream white feminist groups. The third wave (1990s to the present) is often characterized as the intersectional wave, as some feminist groups began utilizing Kimberlé Crenshaw’s concept of intersectionality ( 1991 ) to understand that oppression operates via multiple categories (e.g., gender, race, class, age, ability) and that intersecting oppressions lead to different lived experiences.

Historians and scholars of feminism argue that dividing feminist activism into three waves flattens and erases the major contributions of women of color and gender-nonconforming people. Thompson ( 2002 ) called this history a history of hegemonic feminism and proposed that we look at the contributions of multiracial feminism when discussing history. Her work, along with that of Allen ( 1984 ) about the indigenous roots of U.S. feminism, raised many questions about the ways that feminism operates within the public and academic spheres. For those who wish to engage in feminist research, it is vital to spend time understanding the historical, theoretical, and political ways that feminism(s) can both liberate and oppress, depending on the scholar’s understandings of, and orientations to, feminist projects.

Standpoint Epistemology

Much of the theoretical work that informs feminist qualitative research today emerged out of second-wave feminist scholarship. Standpoint epistemology, according to Harding ( 1991 , 2004 ), posits that knowledge comes from one’s particular social location, that it is subjective, and the further one is from the hegemonic norm, the clearer one can see oppression. This was a major challenge to androcentric and Enlightenment theories of knowledge because standpoint theory acknowledges that there is no universal understanding of the world. This theory aligns with the second-wave feminist slogan, “The personal is political,” and advocates for a view of knowledge that is produced from the body.

Greene ( 1994 ) wrote from a feminist postmodernist epistemology and attacked Enlightenment thinking by using standpoint theory as her starting point. Her work serves as an example of one way that educational scholars can use standpoint theory in their work. She theorized encounters with “imaginative literature” to help educators conceptualize new ways of using reading and writing in the classroom and called for teachers to think of literature as “a harbinger of the possible.” (Greene, 1994 , p. 218). Greene wrote from an explicitly feminist perspective and moved beyond simple analyses of gender to a larger critique of the ways that knowledge is constructed in classrooms.

Intersectionality

Crenshaw ( 1991 ) and Collins ( 2000 ) challenged and expanded standpoint theory to move it beyond an individual understanding of knowledge to a group-based theory of oppression. Their work, and that of other black and womanist feminists, opened up multiple spaces of possibility for feminist scholars and researchers because it challenged hegemonic feminist thought. For those interested in conducting feminist research in educational settings, their work is especially pertinent because they advocate for feminists to attend to all aspects of oppression rather than flattening them to one of simple gender-based oppression.

Haddix, McArthur, Muhammad, Price-Dennis, and Sealey-Ruiz ( 2016 ), all women-of-color feminist educators, wrote a provocateur piece in a special issue of English Education on black girls’ literacy. The four authors drew on black feminist thought and conducted a virtual kitchen-table conversation. By symbolically representing their conversations as one from the kitchen, this article pays homage to women-of-color feminism and pushes educators who read English Education to reconsider elements of their own subjectivities. Third-wave feminism and black feminism emphasize intersectionality, in that different demographic details like race, class, and gender are inextricably linked in power structures. Intersectionality is an important frame for educational research because identifying the unique experiences, realities, and narratives of those involved in educational systems can highlight the ways that power and oppression operate in society.

Feminist Poststructural Theory

Feminist poststructural theory has greatly informed many feminist projects in educational research. Deconstruction is

a critical practice that aims to ‘dismantle [ déconstruire ] the metaphysical and rhetorical structures that are at work, not in order to reject or discard them, but to reinscribe them in another way,’ (Derrida, quoted in Spivak, 1974 , p. lxxv). Thus, deconstruction is not about tearing down, but about looking at how a structure has been constructed, what holds it together, and what it produces. (St. Pierre, 2000 , p. 482)

Reality, subjectivity, knowledge, and truth are constructed through language and discourse (cultural practices, power relations, etc.), so truth is local and diverse, rather than a universal experience (St. Pierre, 2000 ). Feminist poststructuralist theory may be used to question structural inequality that is maintained in education through dominant discourses.

In Go Be a Writer! Expanding the Curricular Boundaries of Literacy Learning with Children , Kuby and Rucker ( 2016 ) explored early elementary literacy practices using poststructural and posthumanist theories. Their book drew on hours of classroom observations, student interviews and work, and their own musings on ways to de-standardize literacy instruction and curriculum. Through the process of pedagogical documentation, Kuby and Rucker drew on the works of Barad, Deleuze and Guattari, and Derrida to explore the ways they saw children engaging in what they call “literacy desiring(s).” One aim of the book is to find practical and applicable ways to “Disrupt literacy in ways that rewrite the curriculum, the interactions, and the power dynamics of the classroom even begetting a new kind of energy that spirals and bounces and explodes” (Kuby & Rucker, 2016 , p. 5). The second goal of their book is not only to understand what happened in Rucker’s classroom using the theories, but also to unbound the links between “teaching↔learning” (p. 202) and to write with the theories, rather than separating theory from the methodology and classroom enactments (p. 45) because “knowing/being/doing were not separate” (p. 28). This work engages with key tenets of feminist poststructuralist theory and adds to both the theoretical and pedagogical conversations about what counts as a literacy practice.

While the discussion in this section provides an overview of the histories and major feminist theories, it is by no means exhaustive. Scholars who wish to engage in feminist educational research need to spend time doing the work of understanding the various theories and trajectories that constitute feminist work so they are able to ground their projects and theories in a particular tradition that will inform the ethics and methods of research.

Tenets of Feminist Qualitative Research

Why engage in feminist qualitative research.

Evans and Spivak ( 2016 ) stated, “The only real and effective way you can sabotage something this way is when you are working intimately within it.” Feminist researchers are in the classroom and the academy, working intimately within curricular, pedagogical, and methodological constraints that serve neoliberal ideologies, so it is vital to better understand the ways that we can engage in affirmative sabotage to build a more just and equitable world. Spivak’s ( 2014 ) notion of affirmative sabotage has become a cornerstone for understanding feminist qualitative research and teaching. She borrowed and built on Gramsci’s role of the organic intellectual and stated that they/we need to engage in affirmative sabotage to transform the humanities.

I used the term “affirmative sabotage” to gloss on the usual meaning of sabotage: the deliberate ruining of the master’s machine from the inside. Affirmative sabotage doesn’t just ruin; the idea is of entering the discourse that you are criticizing fully, so that you can turn it around from inside. The only real and effective way you can sabotage something this way is when you are working intimately within it. (Evans & Spivak, 2016 )

While Spivak has been mostly concerned with literary education, her writings provide teachers and researchers numerous lines of inquiry into projects that can explode androcentric universal notions of knowledge and resist reproductive heteronormativity.

Spivak’s pedagogical musings center on deconstruction, primarily Derridean notions of deconstruction (Derrida, 2016 ; Jackson & Mazzei, 2012 ; Spivak, 2006 , 2009 , 2012 ) that seek to destabilize existing categories and to call into question previously unquestioned beliefs about the goals of education. Her works provide an excellent starting point for examining the links between feminism and educational research. The desire to create new worlds within classrooms, worlds that are fluid, interpretive, and inclusive in order to interrogate power structures, lies at the core of what it means to be a feminist education researcher. As researchers, we must seriously engage with feminist theory and include it in our research so that feminism is not seen as a dirty word, but as a movement/pedagogy/methodology that seeks the liberation of all (Davis, 2016 ).

Feminist research and feminist teaching are intrinsically linked. As Kerkhoff ( 2015 ) wrote, “Feminist pedagogy requires students to challenge the norms and to question whether existing practices privilege certain groups and marginalize others” (p. 444), and this is exactly what feminist educational research should do. Bailey ( 2001 ) called on teachers, particularly those who identify as feminists, to be activists, “The values of one’s teaching should not be separated sharply from the values one expresses outside the classroom, because teaching is not inherently pure or laboratory practice” (p. 126); however, we have to be careful not to glorify teachers as activists because that leads to the risk of misinterpreting actions. Bailey argued that teaching critical thinking is not enough if it is not coupled with curriculums and pedagogies that are antiheteronormative, antisexist, and antiracist. As Bailey warned, just using feminist theory or identifying as a feminist is not enough. It is very easy to use the language and theories of feminism without being actively feminist in one’s research. There are ethical and methodological issues that feminist scholars must consider when conducting research.

Feminist research requires one to discuss ethics, not as a bureaucratic move, but as a reflexive move that shows the researchers understand that, no matter how much they wish it didn’t, power always plays a role in the process. According to Davies ( 2014 ), “Ethics, as Barad defines it, is a matter of questioning what is being made to matter and how that mattering affects what it is possible to do and to think” (p. 11). In other words, ethics is what is made to matter in a particular time and place.

Davies ( 2016 ) extended her definition of ethics to the interactions one has with others.

This is not ethics as a matter of separate individuals following a set of rules. Ethical practice, as both Barad and Deleuze define it, requires thinking beyond the already known, being open in the moment of the encounter, pausing at the threshold and crossing over. Ethical practice is emergent in encounters with others, in emergent listening with others. It is a matter of questioning what is being made to matter and how that mattering affects what it is possible to do and to think. Ethics is emergent in the intra-active encounters in which knowing, being, and doing (epistemology, ontology, and ethics) are inextricably linked. (Barad, 2007 , p. 83)

The ethics of any project must be negotiated and contested before, during, and after the process of conducting research in conjunction with the participants. Feminist research is highly reflexive and should be conducted in ways that challenge power dynamics between individuals and social institutions. Educational researchers must heed the warning to avoid the “god-trick” (Haraway, 1988 ) and to continually question and re-question the ways we seek to define and present subjugated knowledge (Hesse-Biber, 2012 ).

Positionalities and Reflexivity

According to feminist ethnographer Noelle Stout, “Positionality isn’t meant to be a few sentences at the beginning of a work” (personal communication, April 5, 2016 ). In order to move to new ways of experiencing and studying the world, it is vital that scholars examine the ways that reflexivity and positionality are constructed. In a glorious footnote, Margery Wolf ( 1992 ) related reflexivity in anthropological writing to a bureaucratic procedure (p. 136), and that resonates with how positionality often operates in the field of education.

The current trend in educational research is to include a positionality statement that fixes the identity of the author in a particular place and time and is derived from feminist standpoint theory. Researchers should make their biases and the identities of the authors clear in a text, but there are serious issues with the way that positionality functions as a boundary around the authors. Examining how the researchers exert authority within a text allows the reader the opportunity to determine the intent and philosophy behind the text. If positionality were used in an embedded and reflexive manner, then educational research would be much richer and allow more nuanced views of schools, in addition to being more feminist in nature. The rest of this section briefly discussrs articles that engage with feminist ethics regarding researcher subjectivities and positionality, and two articles are examined in greater depth.

When looking for examples of research that includes deeply reflexive and embedded positionality, one finds that they mostly deal with issues of race, equity, and diversity. The highlighted articles provide examples of positionality statements that are deeply reflexive and represent the ways that feminist researchers can attend to the ethics of being part of a research project. These examples all come from feminist ethnographic projects, but they are applicable to a wide variety of feminist qualitative projects.

Martinez ( 2016 ) examined how research methods are or are not appropriate for specific contexts. Calderon ( 2016 ) examined autoethnography and the reproduction of “settler colonial understandings of marginalized communities” (p. 5). Similarly, Wissman, Staples, Vasudevan, and Nichols ( 2015 ) discussed how to research with adolescents through engaged participation and collaborative inquiry, and Ceglowski and Makovsky ( 2012 ) discussed the ways researchers can engage in duoethnography with young children.

Abajian ( 2016 ) uncovered the ways military recruiters operate in high schools and paid particular attention to the politics of remaining neutral while also working to subvert school militarization. She wrote,

Because of the sensitive and also controversial nature of my research, it was not possible to have a collaborative process with students, teachers, and parents. Purposefully intervening would have made documentation impossible because that would have (rightfully) aligned me with anti-war and counter-recruitment activists who were usually not welcomed on school campuses (Abajian & Guzman, 2013 ). It was difficult enough to find an administrator who gave me consent to conduct my research within her school, as I had explicitly stated in my participant recruitment letters and consent forms that I was going to research the promotion of post-secondary paths including the military. Hence, any purposeful intervention on my part would have resulted in the termination of my research project. At the same time, my documentation was, in essence, an intervention. I hoped that my presence as an observer positively shaped the context of my observation and also contributed to the larger struggle against the militarization of schools. (p. 26)

Her positionality played a vital role in the creation, implementation, and analysis of military recruitment, but it also forced her into unexpected silences in order to carry out her research. Abajian’s positionality statement brings up many questions about the ways researchers have to use or silence their positionality to further their research, especially if they are working in ostensibly “neutral” and “politically free” zones, such as schools. Her work drew on engaged anthropology (Low & Merry, 2010 ) and critical reflexivity (Duncan-Andrade & Morrell, 2008 ) to highlight how researchers’ subjectivities shape ethnographic projects. Questions of subjectivity and positionality in her work reflect the larger discourses around these topics in feminist theory and qualitative research.

Brown ( 2011 ) provided another example of embedded and reflexive positionality of the articles surveyed. Her entire study engaged with questions about how her positionality influenced the study during the field-work portion of her ethnography on how race and racism operate in ethnographic field-work. This excerpt from her study highlights how she conceived of positionality and how it informed her work and her process.

Next, I provide a brief overview of the research study from which this paper emerged and I follow this with a presentation of four, first-person narratives from key encounters I experienced while doing ethnographic field research. Each of these stories centres the role race played as I negotiated my multiple, complex positionality vis-á-vis different informants and participants in my study. These stories highlight the emotional pressures that race work has on the researcher and the research process, thus reaffirming why one needs to recognise the role race plays, and may play, in research prior to, during, and after conducting one’s study (Milner, 2007 ). I conclude by discussing the implications these insights have on preparing researchers of color to conduct cross-racial qualitative research. (Brown, 2011 , p. 98)

Brown centered the roles of race and subjectivity, both hers and her participants, by focusing her analysis on the four narratives. The researchers highlighted in this section thought deeply about the ethics of their projects and the ways that their positionality informed their choice of methods.

Methods and Challenges

Feminist qualitative research can take many forms, but the most common data collection methods include interviews, observations, and narrative or discourse analysis. For the purposes of this article, methods refer to the tools and techniques researchers use, while methodology refers to the larger philosophical and epistemological approaches to conducting research. It is also important to note that these are not fixed terms, and that there continues to be much debate about what constitutes feminist theory and feminist research methods among feminist qualitative researchers. This section discusses some of the tensions and constraints of using feminist theory in educational research.

Jackson and Mazzei ( 2012 ) called on researchers to think through their data with theory at all stages of the collection and analysis process. They also reminded us that all data collection is partial and informed by the researcher’s own beliefs (Koro-Ljungberg, Löytönen, & Tesar, 2017 ). Interviews are sites of power and critiques because they show the power of stories and serve as a method of worlding, the process of “making a world, turning insight into instrument, through and into a possible act of freedom” (Spivak, 2014 , p. xiii). Interviews allow researchers and participants ways to engage in new ways of understanding past experiences and connecting them to feminist theories. The narratives serve as data, but it is worth noting that the data collected from interviews are “partial, incomplete, and always being re-told and re-membered” (Jackson & Mazzei, 2012 , p. 3), much like the lived experiences of both researcher and participant.

Research, data collection, and interpretation are not neutral endeavors, particularly with interviews (Jackson & Mazzei, 2009 ; Mazzei, 2007 , 2013 ). Since education research emerged out of educational psychology (Lather, 1991 ; St. Pierre, 2016 ), historically there has been an emphasis on generalizability and positivist data collection methods. Most feminist research makes no claims of generalizability or truth; indeed, to do so would negate the hyperpersonal and particular nature of this type of research (Love, 2017 ). St. Pierre ( 2016 ) viewed the lack of generalizability as an asset of feminist and poststructural research, rather than a limitation, because it creates a space of resistance against positivist research methodologies.

Denzin and Giardina ( 2016 ) urged researchers to “consider an alternative mode of thinking about the critical turn in qualitative inquiry and posit the following suggestion: perhaps it is time we turned away from ‘methodology’ altogether ” (p. 5, italics original). Despite the contention over the term critical among some feminist scholars (e.g. Ellsworth, 1989 ), their suggestion is valid and has been picked up by feminist and poststructural scholars who examine the tensions between following a strict research method/ology and the theoretical systems out of which they operate because precision in method obscures the messy and human nature of research (Koro-Ljungberg, 2016 ; Koro-Ljungberg et al., 2017 ; Love, 2017 ; St. Pierre & Pillow, 2000 ). Feminist qualitative researchers should seek to complicate the question of what method and methodology mean when conducting feminist research (Lather, 1991 ), due to the feminist emphasis on reflexive and situated research methods (Hesse-Biber, 2012 ).

Examples of Feminist Qualitative Research in Education

A complete overview of the literature is not possible here, due to considerations of length, but the articles and books selected represent the various debates within feminist educational research. They also show how research preoccupations have changed over the course of feminist work in education. The literature review is divided into three broad categories: Power, canons, and gender; feminist pedagogies, curriculums, and classrooms; and teacher education, identities, and knowledge. Each section provides a broad overview of the literature to demonstrate the breadth of work using feminist theory, with some examples more deeply explicated to describe how feminist theories inform the scholarship.

Power, Canons, and Gender

The literature in this category contests disciplinary practices that are androcentric in both content and form, while asserting the value of using feminist knowledge to construct knowledge. The majority of the work was written in the 1980s and supported the creation of feminist ways of knowing, particularly via the creation of women’s studies programs or courses in existing departments that centered female voices and experiences.

Questioning the canon has long been a focus of feminist scholarship, as has the attempt to subvert its power in the disciplines. Bezucha ( 1985 ) focused on the ways that departments of history resist the inclusion of both women and feminism in the historical canon. Similarly, Miller ( 1985 ) discussed feminism as subversion when seeking to expand the canon of French literature in higher education.

Lauter and Dieterich ( 1972 ) examined a report by ERIC, “Women’s Place in Academe,” a collection of articles about the discrepancies by gender in jobs and tenure-track positions and the lack of inclusion of women authors in literature classes. They also found that women were relegated to “softer” disciplines and that feminist knowledge was not acknowledged as valid work. Culley and Portuges ( 1985 ) expanded the focus beyond disciplines to the larger structures of higher education and noted the varies ways that professors subvert from within their disciplines. DuBois et al. ( 1985 ) chronicled the development of feminist scholarship in the disciplines of anthropology, education, history, literature, and philosophy. They explained that the institutions of higher education often prevent feminist scholars from working across disciplines in an attempt to keep them separate. Raymond ( 1985 ) also critiqued the academy for not encouraging relationships across disciplines and offered the development of women’s, gender, and feminist studies as one solution to greater interdisciplinary work.

Parson ( 2016 ) examined the ways that STEM syllabi reinforce gendered norms in higher education. She specifically looked at eight syllabi from math, chemistry, biology, physics, and geology classes to determine how modal verbs showing stance, pronouns, intertextuality, interdiscursivity, and gender showed power relations in higher education. She framed the study through poststructuralist feminist critical discourse analysis to uncover “the ways that gendered practices that favor men are represented and replicated in the syllabus” (p. 103). She found that all the syllabi positioned knowledge as something that is, rather than something that can be co-constructed. Additionally, the syllabi also favored individual and masculine notions of what it means to learn by stressing the competitive and difficult nature of the classroom and content.

When reading newer work on feminism in higher education and the construction of knowledge, it is easy to feel that, while the conversations might have shifted somewhat, the challenge of conducting interdisciplinary feminist work in institutions of higher education remains as present as it was during the creation of women’s and gender studies departments. The articles all point to the fact that simply including women’s and marginalized voices in the academy does not erase or mitigate the larger issues of gender discrimination and androcentricity within the silos of the academy.

Feminist Pedagogies, Curricula, and Classrooms

This category of literature has many similarities to the previous one, but all the works focus more specifically on questions of curriculum and pedagogy. A review of the literature shows that the earliest conversations were about the role of women in academia and knowledge construction, and this selection builds on that work to emphasize the ways that feminism can influence the events within classes and expands the focus to more levels of education.

Rich ( 1985 ) explained that curriculum in higher education courses needs to validate gender identities while resisting patriarchal canons. Maher ( 1985 ) narrowed the focus to a critique of the lecture as a pedagogical technique that reinforces androcentric ways of learning and knowing. She called for classes in higher education to be “collaborative, cooperative, and interactive” (p. 30), a cry that still echoes across many college campuses today, especially from students in large lecture-based courses. Maher and Tetreault ( 1994 ) provided a collection of essays that are rooted in feminist classroom practice and moved from the classroom into theoretical possibilities for feminist education. Warren ( 1998 ) recommended using Peggy McIntosh’s five phases of curriculum development ( 1990 ) and extending it to include feminist pedagogies that challenge patriarchal ways of teaching. Exploring the relational encounters that exist in feminist classrooms, Sánchez-Pardo ( 2017 ) discussed the ethics of pedagogy as a politics of visibility and investigated the ways that democratic classrooms relate to feminist classrooms.

While all of the previously cited literature is U.S.–based, the next two works focus on the ways that feminist pedagogies and curriculum operate in a European context. Weiner ( 1994 ) used autobiography and narrative methodologies to provide an introduction to how feminism has influenced educational research and pedagogy in Britain. Revelles-Benavente and Ramos ( 2017 ) collected a series of studies about how situated feminist knowledge challenges the problems of neoliberal education across Europe. These two, among many European feminist works, demonstrate the range of scholarship and show the trans-Atlantic links between how feminism has been received in educational settings. However, much more work needs to be done in looking at the broader global context, and particularly by feminist scholars who come from non-Western contexts.

The following literature moves us into P–12 classrooms. DiGiovanni and Liston ( 2005 ) called for a new research agenda in K–5 education that explores the hidden curriculums surrounding gender and gender identity. One source of the hidden curriculum is classroom literature, which both Davies ( 2003 ) and Vandergrift ( 1995 ) discussed in their works. Davies ( 2003 ) used feminist ethnography to understand how children who were exposed to feminist picture books talked about gender and gender roles. Vandergrift ( 1995 ) presented a theoretical piece that explored the ways picture books reinforce or resist canons. She laid out a future research agenda using reader response theory to better comprehend how young children question gender in literature. Willinsky ( 1987 ) explored the ways that dictionary definitions reinforced constructions of gender. He looked at the definitions of the words clitoris, penis , and vagina in six school dictionaries and then compared them with A Feminist Dictionary to see how the definitions varied across texts. He found a stark difference in the treatment of the words vagina and penis ; definitions of the word vagina were treated as medical or anatomical and devoid of sexuality, while definitions of the term penis were linked to sex (p. 151).

Weisner ( 2004 ) addressed middle school classrooms and highlighted the various ways her school discouraged unconventional and feminist ways of teaching. She also brought up issues of silence, on the part of both teachers and students, regarding sexuality. By including students in the curriculum planning process, Weisner provided more possibilities for challenging power in classrooms. Wallace ( 1999 ) returned to the realm of higher education and pushed literature professors to expand pedagogy to be about more than just the texts that are read. She challenged the metaphoric dichotomy of classrooms as places of love or battlefields; in doing so, she “advocate[d] active ignorance and attention to resistances” (p. 194) as a method of subverting transference from students to teachers.

The works discussed in this section cover topics ranging from the place of women in curriculum to the gendered encounters teachers and students have with curriculums and pedagogies. They offer current feminist scholars many directions for future research, particularly in the arena of P–12 education.

Teacher Education, Identities, and Knowledge

The third subset of literature examines the ways that teachers exist in classrooms and some possibilities for feminist teacher education. The majority of the literature in this section starts from the premise that the teachers are engaged in feminist projects. The selections concerning teacher education offer critiques of existing heteropatriarchal normative teacher education and include possibilities for weaving feminism and feminist pedagogies into the education of preservice teachers.

Holzman ( 1986 ) explored the role of multicultural teaching and how it can challenge systematic oppression; however, she complicated the process with her personal narrative of being a lesbian and working to find a place within the school for her sexual identity. She questioned how teachers can protect their identities while also engaging in the fight for justice and equity. Hoffman ( 1985 ) discussed the ways teacher power operates in the classroom and how to balance the personal and political while still engaging in disciplinary curriculums. She contended that teachers can work from personal knowledge and connect it to the larger curricular concerns of their discipline. Golden ( 1998 ) used teacher narratives to unpack how teachers can become radicalized in the higher education classroom when faced with unrelenting patriarchal and heteronormative messages.

Extending this work, Bailey ( 2001 ) discussed teachers as activists within the classroom. She focused on three aspects of teaching: integrity with regard to relationships, course content, and teaching strategies. She concluded that teachers cannot separate their values from their profession. Simon ( 2007 ) conducted a case study of a secondary teacher and communities of inquiry to see how they impacted her work in the classroom. The teacher, Laura, explicitly tied her inquiry activities to activist teacher education and critical pedagogy, “For this study, inquiry is fundamental to critical pedagogy, shaped by power and ideology, relationships within and outside of the classroom, as well as teachers’ and students’ autochthonous histories and epistemologies” (Simon, 2007 , p. 47). Laura’s experiences during her teacher education program continued during her years in the classroom, leading her to create a larger activism-oriented teacher organization.

Collecting educational autobiographies from 17 college-level feminist professors, Maher and Tetreault ( 1994 ) worried that educators often conflated “the experience and values of white middle-class women like ourselves for gendered universals” (p. 15). They complicated the idea of a democratic feminist teacher, raised issues regarding the problematic ways hegemonic feminism flattens experience to that of just white women, and pushed feminist professors to pay particular attention to the intersections of race, class, gender, and sexuality when teaching.

Cheira ( 2017 ) called for gender-conscious teaching and literature-based teaching to confront the gender stereotypes she encountered in Portuguese secondary schools. Papoulis and Smith ( 1992 ) conducted summer sessions where teachers experienced writing activities they could teach their students. Conceptualized as an experiential professional development course, the article revolved around an incident where the seminar was reading Emily Dickinson and the men in the course asked the two female instructors why they had to read feminist literature and the conversations that arose. The stories the women told tie into Papoulis and Smith’s call for teacher educators to interrogate their underlying beliefs and ideologies about gender, race, and class, so they are able to foster communities of study that can purposefully and consciously address feminist inquiry.

McWilliam ( 1994 ) collected stories of preservice teachers in Australia to understand how feminism can influence teacher education. She explored how textual practices affect how preservice teachers understand teaching and their role. Robertson ( 1994 ) tackled the issue of teacher education and challenged teachers to move beyond the two metaphors of banking and midwifery when discussing feminist ways of teaching. She called for teacher educators to use feminist pedagogies within schools of education so that preservice teachers experience a feminist education. Maher and Rathbone ( 1986 ) explored the scholarship on women’s and girls’ educational experiences and used their findings to call for changes in teacher education. They argued that schools reinforce the notion that female qualities are inferior due to androcentric curriculums and ways of showing knowledge. Justice-oriented teacher education is a more recent iteration of this debate, and Jones and Hughes ( 2016 ) called for community-based practices to expand the traditional definitions of schooling and education. They called for preservice teachers to be conversant with, and open to, feminist storylines that defy existing gendered, raced, and classed stereotypes.

Bieler ( 2010 ) drew on feminist and critical definitions of dialogue (e.g., those by Bakhtin, Freire, Ellsworth, hooks, and Burbules) to reframe mentoring discourse in university supervision and dialogic praxis. She concluded by calling on university supervisors to change their methods of working with preservice teachers to “Explicitly and transparently cultivat[e] dialogic praxis-oriented mentoring relationships so that the newest members of our field can ‘feel their own strength at last,’ as Homer’s Telemachus aspired to do” (Bieler, 2010 , p. 422).

Johnson ( 2004 ) also examined the role of teacher educators, but she focused on the bodies and sexualities of preservice teachers. She explored the dynamics of sexual tension in secondary classrooms, the role of the body in teaching, and concerns about clothing when teaching. She explicitly worked to resist and undermine Cartesian dualities and, instead, explored the erotic power of teaching and seducing students into a love of subject matter. “But empowered women threaten the patriarchal structure of this society. Therefore, women have been acculturated to distrust erotic power” (Johnson, 2004 , p. 7). Like Bieler ( 2010 ), Johnson ( 2004 ) concluded that, “Teacher educators could play a role in creating a space within the larger framework of teacher education discourse such that bodily knowledge is considered along with pedagogical and content knowledge as a necessary component of teacher training and professional development” (p. 24). The articles about teacher education all sought to provoke questions about how we engage in the preparation and continuing development of educators.

Teacher identity and teacher education constitute how teachers construct knowledge, as both students and teachers. The works in this section raise issues of what identities are “acceptable” in the classroom, ways teachers and teacher educators can disrupt oppressive storylines and practices, and the challenges of utilizing feminist pedagogies without falling into hegemonic feminist practices.

Possibilities for Feminist Qualitative Research

Spivak ( 2012 ) believed that “gender is our first instrument of abstraction” (p. 30) and is often overlooked in a desire to understand political, curricular, or cultural moments. More work needs to be done to center gender and intersecting identities in educational research. One way is by using feminist qualitative methods. Classrooms and educational systems need to be examined through their gendered components, and the ways students operate within and negotiate systems of power and oppression need to be explored. We need to see if and how teachers are actively challenging patriarchal and heteronormative curriculums and to learn new methods for engaging in affirmative sabotage (Spivak, 2014 ). Given the historical emphasis on higher education, more work is needed regarding P–12 education, because it is in P–12 classrooms that affirmative sabotage may be the most necessary to subvert systems of oppression.

In order to engage in affirmative sabotage, it is vital that qualitative researchers who wish to use feminist theory spend time grappling with the complexity and multiplicity of feminist theory. It is only by doing this thought work that researchers will be able to understand the ongoing debates within feminist theory and to use it in a way that leads to a more equitable and just world. Simply using feminist theory because it may be trendy ignores the very real political nature of feminist activism. Researchers need to consider which theories they draw on and why they use those theories in their projects. One way of doing this is to explicitly think with theory (Jackson & Mazzei, 2012 ) at all stages of the research project and to consider which voices are being heard and which are being silenced (Gilligan, 2011 ; Spivak, 1988 ) in educational research. More consideration also needs to be given to non-U.S. and non-Western feminist theories and research to expand our understanding of education and schooling.

Paying close attention to feminist debates about method and methodology provides another possibility for qualitative research. The very process of challenging positivist research methods opens up new spaces and places for feminist qualitative research in education. It also allows researchers room to explore subjectivities that are often marginalized. When researchers engage in the deeply reflexive work that feminist research requires, it leads to acts of affirmative sabotage within the academy. These discussions create the spaces that lead to new visions and new worlds. Spivak ( 2006 ) once declared, “I am helpless before the fact that all my essays these days seem to end with projects for future work” (p. 35), but this is precisely the beauty of feminist qualitative research. We are setting ourselves and other feminist researchers up for future work, future questions, and actively changing the nature of qualitative research.

Acknowledgements

Dr. George Noblit provided the author with the opportunity to think deeply about qualitative methods and to write this article, for which the author is extremely grateful. Dr. Lynda Stone and Dr. Tanya Shields are thanked for encouraging the author’s passion for feminist theory and for providing many hours of fruitful conversation and book lists. A final thank you is owed to the author’s partner, Ben Skelton, for hours of listening to her talk about feminist methods, for always being a first reader, and for taking care of their infant while the author finished writing this article.

• Abajian, S. M. (2016). Documenting militarism: Challenges of researching highly contested practices within urban schools. Anthropology & Education Quarterly , 47 (1), 25–41.
• Abajian, S. M. , and Guzman, M. (2013). Moving beyond slogans: Possibilities for a more connected and humanizing “counter-recruitment” pedagogy in militarized urban schools. Journal of Curriculum Theorizing , 29 (2), 191–205.
• Allen, P. G. (1984). Who is your mother? Red roots of white feminism. Sinister Wisdom , 25 (Winter), 34–46.
• American Association of University Women . (1992). How schools shortchange girls: The AAUW report: A study of major findings on girls and education . Washington, DC.
• AAUW . (1999). Gender gaps: Where schools still fail our children . New York, NY: Marlowe.
• Bailey, C. (2001). Teaching as activism and excuse: A reconsideration of the theory−practice dichotomy. Feminist Teacher , 13 (2), 125–133.
• Barad, K. (2007). Meeting the universe halfway: Quantum physics and the entanglement of matter and meaning. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
• Behar, R. , & Gordon, D. A. (Eds.). (1995). Women writing culture . Berkeley: University of California Press.
• Bezucha, R. J. (1985). Feminist pedagogy as a subversive activity. In M. Culley & C. Portuges (Eds.), Gendered subjects: The dynamics of feminist teaching (pp. 81–95). Boston, MA: Routledge.
• Bieler, D. (2010). Dialogic praxis in teacher preparation: A discourse analysis of mentoring talk. English Education , 42 (4), 391–426.
• Brown, K. D. (2011). Elevating the role of race in ethnographic research: Navigating race relations in the field. Ethnography and Education , 6 (1), 97–111.
• Calderon, D. (2016). Moving from damage-centered research through unsettling reflexivity. Anthropology & Education Quarterly , 47 (1), 5–24.
• Ceglowski, D. , & Makovsky, T. (2012) Duoethnography with children. Ethnography and Education , 7 (3), 283–295.
• Cheira, A. (2017). (Fostering) princesses that can stand on their own two feet: Using wonder tale narratives to change teenage gendered stereotypes in Portuguese EFL classrooms. In B. Revelles-Benavente & A. M. Ramos (Eds.), Teaching gender: Feminist pedagogy and responsibility in times of political crisis (pp. 146–162). London, U.K.: Routledge.
• Clifford, J. , & Marcus, G. (Eds.). (1986). Writing culture: The poetics and politics of ethnography . Berkeley: University of California Press.
• Coffey, A. , & Delamont, S. (2000). Feminism and the classroom teacher: Research, praxis, and pedagogy . New York, NY: Routledge.
• Crenshaw, K. (1991). Mapping the margins: Intersectionality, identity politics, and violence against women of color . Stanford Law Review , 43 (6), 1241–1299.
• Culley, M. , & Portuges, C. (Eds.). (1985). Gendered subjects: The dynamics of feminist teaching . Boston, MA: Routledge & Kegan Paul.
• Davies, B. (2003). Frogs and snails and feminist tales: Preschool children and gender . Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press.
• Davies, B. (2014). Listening to children: Being and becoming . New York, NY: Routledge.
• Davies, B. (2016). Emergent listening. In N. K. Denzin & M. D. Giardina (Eds.), Qualitative inquiry through a critical lens (pp. 73–84). New York, NY: Routledge.
• Davis, A. Y. (2016). Freedom is a constant struggle: Ferguson, Palestine, and the foundations of a movement . Chicago, IL: Haymarket Books.
• Denzin, N. K. , & Giardina, M. D. (Eds.). (2016). Qualitative inquiry through a critical lens . New York, NY: Routledge.
• Derrida, J. (2016). Of grammatology ( G. C. Spivak , Trans.). Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.
• Digiovanni, L. W. , & Liston, D. D. (2005). Feminist pedagogy in the elementary classroom: An agenda for practice. Feminist Teacher , 15 (2), 123–131.
• Diller, A. , Houston, B. , Morgan, K. P. , & Ayim, M. (1996). The gender question in education: Theory, pedagogy, and politics . Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
• DuBois, E. C. , Kelly, G. P. , Kennedy, E. L. , Korsmeyer, C. W. , & Robinson, L. S. (1985). Feminist scholarship: Kindling in the groves of the academe . Urbana: University of Illinois Press.
• Duncan-Andrade, J. M. , & Morrell, E. (2008). The art of critical pedagogy: Possibilities for moving from theory to practice in urban schools . New York, NY: Peter Lang.
• Ellsworth, E. (1989). Why doesn’t this feel empowering? Working through the repressive myths of critical pedagogy. Harvard Educational Review , 59 (3), 297–324.
• Evans, B. , & Spivak, G. C. (2016, July 13). When law is not justice. New York Times (online).
• Gabriel, S. L. , & Smithson, I. (1990). Gender in the classroom: Power and pedagogy . Urbana: University of Illinois Press.
• Gilligan, C. (1982). In a different voice: Psychological theory and women’s development . Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
• Gilligan, C. (2011). Joining the resistance . Malden, MA: Polity Press.
• Golden, C. (1998). The radicalization of a teacher. In G. E. Cohee , E. Däumer , T. D. Kemp , P. M. Krebs , S. Lafky , & S. Runzo (Eds.), The feminist teacher anthology . New York, NY: Teachers College Press.
• Gottesman, I. H. (2016). The critical turn in education: From Marxist critique to poststructuralist feminism to critical theories of race . New York, NY: Routledge.
• Greene, M. (1994). Postmodernism and the crisis of representation. English Education , 26 (4), 206–219.
• Haddix, M. , McArthur, S. A. , Muhammad, G. E. , Price-Dennis, D. , & Sealey-Ruiz, Y. (2016). At the kitchen table: Black women English educators speaking our truths. English Education , 48 (4), 380–395.
• Hancock, E. (1989). The girl within . New York, NY: Fawcett Columbine.
• Haraway, D. (1988). Situated knowledges: The science question in feminism and the privilege of partial perspective. Feminist Studies , 14 (3), 575–599.
• Harding, S. (1991). Whose science/Whose knowledge? Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
• Harding, S. (Ed.). (2004). The feminist standpoint theory reader . New York, NY: Routledge.
• Hesse-Biber, S. N. (Ed.). (2012). Handbook of feminist research: Theory and praxis . Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.
• Hill Collins, P. (2000). Black feminist thought: Knowledge, consciousness, and the politics of empowerment . New York, NY: Routledge.
• Hoffman, N. J. (1985). Breaking silences: Life in the feminist classroom. In M. Culley & C. Portuges (Eds.), Gendered subjects: The dynamics of feminist teaching (pp. 147–154). Boston, MA: Routledge.
• Holzman, L. (1986). What do teachers have to teach? Feminist Teacher , 2 (3), 23–24.
• Jackson, A. , & Mazzei, L. (2009). Voice in qualitative inquiry: Challenging conventional, interpretive, and critical conceptions in qualitative research . New York, NY: Routledge.
• Jackson, A. Y. , & Mazzei, L. A. (2012). Thinking with theory in qualitative research: Viewing data across multiple perspectives . New York, NY: Routledge.
• Jackson, C. , Paechter, C. , & Renold, E. (2010). Girls and education 3–16: Continuing concerns, new agendas . Maidenhead, U.K.: Open University Press.
• Johnson, T. S. (2004). “It’s pointless to deny that that dynamic is there”: Sexual tensions in secondary classrooms. English Education , 37 (1), 5–29.
• Jones, S. , & Hughes, H. E. (2016). Changing the place of teacher education: Feminism, fear, and pedagogical paradoxes . Harvard Educational Review , 86 (2), 161–182.
• Kerkhoff, S. N. (2015). Dialogism: Feminist revision of argumentative writing instruction . Literacy Research: Theory, Method, and Practice , 64 (1), 443–460.
• Koro-Ljungberg, M. (2016). Reconceptualizing qualitiative research: Methodologies without methodology . Los Angeles, CA: SAGE.
• Koro-Ljungberg, M. , Löytönen, T. , & Tesar, M. (Eds.). (2017). Disrupting data in qualitative inquiry: Entanglements with the post-critical and post-anthropocentric . New York, NY: Peter Lang.
• Kuby, C. R. , & Rucker, T. G. (2016). Go be a writer! Expanding the curricular boundaries of literacy learning with children . New York, NY: Teachers College Press.
• Lather, P. (1991). Feminist research in education: Within/against . Geelong, Victoria: Deakin University Press.
• Lauter, N. A. , & Dieterich, D. (1972). “Woman’s place in academe”: An ERIC Report. English Education , 3 (3), 169–173.
• Levinson, B. A. (1998). (How) can a man do feminist ethnography of education? Qualitative Inquiry , 4 (3), 337–368.
• Love, B. L. (2017). A ratchet lens: Black queer youth, agency, hip hop, and the Black ratchet imagination . Educational Researcher , 46 (9), 539–547.
• Low, S. M. , & Merry, S. E. (2010). Engaged anthropology: Diversity and dilemmas. Current Anthropology 51 (S2), S203–S226.
• Maher, F. (1985). Classroom pedagogy and the new scholarship on women. In M. Culley & C. Portuges (Eds.), Gendered subjects: The dynamics of feminist teaching (pp. 29–48). Boston, MA: Routledge.
• Maher, F. A. , & Rathbone, C. H. (1986). Teacher education and feminist theory: Some implications for practice. American Journal of Education , 94 (2), 214–235.
• Maher, F. A. , & Tetreault, M. K. T. (1994). The feminist classroom: An inside look a how professors and students are transforming higher education for a diverse society . New York, NY: Basic Books.
• Martinez, D. C. (2016). “This ain’t the projects”: A researcher’s reflections on the local appropriateness of our research tools. Anthropology & Education Quarterly , 47 (1), 59–77.
• Mayberry, M. , & Rose, E. C. (1999). Meeting the challenge: Innovative feminist pedagogies in action . New York, NY: Routledge.
• Mazzei, L. A. (2007). Inhabited silence in qualitative research: Putting poststructural theory to work . New York, NY: Peter Lang.
• Mazzei, L. A. (2013). A voice without organs: interviewing in posthumanist research . International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education , 26 (6), 732–740.
• McIntosh, P. (1990). Interactive phases of curricular and personal revision with regard to race . New York: State University of New York Press.
• McWilliam, E. (1994). In broken images: Feminist tales for a different teacher education . New York, NY: Teachers College Press.
• Miller, N. K. (1985). Mastery, identity and the politics of work: A feminist teacher in the graduate classroom. In M. Culley & C. Portuges (Eds.), Gendered subjects: The dynamics of feminist teaching (pp. 195–202). Boston, MA: Routledge.
• Milner, H. R. (2007). Race, culture, and researcher positionality: Working through dangers seen, unseen, and unforeseen. Educational Researcher , 36 , 388–400.
• National Coalition for Women and Girls in Education . (2002). Title IX at thirty: Report card on gender equity .
• Orenstein, P. (1994). Schoolgirls: Young women, self-esteem, and the confidence gap . New York, NY: Anchor Books.
• Papoulis, I. , & Smith, C. A. (1992). Could Cherryl or Irene just take a few minutes to explain this feminist view of literature? English Education , 24 (1), 52–60.
• Parson, L. (2016). Are STEM syllabi gendered? A feminist critical discourse analysis. Qualitative Report , 21 (1), 102–116.
• Pipher, M. (1994). Reviving Ophelia: Saving the selves of adolescent girls . New York, NY: Ballentine.
• Raymond, J. G. (1985). Women’s studies: A knowledge of one’s own. In M. Culley & C. Portuges (Eds.), Gendered subjects: The dynamics of feminist teaching (pp. 49–63). Boston, MA: Routledge.
• Revelles-Benavente, B. , & Ramos, A. M. (Eds.). (2017). Teaching gender: Feminist pedagogy and responsiblity in times of political crisis . London, U.K.: Routledge.
• Rich, A. (1985). Taking women students seriously. In M. Culley & C. Portuges (Eds.), Gendered subjects: The dynamics of feminist teaching (pp. 21–28). Boston, MA: Routledge.
• Robertson, L. (1994). Feminist teacher education: Applying feminist pedagogies to the preparation of new teachers. Feminist Teacher , 8 (1), 11–15.
• Sadker, M. , & Sadker, D. (1994). Failing at fairness: How our schools cheat girls . New York, NY: Charles Scribner’s Sons.
• Sánchez-Pardo, E. (2017). “It’s a hell of a responsibilty to be yourself”: Troubling the personal and the political in feminist pedagogy. In B. Revelles-Benavente & A. M. Ramos (Eds.), Teaching gender: Feminist pedagogy and responsibility in times of political crisis (pp. 64–80). London, U.K.: Routledge.
• Simon, L. (2007). Expanding literacies: Teachers’ inquiry research and multigenre texts. English Education , 39 (2), 146–176.
• Spivak, G. C. (1974). Translator’s preface. In J. Derrida Of grammatology ( G. C. Spivak , Trans.). (pp. ix–xc). Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
• Spivak, G. C. (1988). Can the subaltern speak? Speculations on widow-sacrifice. Wedge , 7 (8), 120–130.
• Spivak, G. C. (2006). In other worlds: Essays in cultural politics . New York, NY: Routledge.
• Spivak, G. C. (2009). Outside in the teaching machine . New York, NY: Routledge.
• Spivak, G. C. (2012). An aesthetic education in the era of globalization . Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
• Spivak, G. C. (2014). Readings . New York, NY: Seagull Books.
• St. Pierre, E. A. (2000). Poststructural feminism in education: An overview . International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education , 13 (5), 477–515.
• St. Pierre, E. A. (2016). The long reach of logical positivism/logical empiricism. In N. K. Denzin & M. D. Giardina (Eds.), Qualitative inquiry through a critical lens (pp. 19–30). New York, NY: Routledge.
• St. Pierre, E. A. , & Pillow, W. S. (Eds.). (2000). Working the ruins: Feminist poststructural theory and methods in education . New York, NY: Routledge.
• Thayer-Bacon, B. J. , Stone, L. , & Sprecher, K. M. (2013). Education feminism: Classic and contemporary readings . Albany: State University of New York Press.
• Thompson, B. (2002). Multiracial feminism: Recasting the chronology of second wave feminism . Feminist Studies , 28 (2), 337–360.
• Vandergrift, K. E. (1995). Female protagonists and beyond: Picture books for future feminists. Feminist Teacher , 9 (2), 61–69.
• Wallace, M. L. (1999). Beyond love and battle: Practicing feminist pedagogy. Feminist Teacher , 12 (3), 184–197.
• Warren, K. J. (1998). Rewriting the future: The feminist challenge to the malestream curriculum. In G. E. Cohee , E. Däumer , T. D. Kemp , P. M. Krebs , S. Lafky , & S. Runzo (Eds.), The feminist teacher anthology . New York, NY: Teachers College Press.
• Weiner, G. (1994). Feminisms in education: An introduction . Buckingham, U.K.: Open University Press.
• Weisner, J. (2004). Awakening teacher voice and student voice: The development of a feminist pedagogy. Feminist Teacher , 15 (1), 34–47.
• Willinsky, J. (1987). Learning the language of difference: The dictionary in the high school. English Education , 19 (3), 146–158.
• Wissman, K. K. , Staples, J. M. , Vasudevan, L. , & Nichols, R. E. (2015). Cultivating research pedagogies with adolescents: Created spaces, engaged participation, and embodied inquiry. Anthropology & Education Quarterly , 46 (2), 186–197.
• Wolf, M. (1992). A thrice-told tale: Feminism, postmodernism, and ethnographic responsibility . Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.

Related Articles

• Gender, Justice, and Equity in Education
• Education, Women, and the Politics of Curriculum
• Risky Truth-Making in Qualitative Inquiry
• Ecofeminism and Education
• Qualitative Approaches to Studying Marginalized Communities
• Poststructural Temporalities in School Ethnography
• Gender and Technology in Education
• Gender and the Superintendency
• Activism and Social Movement Building in Curriculum
• Gender Equitable Education and Technological Innovation

Printed from Oxford Research Encyclopedias, Education. Under the terms of the licence agreement, an individual user may print out a single article for personal use (for details see Privacy Policy and Legal Notice).

date: 01 May 2024

• Cookie Policy
• Privacy Policy
• Legal Notice
• Accessibility
• [66.249.64.20|185.66.14.133]
• 185.66.14.133

Character limit 500 /500

Criteria for Good Qualitative Research: A Comprehensive Review

• Regular Article
• Open access
• Published: 18 September 2021
• Volume 31 , pages 679–689, ( 2022 )

Cite this article

You have full access to this open access article

• Drishti Yadav   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-2974-0323 1  

79k Accesses

28 Citations

72 Altmetric

Explore all metrics

This review aims to synthesize a published set of evaluative criteria for good qualitative research. The aim is to shed light on existing standards for assessing the rigor of qualitative research encompassing a range of epistemological and ontological standpoints. Using a systematic search strategy, published journal articles that deliberate criteria for rigorous research were identified. Then, references of relevant articles were surveyed to find noteworthy, distinct, and well-defined pointers to good qualitative research. This review presents an investigative assessment of the pivotal features in qualitative research that can permit the readers to pass judgment on its quality and to condemn it as good research when objectively and adequately utilized. Overall, this review underlines the crux of qualitative research and accentuates the necessity to evaluate such research by the very tenets of its being. It also offers some prospects and recommendations to improve the quality of qualitative research. Based on the findings of this review, it is concluded that quality criteria are the aftereffect of socio-institutional procedures and existing paradigmatic conducts. Owing to the paradigmatic diversity of qualitative research, a single and specific set of quality criteria is neither feasible nor anticipated. Since qualitative research is not a cohesive discipline, researchers need to educate and familiarize themselves with applicable norms and decisive factors to evaluate qualitative research from within its theoretical and methodological framework of origin.

Similar content being viewed by others

Good Qualitative Research: Opening up the Debate

Beyond qualitative/quantitative structuralism: the positivist qualitative research and the paradigmatic disclaimer.

What is Qualitative in Research

Avoid common mistakes on your manuscript.

Introduction

“… It is important to regularly dialogue about what makes for good qualitative research” (Tracy, 2010 , p. 837)

To decide what represents good qualitative research is highly debatable. There are numerous methods that are contained within qualitative research and that are established on diverse philosophical perspectives. Bryman et al., ( 2008 , p. 262) suggest that “It is widely assumed that whereas quality criteria for quantitative research are well‐known and widely agreed, this is not the case for qualitative research.” Hence, the question “how to evaluate the quality of qualitative research” has been continuously debated. There are many areas of science and technology wherein these debates on the assessment of qualitative research have taken place. Examples include various areas of psychology: general psychology (Madill et al., 2000 ); counseling psychology (Morrow, 2005 ); and clinical psychology (Barker & Pistrang, 2005 ), and other disciplines of social sciences: social policy (Bryman et al., 2008 ); health research (Sparkes, 2001 ); business and management research (Johnson et al., 2006 ); information systems (Klein & Myers, 1999 ); and environmental studies (Reid & Gough, 2000 ). In the literature, these debates are enthused by the impression that the blanket application of criteria for good qualitative research developed around the positivist paradigm is improper. Such debates are based on the wide range of philosophical backgrounds within which qualitative research is conducted (e.g., Sandberg, 2000 ; Schwandt, 1996 ). The existence of methodological diversity led to the formulation of different sets of criteria applicable to qualitative research.

Among qualitative researchers, the dilemma of governing the measures to assess the quality of research is not a new phenomenon, especially when the virtuous triad of objectivity, reliability, and validity (Spencer et al., 2004 ) are not adequate. Occasionally, the criteria of quantitative research are used to evaluate qualitative research (Cohen & Crabtree, 2008 ; Lather, 2004 ). Indeed, Howe ( 2004 ) claims that the prevailing paradigm in educational research is scientifically based experimental research. Hypotheses and conjectures about the preeminence of quantitative research can weaken the worth and usefulness of qualitative research by neglecting the prominence of harmonizing match for purpose on research paradigm, the epistemological stance of the researcher, and the choice of methodology. Researchers have been reprimanded concerning this in “paradigmatic controversies, contradictions, and emerging confluences” (Lincoln & Guba, 2000 ).

In general, qualitative research tends to come from a very different paradigmatic stance and intrinsically demands distinctive and out-of-the-ordinary criteria for evaluating good research and varieties of research contributions that can be made. This review attempts to present a series of evaluative criteria for qualitative researchers, arguing that their choice of criteria needs to be compatible with the unique nature of the research in question (its methodology, aims, and assumptions). This review aims to assist researchers in identifying some of the indispensable features or markers of high-quality qualitative research. In a nutshell, the purpose of this systematic literature review is to analyze the existing knowledge on high-quality qualitative research and to verify the existence of research studies dealing with the critical assessment of qualitative research based on the concept of diverse paradigmatic stances. Contrary to the existing reviews, this review also suggests some critical directions to follow to improve the quality of qualitative research in different epistemological and ontological perspectives. This review is also intended to provide guidelines for the acceleration of future developments and dialogues among qualitative researchers in the context of assessing the qualitative research.

The rest of this review article is structured in the following fashion: Sect.  Methods describes the method followed for performing this review. Section Criteria for Evaluating Qualitative Studies provides a comprehensive description of the criteria for evaluating qualitative studies. This section is followed by a summary of the strategies to improve the quality of qualitative research in Sect.  Improving Quality: Strategies . Section  How to Assess the Quality of the Research Findings? provides details on how to assess the quality of the research findings. After that, some of the quality checklists (as tools to evaluate quality) are discussed in Sect.  Quality Checklists: Tools for Assessing the Quality . At last, the review ends with the concluding remarks presented in Sect.  Conclusions, Future Directions and Outlook . Some prospects in qualitative research for enhancing its quality and usefulness in the social and techno-scientific research community are also presented in Sect.  Conclusions, Future Directions and Outlook .

For this review, a comprehensive literature search was performed from many databases using generic search terms such as Qualitative Research , Criteria , etc . The following databases were chosen for the literature search based on the high number of results: IEEE Explore, ScienceDirect, PubMed, Google Scholar, and Web of Science. The following keywords (and their combinations using Boolean connectives OR/AND) were adopted for the literature search: qualitative research, criteria, quality, assessment, and validity. The synonyms for these keywords were collected and arranged in a logical structure (see Table 1 ). All publications in journals and conference proceedings later than 1950 till 2021 were considered for the search. Other articles extracted from the references of the papers identified in the electronic search were also included. A large number of publications on qualitative research were retrieved during the initial screening. Hence, to include the searches with the main focus on criteria for good qualitative research, an inclusion criterion was utilized in the search string.

From the selected databases, the search retrieved a total of 765 publications. Then, the duplicate records were removed. After that, based on the title and abstract, the remaining 426 publications were screened for their relevance by using the following inclusion and exclusion criteria (see Table 2 ). Publications focusing on evaluation criteria for good qualitative research were included, whereas those works which delivered theoretical concepts on qualitative research were excluded. Based on the screening and eligibility, 45 research articles were identified that offered explicit criteria for evaluating the quality of qualitative research and were found to be relevant to this review.

Figure  1 illustrates the complete review process in the form of PRISMA flow diagram. PRISMA, i.e., “preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses” is employed in systematic reviews to refine the quality of reporting.

PRISMA flow diagram illustrating the search and inclusion process. N represents the number of records

Criteria for Evaluating Qualitative Studies

Fundamental criteria: general research quality.

Various researchers have put forward criteria for evaluating qualitative research, which have been summarized in Table 3 . Also, the criteria outlined in Table 4 effectively deliver the various approaches to evaluate and assess the quality of qualitative work. The entries in Table 4 are based on Tracy’s “Eight big‐tent criteria for excellent qualitative research” (Tracy, 2010 ). Tracy argues that high-quality qualitative work should formulate criteria focusing on the worthiness, relevance, timeliness, significance, morality, and practicality of the research topic, and the ethical stance of the research itself. Researchers have also suggested a series of questions as guiding principles to assess the quality of a qualitative study (Mays & Pope, 2020 ). Nassaji ( 2020 ) argues that good qualitative research should be robust, well informed, and thoroughly documented.

Qualitative Research: Interpretive Paradigms

All qualitative researchers follow highly abstract principles which bring together beliefs about ontology, epistemology, and methodology. These beliefs govern how the researcher perceives and acts. The net, which encompasses the researcher’s epistemological, ontological, and methodological premises, is referred to as a paradigm, or an interpretive structure, a “Basic set of beliefs that guides action” (Guba, 1990 ). Four major interpretive paradigms structure the qualitative research: positivist and postpositivist, constructivist interpretive, critical (Marxist, emancipatory), and feminist poststructural. The complexity of these four abstract paradigms increases at the level of concrete, specific interpretive communities. Table 5 presents these paradigms and their assumptions, including their criteria for evaluating research, and the typical form that an interpretive or theoretical statement assumes in each paradigm. Moreover, for evaluating qualitative research, quantitative conceptualizations of reliability and validity are proven to be incompatible (Horsburgh, 2003 ). In addition, a series of questions have been put forward in the literature to assist a reviewer (who is proficient in qualitative methods) for meticulous assessment and endorsement of qualitative research (Morse, 2003 ). Hammersley ( 2007 ) also suggests that guiding principles for qualitative research are advantageous, but methodological pluralism should not be simply acknowledged for all qualitative approaches. Seale ( 1999 ) also points out the significance of methodological cognizance in research studies.

Table 5 reflects that criteria for assessing the quality of qualitative research are the aftermath of socio-institutional practices and existing paradigmatic standpoints. Owing to the paradigmatic diversity of qualitative research, a single set of quality criteria is neither possible nor desirable. Hence, the researchers must be reflexive about the criteria they use in the various roles they play within their research community.

Improving Quality: Strategies

Another critical question is “How can the qualitative researchers ensure that the abovementioned quality criteria can be met?” Lincoln and Guba ( 1986 ) delineated several strategies to intensify each criteria of trustworthiness. Other researchers (Merriam & Tisdell, 2016 ; Shenton, 2004 ) also presented such strategies. A brief description of these strategies is shown in Table 6 .

It is worth mentioning that generalizability is also an integral part of qualitative research (Hays & McKibben, 2021 ). In general, the guiding principle pertaining to generalizability speaks about inducing and comprehending knowledge to synthesize interpretive components of an underlying context. Table 7 summarizes the main metasynthesis steps required to ascertain generalizability in qualitative research.

Figure  2 reflects the crucial components of a conceptual framework and their contribution to decisions regarding research design, implementation, and applications of results to future thinking, study, and practice (Johnson et al., 2020 ). The synergy and interrelationship of these components signifies their role to different stances of a qualitative research study.

Essential elements of a conceptual framework

In a nutshell, to assess the rationale of a study, its conceptual framework and research question(s), quality criteria must take account of the following: lucid context for the problem statement in the introduction; well-articulated research problems and questions; precise conceptual framework; distinct research purpose; and clear presentation and investigation of the paradigms. These criteria would expedite the quality of qualitative research.

How to Assess the Quality of the Research Findings?

The inclusion of quotes or similar research data enhances the confirmability in the write-up of the findings. The use of expressions (for instance, “80% of all respondents agreed that” or “only one of the interviewees mentioned that”) may also quantify qualitative findings (Stenfors et al., 2020 ). On the other hand, the persuasive reason for “why this may not help in intensifying the research” has also been provided (Monrouxe & Rees, 2020 ). Further, the Discussion and Conclusion sections of an article also prove robust markers of high-quality qualitative research, as elucidated in Table 8 .

Quality Checklists: Tools for Assessing the Quality

Numerous checklists are available to speed up the assessment of the quality of qualitative research. However, if used uncritically and recklessly concerning the research context, these checklists may be counterproductive. I recommend that such lists and guiding principles may assist in pinpointing the markers of high-quality qualitative research. However, considering enormous variations in the authors’ theoretical and philosophical contexts, I would emphasize that high dependability on such checklists may say little about whether the findings can be applied in your setting. A combination of such checklists might be appropriate for novice researchers. Some of these checklists are listed below:

The most commonly used framework is Consolidated Criteria for Reporting Qualitative Research (COREQ) (Tong et al., 2007 ). This framework is recommended by some journals to be followed by the authors during article submission.

Standards for Reporting Qualitative Research (SRQR) is another checklist that has been created particularly for medical education (O’Brien et al., 2014 ).

Also, Tracy ( 2010 ) and Critical Appraisal Skills Programme (CASP, 2021 ) offer criteria for qualitative research relevant across methods and approaches.

Further, researchers have also outlined different criteria as hallmarks of high-quality qualitative research. For instance, the “Road Trip Checklist” (Epp & Otnes, 2021 ) provides a quick reference to specific questions to address different elements of high-quality qualitative research.

Conclusions, Future Directions, and Outlook

This work presents a broad review of the criteria for good qualitative research. In addition, this article presents an exploratory analysis of the essential elements in qualitative research that can enable the readers of qualitative work to judge it as good research when objectively and adequately utilized. In this review, some of the essential markers that indicate high-quality qualitative research have been highlighted. I scope them narrowly to achieve rigor in qualitative research and note that they do not completely cover the broader considerations necessary for high-quality research. This review points out that a universal and versatile one-size-fits-all guideline for evaluating the quality of qualitative research does not exist. In other words, this review also emphasizes the non-existence of a set of common guidelines among qualitative researchers. In unison, this review reinforces that each qualitative approach should be treated uniquely on account of its own distinctive features for different epistemological and disciplinary positions. Owing to the sensitivity of the worth of qualitative research towards the specific context and the type of paradigmatic stance, researchers should themselves analyze what approaches can be and must be tailored to ensemble the distinct characteristics of the phenomenon under investigation. Although this article does not assert to put forward a magic bullet and to provide a one-stop solution for dealing with dilemmas about how, why, or whether to evaluate the “goodness” of qualitative research, it offers a platform to assist the researchers in improving their qualitative studies. This work provides an assembly of concerns to reflect on, a series of questions to ask, and multiple sets of criteria to look at, when attempting to determine the quality of qualitative research. Overall, this review underlines the crux of qualitative research and accentuates the need to evaluate such research by the very tenets of its being. Bringing together the vital arguments and delineating the requirements that good qualitative research should satisfy, this review strives to equip the researchers as well as reviewers to make well-versed judgment about the worth and significance of the qualitative research under scrutiny. In a nutshell, a comprehensive portrayal of the research process (from the context of research to the research objectives, research questions and design, speculative foundations, and from approaches of collecting data to analyzing the results, to deriving inferences) frequently proliferates the quality of a qualitative research.

Prospects : A Road Ahead for Qualitative Research

Irrefutably, qualitative research is a vivacious and evolving discipline wherein different epistemological and disciplinary positions have their own characteristics and importance. In addition, not surprisingly, owing to the sprouting and varied features of qualitative research, no consensus has been pulled off till date. Researchers have reflected various concerns and proposed several recommendations for editors and reviewers on conducting reviews of critical qualitative research (Levitt et al., 2021 ; McGinley et al., 2021 ). Following are some prospects and a few recommendations put forward towards the maturation of qualitative research and its quality evaluation:

In general, most of the manuscript and grant reviewers are not qualitative experts. Hence, it is more likely that they would prefer to adopt a broad set of criteria. However, researchers and reviewers need to keep in mind that it is inappropriate to utilize the same approaches and conducts among all qualitative research. Therefore, future work needs to focus on educating researchers and reviewers about the criteria to evaluate qualitative research from within the suitable theoretical and methodological context.

There is an urgent need to refurbish and augment critical assessment of some well-known and widely accepted tools (including checklists such as COREQ, SRQR) to interrogate their applicability on different aspects (along with their epistemological ramifications).

Efforts should be made towards creating more space for creativity, experimentation, and a dialogue between the diverse traditions of qualitative research. This would potentially help to avoid the enforcement of one's own set of quality criteria on the work carried out by others.

Moreover, journal reviewers need to be aware of various methodological practices and philosophical debates.

It is pivotal to highlight the expressions and considerations of qualitative researchers and bring them into a more open and transparent dialogue about assessing qualitative research in techno-scientific, academic, sociocultural, and political rooms.

Frequent debates on the use of evaluative criteria are required to solve some potentially resolved issues (including the applicability of a single set of criteria in multi-disciplinary aspects). Such debates would not only benefit the group of qualitative researchers themselves, but primarily assist in augmenting the well-being and vivacity of the entire discipline.

To conclude, I speculate that the criteria, and my perspective, may transfer to other methods, approaches, and contexts. I hope that they spark dialog and debate – about criteria for excellent qualitative research and the underpinnings of the discipline more broadly – and, therefore, help improve the quality of a qualitative study. Further, I anticipate that this review will assist the researchers to contemplate on the quality of their own research, to substantiate research design and help the reviewers to review qualitative research for journals. On a final note, I pinpoint the need to formulate a framework (encompassing the prerequisites of a qualitative study) by the cohesive efforts of qualitative researchers of different disciplines with different theoretic-paradigmatic origins. I believe that tailoring such a framework (of guiding principles) paves the way for qualitative researchers to consolidate the status of qualitative research in the wide-ranging open science debate. Dialogue on this issue across different approaches is crucial for the impending prospects of socio-techno-educational research.

Amin, M. E. K., Nørgaard, L. S., Cavaco, A. M., Witry, M. J., Hillman, L., Cernasev, A., & Desselle, S. P. (2020). Establishing trustworthiness and authenticity in qualitative pharmacy research. Research in Social and Administrative Pharmacy, 16 (10), 1472–1482.

Article   Google Scholar  

Barker, C., & Pistrang, N. (2005). Quality criteria under methodological pluralism: Implications for conducting and evaluating research. American Journal of Community Psychology, 35 (3–4), 201–212.

Bryman, A., Becker, S., & Sempik, J. (2008). Quality criteria for quantitative, qualitative and mixed methods research: A view from social policy. International Journal of Social Research Methodology, 11 (4), 261–276.

Caelli, K., Ray, L., & Mill, J. (2003). ‘Clear as mud’: Toward greater clarity in generic qualitative research. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 2 (2), 1–13.

CASP (2021). CASP checklists. Retrieved May 2021 from https://casp-uk.net/casp-tools-checklists/

Cohen, D. J., & Crabtree, B. F. (2008). Evaluative criteria for qualitative research in health care: Controversies and recommendations. The Annals of Family Medicine, 6 (4), 331–339.

Denzin, N. K., & Lincoln, Y. S. (2005). Introduction: The discipline and practice of qualitative research. In N. K. Denzin & Y. S. Lincoln (Eds.), The sage handbook of qualitative research (pp. 1–32). Sage Publications Ltd.

Google Scholar  

Elliott, R., Fischer, C. T., & Rennie, D. L. (1999). Evolving guidelines for publication of qualitative research studies in psychology and related fields. British Journal of Clinical Psychology, 38 (3), 215–229.

Epp, A. M., & Otnes, C. C. (2021). High-quality qualitative research: Getting into gear. Journal of Service Research . https://doi.org/10.1177/1094670520961445

Guba, E. G. (1990). The paradigm dialog. In Alternative paradigms conference, mar, 1989, Indiana u, school of education, San Francisco, ca, us . Sage Publications, Inc.

Hammersley, M. (2007). The issue of quality in qualitative research. International Journal of Research and Method in Education, 30 (3), 287–305.

Haven, T. L., Errington, T. M., Gleditsch, K. S., van Grootel, L., Jacobs, A. M., Kern, F. G., & Mokkink, L. B. (2020). Preregistering qualitative research: A Delphi study. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 19 , 1609406920976417.

Hays, D. G., & McKibben, W. B. (2021). Promoting rigorous research: Generalizability and qualitative research. Journal of Counseling and Development, 99 (2), 178–188.

Horsburgh, D. (2003). Evaluation of qualitative research. Journal of Clinical Nursing, 12 (2), 307–312.

Howe, K. R. (2004). A critique of experimentalism. Qualitative Inquiry, 10 (1), 42–46.

Johnson, J. L., Adkins, D., & Chauvin, S. (2020). A review of the quality indicators of rigor in qualitative research. American Journal of Pharmaceutical Education, 84 (1), 7120.

Johnson, P., Buehring, A., Cassell, C., & Symon, G. (2006). Evaluating qualitative management research: Towards a contingent criteriology. International Journal of Management Reviews, 8 (3), 131–156.

Klein, H. K., & Myers, M. D. (1999). A set of principles for conducting and evaluating interpretive field studies in information systems. MIS Quarterly, 23 (1), 67–93.

Lather, P. (2004). This is your father’s paradigm: Government intrusion and the case of qualitative research in education. Qualitative Inquiry, 10 (1), 15–34.

Levitt, H. M., Morrill, Z., Collins, K. M., & Rizo, J. L. (2021). The methodological integrity of critical qualitative research: Principles to support design and research review. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 68 (3), 357.

Lincoln, Y. S., & Guba, E. G. (1986). But is it rigorous? Trustworthiness and authenticity in naturalistic evaluation. New Directions for Program Evaluation, 1986 (30), 73–84.

Lincoln, Y. S., & Guba, E. G. (2000). Paradigmatic controversies, contradictions and emerging confluences. In N. K. Denzin & Y. S. Lincoln (Eds.), Handbook of qualitative research (2nd ed., pp. 163–188). Sage Publications.

Madill, A., Jordan, A., & Shirley, C. (2000). Objectivity and reliability in qualitative analysis: Realist, contextualist and radical constructionist epistemologies. British Journal of Psychology, 91 (1), 1–20.

Mays, N., & Pope, C. (2020). Quality in qualitative research. Qualitative Research in Health Care . https://doi.org/10.1002/9781119410867.ch15

McGinley, S., Wei, W., Zhang, L., & Zheng, Y. (2021). The state of qualitative research in hospitality: A 5-year review 2014 to 2019. Cornell Hospitality Quarterly, 62 (1), 8–20.

Merriam, S., & Tisdell, E. (2016). Qualitative research: A guide to design and implementation. San Francisco, US.

Meyer, M., & Dykes, J. (2019). Criteria for rigor in visualization design study. IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics, 26 (1), 87–97.

Monrouxe, L. V., & Rees, C. E. (2020). When I say… quantification in qualitative research. Medical Education, 54 (3), 186–187.

Morrow, S. L. (2005). Quality and trustworthiness in qualitative research in counseling psychology. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 52 (2), 250.

Morse, J. M. (2003). A review committee’s guide for evaluating qualitative proposals. Qualitative Health Research, 13 (6), 833–851.

Nassaji, H. (2020). Good qualitative research. Language Teaching Research, 24 (4), 427–431.

O’Brien, B. C., Harris, I. B., Beckman, T. J., Reed, D. A., & Cook, D. A. (2014). Standards for reporting qualitative research: A synthesis of recommendations. Academic Medicine, 89 (9), 1245–1251.

O’Connor, C., & Joffe, H. (2020). Intercoder reliability in qualitative research: Debates and practical guidelines. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 19 , 1609406919899220.

Reid, A., & Gough, S. (2000). Guidelines for reporting and evaluating qualitative research: What are the alternatives? Environmental Education Research, 6 (1), 59–91.

Rocco, T. S. (2010). Criteria for evaluating qualitative studies. Human Resource Development International . https://doi.org/10.1080/13678868.2010.501959

Sandberg, J. (2000). Understanding human competence at work: An interpretative approach. Academy of Management Journal, 43 (1), 9–25.

Schwandt, T. A. (1996). Farewell to criteriology. Qualitative Inquiry, 2 (1), 58–72.

Seale, C. (1999). Quality in qualitative research. Qualitative Inquiry, 5 (4), 465–478.

Shenton, A. K. (2004). Strategies for ensuring trustworthiness in qualitative research projects. Education for Information, 22 (2), 63–75.

Sparkes, A. C. (2001). Myth 94: Qualitative health researchers will agree about validity. Qualitative Health Research, 11 (4), 538–552.

Spencer, L., Ritchie, J., Lewis, J., & Dillon, L. (2004). Quality in qualitative evaluation: A framework for assessing research evidence.

Stenfors, T., Kajamaa, A., & Bennett, D. (2020). How to assess the quality of qualitative research. The Clinical Teacher, 17 (6), 596–599.

Taylor, E. W., Beck, J., & Ainsworth, E. (2001). Publishing qualitative adult education research: A peer review perspective. Studies in the Education of Adults, 33 (2), 163–179.

Tong, A., Sainsbury, P., & Craig, J. (2007). Consolidated criteria for reporting qualitative research (COREQ): A 32-item checklist for interviews and focus groups. International Journal for Quality in Health Care, 19 (6), 349–357.

Tracy, S. J. (2010). Qualitative quality: Eight “big-tent” criteria for excellent qualitative research. Qualitative Inquiry, 16 (10), 837–851.

Download references

Open access funding provided by TU Wien (TUW).

Author information

Authors and affiliations.

Faculty of Informatics, Technische Universität Wien, 1040, Vienna, Austria

Drishti Yadav

You can also search for this author in PubMed   Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Drishti Yadav .

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest.

The author declares no conflict of interest.

Additional information

Publisher's note.

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Rights and permissions

Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ .

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Yadav, D. Criteria for Good Qualitative Research: A Comprehensive Review. Asia-Pacific Edu Res 31 , 679–689 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40299-021-00619-0

Download citation

Accepted : 28 August 2021

Published : 18 September 2021

Issue Date : December 2022

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/s40299-021-00619-0

Share this article

Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:

Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.

Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative

• Qualitative research
• Evaluative criteria
• Find a journal
• Publish with us
• Track your research

The experience of citizenship in a segregated school system: Curricular experiences in citizenship of young people who studied in Chilean schools of different dependencies and modalities

This paper presents the results of a qualitative research with a biographical approach that delved into the curricular experiences in citizenship of young people who completed their secondary education in Chile, within schools of different dependencies and modalities, in different socioeconomic contexts, and during a period of important student mobilizations (2015-2020). To document these experiences, five workshops were held to exchange curricular experiences in citizenship, one for each dependency (public, private-subsidized, and private schools) and modality (oriented to work and higher education). A total of 56 young people between the ages of 20 and 25 participated in these workshops. The information produced was analyzed through a collaborative analysis of qualitative data to describe and compare the curricular experiences in citizenship of those who graduated from these different types of schools. The results show that different types of establishments promote different types of citizenship with different conceptions of citizenship and its exercise. These differences are related to socioeconomic and ideological elements.

Author Biographies

Renato gazmuri-stein, universidad diego portales.

Licenciado en Historia, Universidad Católica de Chile. Máster y Doctor en Didáctica de la Historia y las Ciencias Sociales por la Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona. Profesor asociado Facultad de Educación, Universidad Diego Portales.

María Toledo-Jofré, Universidad Diego Portales

Antropóloga y Licenciada en Antropología, Universidad de Chile, Chile; Doctora en Ciencias de la Educación por la Universidad Católica de Lovaina, Bélgica. Profesora titular de la Escuela de Psicología, Coordinadora Programa Estudios Psicosociales en Contextos Educativos de la Facultad de Psicología, Universidad Diego Portales.

Gabriel Villalón-Gálvez, Universidad de Chile

Profesor de Historia, Geografía y Educación Cívica, Universidad Metropolitana de Ciencias de la Educación y Doctor en Didáctica de la Historia y las Ciencias Sociales por la Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona. Profesor Asistente Departamento de Estudios Pedagógicos de la Facultad de Filosofía y Humanidades, Universidad de Chile.

Eliana Moraleda-Albornoz, Universidad Alberto Hurtado

Profesor de Historia y Geografía, Universidad de Tarapacá. Magister en Currículum, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. Profesional, Universidad Alberto Hurtado.

• PDF (Español)

How to Cite

• Endnote/Zotero/Mendeley (RIS)

Copyright (c) 2024 Renato Gazmuri-Stein, María Toledo-Jofré, Gabriel Villalón-Gálvez, Eliana Moraleda-Albornoz

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License .

Education Policy Analysis Archives/Archivos Analíticos de Políticas Educativas/Arquivos Analíticos de Políticas Educativas (EPAA/AAPE;  ISSN 1068-2341 ) is a peer-reviewed, open-access, international, multilingual, and multidisciplinary journal designed for researchers, practitioners, policy makers, and development analysts concerned with education policies.

• Português (Brasil)
• Español (España)

Make a Gift

Submit a manuscript or revision, recent special issues.

Youth and Adult Education, Literacies and Decoloniality

Global Policy Mobilities in Federal Education Systems

Teacher Subjectivities in Latin America

• Open access
• Published: 18 April 2024

Integrating training in evidence-based medicine and shared decision-making: a qualitative study of junior doctors and consultants

• Mary Simons   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-9627-7861 1 , 4 ,
• Georgia Fisher   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-7252-7800 1 ,
• Samantha Spanos   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-3734-3907 1 ,
• Yvonne Zurynski   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-7744-8717 1 ,
• Andrew Davidson   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-8449-3727 2 ,
• Marcus Stoodley   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-4207-8493 3 ,
• Frances Rapport   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-4428-2826 1 &
• Louise A. Ellis   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-6902-4578 1  

BMC Medical Education volume  24 , Article number:  418 ( 2024 ) Cite this article

421 Accesses

6 Altmetric

Metrics details

In the past, evidence-based medicine (EBM) and shared decision-making (SDM) have been taught separately in health sciences and medical education. However, recognition is increasing of the importance of EBM training that includes SDM, whereby practitioners incorporate all steps of EBM, including person-centered decision-making using SDM. However, there are few empirical investigations into the benefits of training that integrates EBM and SDM (EBM-SDM) for junior doctors, and their influencing factors. This study aimed to explore how integrated EBM-SDM training can influence junior doctors’ attitudes to and practice of EBM and SDM; to identify the barriers and facilitators associated with junior doctors’ EBM-SDM learning and practice; and to examine how supervising consultants’ attitudes and authority impact on junior doctors’ opportunities for EBM-SDM learning and practice.

We developed and ran a series of EBM-SDM courses for junior doctors within a private healthcare setting with protected time for educational activities. Using an emergent qualitative design, we first conducted pre- and post-course semi-structured interviews with 12 junior doctors and thematically analysed the influence of an EBM-SDM course on their attitudes and practice of both EBM and SDM, and the barriers and facilitators to the integrated learning and practice of EBM and SDM. Based on the responses of junior doctors, we then conducted interviews with ten of their supervising consultants and used a second thematic analysis to understand the influence of consultants on junior doctors’ EBM-SDM learning and practice.

Junior doctors appreciated EBM-SDM training that involved patient participation. After the training course, they intended to improve their skills in person-centered decision-making including SDM. However, junior doctors identified medical hierarchy, time factors, and lack of prior training as barriers to the learning and practice of EBM-SDM, whilst the private healthcare setting with protected learning time and supportive consultants were considered facilitators. Consultants had mixed attitudes towards EBM and SDM and varied perceptions of the role of junior doctors in either practice, both of which influenced the practice of junior doctors.

Conclusions

These findings suggested that future medical education and research should include training that integrates EBM and SDM that acknowledges the complex environment in which this training must be put into practice, and considers strategies to overcome barriers to the implementation of EBM-SDM learning in practice.

Peer Review reports

The practice of evidence-based medicine (EBM) requires clinicians to incorporate their own expertise, the best research evidence, and patient preferences when making decisions about patient care [ 1 ]. Since its introduction, approaches to teaching EBM skills have focused on the use of critical appraisal to determine the highest level of evidence, largely overlooking clinician expertise and patient preferences [ 2 , 3 ] and disregarding the established central role of person-centered care and shared decision-making (SDM), where clinician and patient make care decisions together [ 4 ]. This disparate approach may be connected to the way that EBM has been traditionally taught during medical training, where education about person-centered care and SDM has occurred in a separate educational silo to EBM education [ 2 , 5 , 6 ]. In recent years, a potential solution has been proposed: teaching EBM and SDM together, where evidence is applied using SDM skills [ 7 , 8 ].

Some educators and practitioners have identified the potential benefit of incorporating the principals of SDM into EBM training, so that education centers on the patient as well as the evidence [ 9 , 10 ]. However, very few published studies provide empirical data on how this can be successfully done [ 8 , 11 ]. In an Australian study, researchers ran a single EBM-SDM workshop for medical and allied health student-clinicians [ 12 ], where SDM was introduced as part of the students’ compulsory EBM course. In this study, participants who underwent SDM training in addition to reading SDM material scored significantly higher on measures of ability, attitudes, and confidence in incorporating SDM into EBM when compared to participants who read SDM material alone. In a more recent study, researchers from the same institution conducted a half-day EBM-SDM workshop to train primary care practitioners in using SDM with EBM to improve decision-making for patient care [ 13 ]. In this study, pre- and post- workshop observations of doctors’ skills in SDM were assessed via recorded consultations and pre- and post- workshop attitude questionnaires. The results from this pilot found that participants had increased positive attitudes towards SDM and improved SDM skills immediately after the half-day workshop [ 13 ], though the focus of this training was limited to general practice-focused clinical scenarios, did not incorporate a study follow-up, and omitted qualitative participant feedback. More recently, a scoping review of 23 studies found that while there has been increasing recognition by educators of the interdependence between EBM and SDM, only a minority of included studies explicitly incorporated EBM and SDM into training content [ 8 ].

We previously conducted a series of EBM training courses for junior doctors during which they were taught to apply evidence using SDM skills, namely, an EBM-SDM course. We ran a pilot mixed-methods evaluation, which indicated that while there was a significant increase in positive attitudes towards EBM after the course, there were also several barriers and facilitators that influenced the potential uptake and practice of EBM and SDM [ 14 ]. This is unsurprising, given that EBM training for junior doctors is beset by reports of failure to translate new skills and attitudes into clinical practice [ 9 ] and SDM is slow to be taken up among doctors in general [ 15 , 16 ]. The EBM literature has identified that the main reasons given by junior doctors for not practising EBM included: lack of time to learn [ 17 , 18 ] or practice EBM [ 19 ], workplace culture [ 20 ], and lack of prior training [ 20 ]. Separate SDM literature has identified that barriers to the practice of SDM perceived by doctors, including junior doctors, included time constraints [ 21 ], low levels of patient health literacy [ 22 ], workplace culture [ 23 ], and no opportunities to learn and practice SDM during clinical practice [ 24 ]. However, there are few investigations of barriers to the joint practice of EBM and SDM following their integrated training. As such, there is a need for more comprehensive qualitative evaluations of the outcomes of integrated EBM and SDM training, as well as a more in-depth understanding of the barriers and facilitators to their implementation in clinical practice.

Despite positive attitudinal changes towards EBM-SDM after training [ 13 , 14 ], it is likely that specific barriers prevent the provision of EBM-SDM training and the translation of new skills into clinical practice. It is important to further understand the nature of these barriers so that the impact of EBM and SDM practice can be fully realised. We were interested in examining the private hospital setting, and specific benefits or barriers this setting could introduce. Also of interest was the composition of junior doctor and consultant participant cohorts where most participants were undertaking surgical specialties or training, and its impact on influencing their responses and outcomes following training. In this study, we conducted interviews with junior doctors both before and after EBM-SDM training, and with their supervising consultants to further understand their perceptions and practice of EBM and SDM, and the associated barriers and facilitators.

This study aimed to answer the following research questions:

How does an integrated EBM-SDM course influence junior doctors’ attitudes toward, and practice of, EBM and SDM?

What are the barriers to junior doctors’ EBM-SDM learning and practice? What are the facilitators?

How do supervising consultants’ attitudes and influence impact on junior doctors’ opportunities for EBM-SDM learning and practice?

This study used an emergent qualitative design where data were collected via semi-structured interviews [ 25 ]. Social constructivist theory underpinned our study design to enable the exploration of how junior doctors and consultants created their own meanings, attitudes, and understanding about EBM and SDM, and a deeper understanding of their relationships with each other within this context [ 26 ]. The study centered around an EBM-SDM course that we conducted at an academic health sciences center. Phase 1 of this study involved conducting and analysing pre- and post-course interviews with junior doctors to understand their perceived barriers and facilitators to learning and practising EBM-SDM [ 27 ]. Thematic analysis of the initial interviews with junior doctors raised questions about the role of supervising consultant doctors in EBM-SDM learning and practice, specifically in terms of their support for training and practice opportunities for junior doctors. Thus, Phase 2 of the study used semi-structured interviews with consultants to further understand how their attitudes and influence might impact junior doctors’ opportunities for EBM-SDM learning and practice.

Study setting

The EBM-SDM training course took place at an integrated academic health sciences center (MQ Health) on an urban university campus, comprising a university-owned private hospital and specialty outpatient clinics [ 28 ]. The course was attended by junior doctors who worked at the center. In the Australian setting, junior doctors include new graduates or interns, residents undertaking prevocational training, registrars who are either accredited with a specialty training program or unaccredited, and fellows who have completed specialty training and are seeking sub-specialty training [ 29 ]. The EBM-SDM training course consisted of four 90-minute meetings, and covered all steps of the EBM process and the principles of SDM that are incorporated into the fourth EBM step. The course was conducted over an eight-week period to provide trainees with sufficient time in between meetings for reading, reviewing, and preparing material. The course was conducted five times during this study. Adult learning theory was used as a framework for the problem-based, collaborative learning environment where the teachers facilitated rather than directed learners [ 30 ]. During the course, junior doctors used their own patient cases to increase the course relevance to their practice and patient care [ 31 ]. Additional File 1 contains details of the structure and content of the EBM-SDM training course.

The junior doctors were on a single-term rotation, where they spent one year at the private hospital before returning to rotations in the public hospital system. They worked alongside a variety of other healthcare professionals, including consultants, allied health professionals, researchers, and educators, and were supervised by consultants, specialists from a range of medical and surgical disciplines, who provided individualised mentoring, opportunities for learning and research, and support to enter specialist training programs in Australia. Junior doctors could also take part in educational activities outside of their supervision with consultants, including the EBM-SDM course, to acquire and practice new skills.

Participant recruitment

Participants were recruited via purposive sampling [ 32 ] where doctors from a range of age groups and training backgrounds were approached to obtain a comprehensive sample. In Phase 1, participants were recruited from the university hospital’s training program for junior doctors. Using examples from the literature [ 33 ], an estimated number of 12 to 15 interviewees from the available pool of 30 junior doctors was considered appropriate to provide in-depth data, and to cover all the issues that could arise from interviews pre- and post- EBM-SDM training [ 32 ]. In a similar process, for Phase 2 we sought a sample of 10 consultants from the available pool of 20 who had current supervisory roles in the training of junior doctors at MQ Health. The junior doctors were approached as they enrolled in the EBM course, while the consultants were identified from a list of junior doctors’ supervisors provided by the faculty learning and teaching administration team and were sent individual emails inviting them to take part in the study.

Data collection

Demographic data.

A demographic survey was developed by four authors (MSi, FR, YZ, AD) and emailed to all consenting participants to record their age group, gender, position, country of medical training, period in which training occurred, and prior education in EBM and SDM.

Interview schedules

Interview questions were developed by the first author (MSi), then reviewed and amended with members of the author team (AD, FR, YZ). In Phase 1, two interview schedules were developed: pre-course and post-course. The pre-course interviews were designed to establish a pre-intervention baseline and explore how junior doctors understood and used both EBM and SDM, and their prior training experiences in each. The post-course interview questions examined changes in knowledge, attitudes, and practice of EBM and SDM and explored junior doctors’ perceptions of combined EBM-SDM training for learning and practice, their intentions to use knowledge gained, the influence of their supervising consultants on EBM and SDM practice, and possible barriers and facilitators to learning and using EBM. In Phase 2, interviews with consultants were designed to understand how they viewed EBM and SDM in their own practice, and their views on whether junior doctors should practice EBM and SDM. Interview questions also explored consultants’ views and experiences of combined EBM and SDM training, in influencing both clinical practice and medical education. See Additional File 2 for all interview schedules.

Interview pilot and sessions

In Phase 1, interview questions were designed and piloted with three junior doctors and were subsequently refined into the final interview schedules. In Phase 2, interviews were piloted with one consultant, after which the questions were modified for use with this cohort. Interviews took place in quiet locations with each junior doctor from 2019 until 2022, and with each consultant during 2021; they were conducted face-to-face in 2019, and via Zoom from 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic [ 34 ]. Author MSi conducted the interviews as 40-minute sessions. All interviewees were given the option to comment on their interview transcripts and study results. One interviewee returned for a second interview to capture additional data. Observational notes were taken by MSi to capture additional contextual factors (such as tone of voice) to assist with thematic analysis.

Data analysis

In Phase 1 of the study, junior doctors’ transcripts and field notes were thematically analysed [ 35 , 36 ] to identify, evaluate and report patterns or themes within the data in relation to the three research questions. The first author (MSi) transcribed and familiarised herself with the data. Iterative generation of codes and themes took place with other members of the authorship team (FR, YZ, LAE, GF, SS). Themes were inductively defined as new codes were generated and all themes and sub-themes were named. Transcripts were re-read, and themes reinterpreted until the team decided that data findings had been accurately described. These themes were then used in Phase 2 of the study as a framework to deductively analyse consultants’ interviews. We also included an ‘Other’ category to code any content that did not fit within the framework, and then inductively analysed this content to capture additional sub-themes from the consultant data.

Research team and reflexivity

MSi, a higher degree research student, developed and delivered the EBM-SDM training course with two other authors (MSt, AD). MSi also developed the interview schedules (with FR, AD, YZ) and conducted the interviews. All participants were informed of MSi’s involvement in the study. MSi has training qualifications in adult education and qualitative research methods, including group and individual interviewing techniques. She analysed the interview data with other authors (FR, YZ). MSi knew all study participants (except two consultants) through her work as a clinical librarian at Macquarie University and discussed with the other authors how her involvement in the study and familiarity with the participants may influence her perceptions and analysis of the interview data. FR, YZ, and SS are health service researchers, with extensive experience in qualitative research. As non-clinicians, they reflected on their experiences and expectations as patients, and as researchers, and how that may influence their interpretation of the interview data. GF and LAE are allied healthcare professionals by background and researchers who drew on their clinical and research skills and perspectives to interpret the interview data. AD and MSt are neurosurgeons with experience in training junior doctors and an interest in medical education and teaching EBM. They knew several study participants through their clinical and research work.

Ethical approval and study reporting

Ethics approval was obtained in 2019 to interview junior doctors from Macquarie University Human Research Ethics Committee (# 5201927419929), and in 2021 to add interviews with consultants (Ethics no: 52021274125020). The study was reported using COREQ guidelines (See Related Files).

Demographic information of participants

Demographic details of the junior doctors and consultants who participated in interviews are displayed in Table  1 . Of the 30 junior doctors who completed the EBM-SDM training, 12 participated in interviews. Of the 12 participating junior doctors, five were fellows, five were registrars, one was a resident, and one was an intern, and thus the junior doctor cohort represented a range of training levels and experience. Half of the junior doctors undertook their medical training in Australia and around two-thirds had some prior EBM instruction, although none had received training in SDM. Five junior doctors completed both pre and post interviews; those who only completed one interview cited time factors and clinical schedules as reasons for non-completion. Most junior doctors who completed the EBM-SDM training course but not the interviews cited time factors as reasons for their non-participation.

Ten consultants participated in interviews. Of these 10 consultants, three were Associate Professors and four were Professors. Five consultants had some prior EBM training, and none had any prior SDM training.

Themes and sub-themes

The study had three key research questions, and four major themes were identified around those questions. The themes, sub-themes, and links to the research questions are summarised in Table  2 . In the following results section, junior doctors’ quotes are indicated with “J” and a number; consultants’ quotes are indicated with “C” and a number.

Theme 1: EBM training, understanding, and practice

Four sub-themes were identified that related to perceptions and understanding of EBM training and practice: pre-course understanding and learning EBM, application to practice, training needs of junior doctors, and impact of medical speciality.

Understanding and training in EBM

Prior to the EBM-SDM course, most junior doctors equated EBM to research skills and knowledge-gain, e.g., “[EBM] …means medicine that has a foundation in scientific studies that have been rigorously peer reviewed and developed through a scientific method…” (J3). Some junior doctors linked EBM to a statistical outcome or risk measure, using it to give “ the risks of certain procedures … [and] the risks of conservative management versus operative management” (J4). Of the six junior doctors that trained in Australia, none recalled EBM training within a clinical setting or taught in a way that directly applied to practice. Instead, they reported that EBM training consisted of isolated lectures or projects: “but other than that, there was no course for EBM. It’s just lectures when I was in med[ical] school” (J5).

Five consultants indicated a lack of understanding of EBM practice when asked to prioritise its components: “ Literature-based EBM is the most important, anecdotal or doctors’ experiences is the least important, and what was the third one?” (C7), whilst others were more aware of EBM theory and practice, particularly as it applied to patient care: “ evidence-based medicine in its foundations is meant to tailor it to the particular patient and it is actually quite flexible” (C1).

Actual and intended practice of EBM

Junior doctors’ understanding of the practice of EBM broadened after the EBM-SDM course and was accompanied by increased acknowledgement of patient involvement in their care. One junior doctor described their increased awareness for future practice: “[the course made me wonder] how can I convey the message to patients and get them to be involved in deciding the management plan?” (J5). The greatest barrier to practising EBM was lack of time for learning and practice, with all junior doctors mentioning this during their interviews.

Training needs of junior doctors

Prior to the EBM-SDM training course, most junior doctors were looking forward to developing skills in searching and critically appraising evidence: “ I’d like a better understanding of what a good quality study is…if something is a RCT or cohort study that I want to be able to say, this is a good RCT or, this is a good cohort study” (J4). After the EBM-SDM training course, several junior doctors recommended further training to help them maintain and extend their skills. Some suggested EBM training should be provided for longer and include refresher training, and one suggested giving more emphasis to the SDM component “ because this is the practical part of putting it into our daily life, applying it to patients” (J5).

Impact of the medical speciality of consultants

Consultants’ specialisations impacted their practice of EBM. Those practising as physicians, including a neurologist and cardiologist, reported greater access to high-level evidence and guidelines, with one consultant claiming that “ cardiology is very algorithmic in a lot of ways, and that makes that easier…there’s only so many things you can do…. that kind of distils things” (C6). Consultants from surgical disciplines reported that lower levels of evidence were often drawn upon for decision-making, because “[in surgery] the evidence, sometimes is not like hard science…many times we base our decisions on grey literature, or on evidence that we acquire over time…or from the experience of our other senior colleagues” (C9).

Theme 2: attitudes towards EBM

Three sub-themes were interpreted within the data relating to attitudes towards EBM: attitudes towards the role of evidence in decision-making, attitudes towards patient involvement in care decisions, and attitudes towards junior doctors’ practice of EBM.

Attitudes towards the role of evidence in decision-making

Prior to the EBM-SDM training course, most junior doctors’ attitudes toward EBM were focused on the knowledge they could acquire for decision-making, research, and benchmarking their performance, such as “ recommendations that are based on that evidence to inform medical decision-making” (J3). After the course junior doctors were keen to practice their new EBM skills that had expanded to include finding and using evidence to explain care issues to patients. “It [explaining evidence] really makes them [patients] feel as though they’re being actively involved in the actual details of their specific case” (J3).

Consultant participants frequently discussed the pitfalls of using evidence to inform decisions, with one claiming that “[EBM has] got enormous weaknesses if people think that there’s evidence for everything; that is too simplistic and left brain” (C2). Furthermore, decisions were reportedly often informed by “ what you’ve been taught by your people training you and your mentors” (C5). Two consultants explained how they perceived EBM was negatively changing medical practice: “ [EBM] takes away some of the enjoyment out of practicing medicine individually, in the sense that some of the art has been lost” (T7). Other consultants pointed out advantages of EBM, including provision of high-quality evidence for decision-making that “gives me the ability to then converse with patients as to why we do things and why it would be most appropriate” (C1). Two consultants with prior EBM training discussed the conflict with senior colleagues that can often arise when EBM is practised, one stating that “ sometimes this evidence is not strong enough to change the opinion of some [senior] doctors or surgeons” (C9).

Attitudes towards patient involvement in care decisions

Junior doctors expressed mixed attitudes about patient involvement in decisions. Despite post-training beliefs that patient involvement “ will help to establish…better rapport with patients…because they’re more informed and there’s more trust” (J3), junior doctors also reported the “ need to simplify things for the patient who makes the decision about their life… other than just giving information” (J8). Six junior doctors did, however, plan for greater patient involvement after they completed the EBM-SDM course: “ I am now more inclined to include evidence-based discussions…in how I approach decisions that we present to patients…. I wouldn’t have really brought it up as a topic [previously]” (J3).

Consultants also reported mixed attitudes to patient involvement in their care, with one participant stating that “ it’s good that they’re enthusiastic about it but it’s bad that it’s this sort of modern attitude of ‘my opinion’s as good as your opinion’, even if my opinion is based on social media and newspaper reports” (C4). Six consultants expressed doubts about patients’ ability to grasp complex medical concepts for decision-making, to “ understand something as much as a clinician who’s been doing it for 10, 20, 30 years” (C8). Three consultants strongly endorsed patient involvement, mostly believing that “ at the end of the day … it’s the patient’s body, that they have to be comfortable with the treatment plan” (C1).

Consultant attitudes towards junior doctors’ practice of EBM

Consultants differed in their opinions on whether junior doctors should practice EBM. Five consultants believed there were few roles for junior doctors in evidence-based decision-making, one stating: “ they practice a very protocol driven medicine. And that’s just historical and that’s probably not a bad thing” (C2). The other five consultants, in contrast, stated that limited decision-making roles should exist for junior doctors: “ doctors at any stage should be able to assess the patient and so they can influence decision-making, based on that ” (C3).

Theme 3. Organisational culture and EBM

Two sub-themes were identified pertaining to the influence of organisational culture on practicing EBM: public versus private healthcare, and medical hierarchy.

Public vs. private healthcare

Junior doctors and consultants spoke of differences in EBM learning and practice between public and private healthcare settings. Six junior doctors reported that private healthcare settings, such as the academic health sciences center they were based in, facilitated the practice of EBM, because they had protected time for individual study and educational activities. This did not happen during their public hospital rotations, where junior doctors cited high patient numbers and associated workloads that were prioritised. One such junior doctor stated “ Today I’ve just been allocated a study day… I don’t actually think that happens in public hospitals” ( J4 ) .

Four consultants’ views aligned with those of junior doctors about greater protected time available for learning in private settings. Three consultants stated junior doctors had greater opportunities for patient decision-making in the public system, for example, in the emergency department of public hospitals where “ you see people who are coming in [to the emergency department] and often they’ll see the junior doctors before they even see the senior doctor ” (C6).

Medical hierarchy

Junior doctors and some consultants discussed the emphasis placed on following the instructions of the most senior consultants. Six junior doctors reported that they were rarely involved in decision-making, but rather, follow the consultant’s lead, regardless of whether the consultant’s decisions were evidence driven. Prior to the EBM-SDM course one junior doctor stated: “ I think in some of my other terms, if I had asked, they [consultants] would just say “this is just part of my experience” (J2). She maintained this view after the course, recalling one instance when querying a guideline put in place by a consultant: “ I know as a junior sometimes you get a bit of pushback if what you’re recommending is not guideline driven” (J2).

Two consultants reported that their decision-making capacity was also restricted by their senior colleagues, one consultant claiming that this was “the consequence of the traditional school and all the experience, based on the decades of “we always did it like that” (C9). Another consultant spoke of the difficulties faced by those consultants who completed their medical training before EBM was introduced:

If you look at some of the older clinicians you can be forgiven for thinking that they’re kind of stuck in, frozen in time, right? And that might be a generational thing, but because of this new focus on evidence-based learning and medicine in the nineties, these clinicians didn’t have the benefit of that. (C3.)

Three junior doctors reported that hierarchies were evident even among themselves, and not just between junior doctors and consultants, such that accredited registrars or fellows often held greater credibility than less experienced residents, interns, and unaccredited registrars. Two consultants stated that they only worked with fellows, not the more junior ranked doctors, whereas other consultants reported greater inclusivity of all junior doctors during decision-making, one stating: “ I am very, very open to accept the data or opinion [of a junior doctor] because it’s based on something which is more updated than what I know, and this is something that happens” (C9).

Theme 4: understanding and practice of SDM and its role in EBM

Three sub-themes were identified relating to the understanding and practice of SDM and its role in EBM: Understanding and practicing SDM, the effect of hierarchy on the practice of person-centered care and SDM, and the role of junior doctors in the learning and practice of SDM.

Understanding and practicing SDM

Prior to the EBM-SDM course, four junior doctors could not correctly define what SDM meant, and six described SDM as one-way communication of evidence to patients. After the course, they claimed a greater understanding of SDM as part of person-centered care, and that “ you need to have a good basis in EBM, to actually make sure the patient can be even involved in the discussion. So, the patient understands” (J4). Seven junior doctors believed that SDM and EBM should be taught together, whereas one did not agree: “ I think we don’t need to explicitly incorporate it, that it’s a given” (J1). Given that the training level of junior doctors was highly varied (i.e., from intern to fellow), there was variability in how they understood and approached SDM. For example, fellows, the most experienced of the junior doctors, described using evidence to provide recommendations to patients rather than eliciting patient preferences whilst referring to evidence. One fellow stated: “I think most patients are really welcoming if you tell them that people have done it before, the percentage of people who do good, for example, and those that don’t and they’re willing to accept that” (J10). Consultants conveyed mixed definitions of SDM; some saw it as informed consent, and others saw it as the transfer of information from doctor to patient. All consultants pointed out the difficulties of SDM, with one highlighting that “ it’s really hard to get somebody to the level where they can make some sort of an educated decision” (C8). One consultant commented on the differences in attitudes towards SDM between older and younger colleagues: “ younger clinicians are less likely to be as paternalistic [than older consultants], they’re more willing to accept that patients have their own thoughts, even if they’re unconventional and unrealistic” (C3). Surgeons and surgical trainees, comprising 72% of the study cohort, tended to view EBM and SDM as doctor-driven rather than patient-centered. For example, one neurosurgeon emphasised the important sources of evidence used for patient decisions: “So I always bring to the patient my experience, I bring the MDT [Multidisciplinary Team] meeting decision … and the literature” (C9). This contrasted with the perspective of non-surgical consultants. For example, a cardiologist highlighted the central role of the patient in the decision-making process: “I always think of evidence as the hard science and then for the decision-making process, about the application of that hard science to a particular context and … it’s in that paradigm, that the patient’s point of view is used to temper the evidence that you’re presenting” (C6).

Effect of medical hierarchy on junior doctors’ practice of person-centered care and SDM

Six junior doctors reported that, due to their place in the medical hierarchy, they tended not to practice SDM. One participant stated:

I actually try to hold off on doing that [practising SDM], personally, just because it’s more of a consultant discussion at that stage. When a consultant leaves the room, the patient does actually have more questions, and sometimes I just reiterate what the consultant has already said. (J4.)

Ten junior doctors planned to increase their communication and person-centered care skills after the EBM-SDM course, for example, using EBM to find evidence that reassures a patient; skills that could be implemented now and expanded later to incorporate SDM.

Consultant perceptions of the role of junior doctors in SDM

Four consultants were of the view that junior doctors should not practice SDM due to their junior level. One consultant reported that junior doctors sometimes played a patient advocate role because they “ often have an insight into some of those other levels [of patient care]” (C2). Another consultant considered providing junior doctors “the opportunity to be more involved in that [SDM] discussion” (C7) but cited time constraints as a barrier.

This study explored how integrated EBM and SDM training can impact attitudes, understanding and practice among junior doctors, and whether the attitudes and practice of their supervising consultants can influence those outcomes. Junior doctors demonstrated significant positive attitude changes towards EBM and SDM after the EBM-SDM course. Prior EBM training (during medical training or afterwards) was mostly didactic and focused on knowledge and skill acquisition which is a common finding in other studies that has not equipped junior doctors to practice EBM confidently in clinical settings [ 37 , 38 ]. Following our EBM-SDM course, not only did junior doctors’ knowledge and skills improve, but they frequently referred to the benefits of including patients in their discussions about care, which indicated that they had expanded their understanding of EBM to incorporate aspects of person-centered care. Their intentions to be more person-centered were frequently based on using evidence to effectively communicate risks and benefits to patients, rather than having SDM conversations with patients where all options were described, and decisions made together. However, there appeared to be a disconnect between the practice of SDM and the recognition of its practice. On several occasions, junior doctors facilitated SDM by answering patient questions after the consultant left the room, or by reiterating what the consultant said, but failed to recognise this as part of a SDM conversation with the patient.

Junior doctors also varied in their attitudes and practices of SDM. The more experienced junior doctors, the five fellows, tended to demonstrate a more doctor-centered rather than patient-centered approach to patient care than the less experienced junior doctors (i.e., residents). Junior doctors were at varying levels of their medical training, some of them closer to consultant-level practitioners than others, and may perceive and think about SDM differently depending on their training cohort. Furthermore, several fellows had worked as consultants in their home countries which may have influenced the doctor-centered patterns of decision-making commonly found among consultants. Thus, our study identified that junior doctors attitudes and practices of SDM are likely due to a lack of specific knowledge and understanding of SDM, limited prior training, as well as cultural conventions that may be associated with time and country of training.

Consultants varied greatly in their understanding of EBM and SDM, and their views on whether either should be practised by junior doctors. Senior consultants who completed medical training before the formal introduction of EBM in the 1990s [ 39 ] appeared to be unfamiliar with and less accepting of EBM and SDM and expressed a reluctance for junior doctors to engage in either. In contrast, younger consultants who had prior exposure to EBM training and practice tended to appreciate the benefits of EBM for junior doctors and patients. In another study of junior doctors and senior anaesthetists, interviews indicated there was a link between career stage and workplace settings and EBM attitudes [ 40 ]. In this study, senior anaesthetists (consultants) were reluctant to make decisions or change practice based on evidence in preference to their own experience and opinion [ 40 ]. Junior doctors regarded this as reluctance to change as due to older age, but the consultants saw it as surrendering their professional autonomy [ 40 ]. Thus, there may be a tendency among more senior doctors to resist practising EBM in favour of using their own decision-making preferences, that carry a risk of cognitive bias and are potentially suboptimal or obsolete decisions [ 40 , 41 , 42 ]. In addition, some studies have shown senior medical staff (consultants) have very little expertise in SDM with patients, thereby failing to become the role models in EBM-SDM that junior doctors need [ 43 ]. Senior doctors have also reported difficulty in using technology thus preferring to ask colleagues for advice [ 44 ].

In our study, more senior consultants appeared to dominate the medical workforce hierarchy and exclude junior doctors and patients from decision-making. These consultants believed that decision-making should be underpinned by their experience, knowledge, and their communities of practice. Thus, they did not prioritise decision-making linked to EBM and SDM and consequently educational opportunities for junior doctors under their supervision were reduced. These findings support those of other studies concerning the impact of medical hierarchies on junior medical staff, where power is recognised to sit with senior medical staff positioned at the top of the hierarchy, thereby reducing the autonomy of those positioned lower in the hierarchy, such as junior doctors [ 40 , 45 ]. This has been reported to be particularly evident in surgical specialties, where decision-making is dominated by senior surgeons’ experience rather than evidence [ 46 ]. Junior doctors learn to respect hierarchy from medical school, where they do not challenge authority to avoid unwanted impacts on their training and career progression [ 47 , 48 , 49 ]. The well-established medical hierarchy emerged as a barrier preventing junior doctors in our study from using evidence-based decision-making skills learned in the EBM-SDM course, particularly if the evidence contradicted strongly held views and practices of senior consultants.

Of note was that the present study was conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic, a difficult and uncertain time for all medical professionals. In the Australian context, junior doctors have reported restrictive workplace cultures and behaviours, including being overlooked and undervalued by senior doctors, which contributed negatively to their psychological well-being during COVID-19 [ 49 ]. This had important implications for doctors’ welfare, workforce retention, and safe patient care that needed to be addressed through “positive workplace cultural interventions to engage, validate and empower junior doctors” [ 50 ]. In contrast, junior doctors in our study, and in others, have reported that many consultants and senior medical staff were always supportive and approachable role models, not just during the pandemic, and helped to facilitate their trainees’ well-being and progress [ 47 , 51 ]. The potential contribution of such role models to facilitate and support EBM and SDM learning and practice may help to overcome some of the associated barriers [ 52 ].

Combining EBM and SDM training enabled junior doctors to realise there is more to EBM than the level of evidence, which was what most believed before the training. The combined course enabled them to consider how they would communicate the relevant evidence in a two-way conversation with the patient, and thus situated the principles of EBM within the broader context of patient needs and preferences. Several junior doctors had commented that their awareness and practice of improved communication skills with patients had increased after the course, lending support to the effectiveness of the combined course, and the likelihood that the learnings would be utilised in future. These outcomes also imply that EBM-SDM training has the potential to shift power dynamics within the medical hierarchy through expanding the skillset and abilities of junior doctors.

Another facilitator of combined EBM-SDM learning and practice reported in our study was the capacity of private healthcare facilities in Australia to provide protected time for educational activities. This contrasted with public healthcare facilities, where such opportunities are limited [ 53 ]. Our study took place within a neurosurgery department where a half-day is set aside each week for learning and teaching meetings, including the EBM-SDM course. The meetings were co-ordinated by consultants, thereby enabling junior doctors to learn and practice new skills with consultants’ support. In a similar way, consultants who recognise the benefits of EBM and SDM could act as unofficial champions, who provide further learning and teaching opportunities for junior doctors, whilst demonstrating and communicating those benefits to their senior colleagues. The idea of champions comes from literature demonstrating that colleagues or supervisors of junior clinicians can be a great source of assistance and support when it comes to learning and practicing skills associated with EBM [ 8 ]. Such champions or role models have been recommended as an integral part of EBM teaching because they demonstrate to learners the ‘how-to’ of the application of EBM principles to clinical practice and individual patients [ 54 ]. Within our study, this supportive culture, led by a champion or role model, was very beneficial. One of the neurosurgeon consultants took a keen interest in teaching EBM to junior doctors and he led by example, showing them how to use it in daily practice through patient care consultations, and ward rounds and by leading the EBM-SDM teaching during protected education time. The junior doctors responded with increased motivation to practice their EBM-SDM skills during educational meetings. This opportunity provided by a private healthcare facility could be an exemplar of EBM-SDM education in the Australian context that may be adapted by other institutions.

Future directions

A lack of prior learning and practice of EBM and SDM concepts among this sample of junior doctors echoes previous calls for improved basic and ongoing training in EBM and SDM skills [ 8 , 55 ]. The recently updated Australian specialist training program [ 56 ] has cited the inclusion of EBM and SDM as separate skill sets, with an emphasis on skills and knowledge acquisition. However, there is now a framework providing core competencies that can underpin an EBM curriculum incorporating SDM [ 57 ]. This is a promising initiative that could be adapted and used to meet the needs of institutions whilst identifying and managing barriers and facilitators to the learning and practice of EBM and SDM. Additionally, the capacity of consultants with prior EBM training and experience to act as champions of EBM-SDM could be further explored.

Future research opportunities include evaluation of the impacts of integrated EBM-SDM training content and strategies to determine optimal approaches for educators to adopt in both private and public settings. Future research should also focus on the efficacy of strategies to empower junior doctors to become more independent in using their EBM and SDM skills, such as training champions and consultants who want to help their junior doctor trainees develop skills and experience in EBM and SDM [ 52 , 58 ]. Finally, further investigation is warranted into the significance of undertaking medical training either before or after the introduction of EBM in the 1990s, and how this impacts the medical hierarchy, EBM-SDM training and practice opportunities for junior doctors, and patient care. These investigations could incorporate other qualitative methods such as ethnography to fully capture perceived dynamics and cultural conventions within medical disciplines.

Strengths & limitations

This study has contributed to our knowledge of combined EBM-SDM training in the Australian context. A strength of the study was its emergent design, where consultant interviews in Phase 2 were added after data were analysed from junior doctor interviews in Phase 1. This approach enabled consultant interview schedules to further elucidate the barriers and facilitators associated with EBM and SDM learning and practice that emerged during Phase 1. The study was also strengthened by including two diverse, but linked participant groups, the junior doctors, and their supervising consultants, thus facilitating the collection and analysis of more than one source of relevant data that addressed the study aims. However, the study is not without its limitations. First, the modest sample size of the study, exacerbated by COVID-19 restrictions and the impact of the pandemic on the medical workforce, reduces the study’s transferability to other cohorts and contexts. Second, junior doctors’ limited understanding of SDM after the course may reflect a limitation of the course. Although SDM was introduced and discussed in the course, little time was provided for deliberate SDM practice and feedback; an issue that can be rectified in future training and research. Third, more males than females participated in the study which may have influenced the pattern of results and is an area for further research.

Most junior doctors reported positive attitude changes following EBM-SDM training that encompassed plans to increase patient involvement in their care through better communication and evidence-based shared decision-making. However, time constraints and the influence of the medical hierarchy were significant barriers for most junior doctors when learning and practising EBM and SDM. Despite these barriers, supportive consultants and protected educational time facilitated the learning and practice of EBM and SDM within the context of our study. To counter the reported barriers at our institution there are opportunities available for some consultants to become champions who make protected time available for EBM-SDM learning and practice opportunities. These findings may inform future research and training where integrated EBM and SDM learning and practice could be adapted to the unique contextual and cultural influences of each institution.

Availability of data and materials

The datasets used and/or analysed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

Abbreviations

• Evidence-based medicine
• Shared decision-making

Consolidated criteria for reporting qualitative research

Sackett DL, Rosenberg WM, Gray JM, Haynes RB, Richardson WS. Evidence based medicine: what it is and what it isn’t. BMJ. 1996;312(7023):71–2.

Article   Google Scholar  

Hoffmann T, Glasziou P. Bringing shared decision making and evidence-based practice together. In Shared Decision Making in Health Care: Achieving Evidence-Based Patient Choice . Edited by Elwyn G, Edwards A, Thompson R. Oxford: Oxford University Press; 2016.

Tikkinen KAO, Guyatt GH. Understanding of research results, evidence summaries and their applicability—not critical appraisal—are core skills of medical curriculum. BMJ Evid Based Med. 2021;26(5):231–3.

Hoffmann T, Montori VM, Del Mar C. The connection between evidence-based medicine and shared decision making. JAMA. 2014;312(13):1295–6.

McCormack J, Elwyn G. Shared decision is the only outcome that matters when it comes to evaluating evidence-based practice. BMJ Evid Based Med. 2018;23(4):137–9.

Greenhalgh T, Snow R, Ryan S, Rees S, Salisbury H. Six ‘biases’ against patients and carers in evidence-based medicine. BMC Med. 2015;13(1):200.

Albarqouni L, Hoffmann T, Straus S, Olsen NR, Young T, Ilic D, et al. Core competencies in evidence-based practice for health professionals: consensus statement based on a systematic review and Delphi survey. JAMA Netw Open. 2018;1(2):e180281-e.

Lehane E, Curtin C, Corrigan M. Teaching strategies for shared decision-making within the context of evidence-based healthcare practice: a scoping review. Patient Educ Couns. 2023;109:107630.

Lehane E, Leahy-Warren P, O’Riordan C, Savage E, Drennan J, O’Tuathaigh C, et al. Evidence-based practice education for healthcare professions: an expert view. BMJ Evid Based Med. 2019;24(3):103–8.

Ubbink DT, Hageman MG, Legemate DA. Shared decision-making in surgery. Surg Technol Int. 2015;26:31–6.

Google Scholar  

Greenhalgh T, Howick J, Maskrey N. Evidence based medicine: a movement in crisis? BMJ. 2014;348:g3725.

Hoffmann T, Bennett S, Tomsett C, Del Mar C. Brief training of student clinicians in shared decision making: a single-blind randomized controlled trial. J Gen Intern Med. 2014;29(6):844–9.

Albarqouni L, Glasziou P, Bakhit M, Del Mar C, Hoffmann TC. Development of a contemporary evidence-based practice workshop for health professionals with a focus on pre-appraised evidence and shared decision-making: a before-after pilot study. BMJ Evid Based Med. 2020;25(2):1–2.

Simons M, Rapport F, Stoodley M, Davidson A, Ellis LA, Fisher G, et al. Training in evidence-based medicine and shared decision-making: a new focus on person-centred care for clinicians. Manuscript submitted for publication; 2023.

Pieterse AH, Gulbrandsen P, Ofstad EH, Menichetti J. What does shared decision making ask from doctors? Uncovering suppressed qualities that could improve person-centered care. Patient Educ Couns. 2023;114:107801.

Waddell A, Lennox A, Spassova G, Bragge P. Barriers and facilitators to shared decision-making in hospitals from policy to practice: a systematic review. Implement Sci. 2021;16(1):1–23.

Bhandari M, Montori V, Devereaux PJ, Dosanjh S, Sprague S, Guyatt GH. Challenges to the practice of evidence-based medicine during residents’ surgical training: a qualitative study using grounded theory. Acad Med. 2003;78(11):1183–90.

Halalau A, Holmes B, Rogers-Snyr A, Donisan T, Nielsen E, Cerqueira TL, et al. Evidence-based medicine curricula and barriers for physicians in training: a scoping review. Int J Med Educ. 2021;2:101–24.

Zwolsman SE, van Dijk N, te Pas E, Wieringa-de Waard M. Barriers to the use of evidence-based medicine: knowledge and skills, attitude, and external factors. Perspect Med Educ. 2013;2(1):4–13.

Green ML, Ruff TR. Why do residents fail to answer their clinical questions? A qualitative study of barriers to practicing evidence-based medicine. Acad Med. 2005;80(2):176–82.

Schoenfeld EM, Goff SL, Elia TR, Khordipour ER, Poronsky KE, Nault KA, et al. Physician-identified barriers to and facilitators of shared decision-making in the Emergency Department: an exploratory analysis. Emerg Med J. 2019;36(6):346–54.

Javaid M, Fritz M, O’Brien M, Clark S, Mitchell S, Sanchez SE. Use and perceptions of shared decision-making by general surgery faculty and trainees. J Surg Res. 2022;276:323–30.

Jacobsen MH, Sommer C, Wernberg SA, Schultz H, Fage Hjortø SC, Kristiansen M. Evaluation of a national programme to improve shared decision-making skills among junior medical doctors in Denmark: a mixed methods study of satisfaction, usefulness, and dissemination of learning outcomes in clinical practice. BMC Health Serv Res. 2022;22(1):1–13.

Oerlemans AJM, Knippenberg ML, Olthuis GJ. Learning shared decision-making in clinical practice. Patient Educ Couns. 2021;104(5):1206–12.

Creswell J, Creswell J. Research design: qualitative, quantitative and mixed methods approaches. 5th ed. Los Angeles: SAGE; 2018.

Sawatsky AP, Ratelle JT, Beckman TJ. Qualitative research methods in medical education. Anesthesiology. 2019;131(1):14–22.

Adeoye-Olatunde OA, Olenik NL. Research and scholarly methods: Semi‐structured interviews. JAACP: J Am Coll Clin Pharm. 2021;4(10):1358–67.

Health MQ. Report : 2019–2020. North Ryde NSW: Macquarie University. 2020. https://www.mqhealth.org.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0007/1076902/MQ_Health_2019-2020_report_for_web.pdf . Accessed 1 June 2022.

Australian Medical Association. Pathways in edicine, Kingston ACT. AMA; 2023. https://www.ama.com.au/pathways-in-medicine#doctors-in-training . Accessed 15 July 2022.

Halalau A, Falatko J, Mi M. Application of adult learning theory in teaching evidence based medicine to residents. J Med Educ. 2016;15(4):185–93.

Das K, Malick S, Khan KS. Tips for teaching evidence-based medicine in a clinical setting: lessons from adult learning theory. Part one. J R Soc Med. 2008;101(10):493–500.

Vasileiou K, Barnett J, Thorpe S, Young T. Characterising and justifying sample size sufficiency in interview-based studies: systematic analysis of qualitative health research over a 15-year period. BMC Med Res Methodol. 2018;18(1):148.

Braun V, Clarke V. Successful qualitative research: a practical guide for beginners. London: Sage; 2013.

Zoom Video Communications. Macquarie University’s web conferencing system: Zoom. USA: Zoom Video Communications; 2023.

Braun V, Clarke V. Using thematic analysis in psychology. Qual Res Psychol. 2006;3(2):77–101.

Braun V, Clarke V, Hayfield N, Terry G. Thematic analysis. In Handbook of Research Methods in Health Social Sciences Edited by Liamputtong P. Singapore: Springer Singapore; 2019. pp. 843 – 60.

Meats E, Heneghan C, Crilly M, Glasziou P. Evidence-based medicine teaching in UK medical schools. Med Teach. 2009;31(4):332–7.

Romero-Robles MA, Soriano-Moreno DR, García-Gutiérrez FM, Condori-Meza IB, Sing-Sánchez CC, Bulnes Alvarez SP, et al. Self-perceived competencies on evidence-based medicine in medical students and physicians registered in a virtual course: a cross-sectional study. Med Educ Online. 2022;27(1):2010298.

Wyer PC, Silva SA. Where is the wisdom? I – A conceptual history of evidence-based medicine. J Eval Clin Pract. 2009;15(6):891–8.

Swennen MHJ, Van Der Heijden GJMG, Blijham GH, Kalkman CJ. Career stage and work setting create different barriers for evidence-based medicine. J Eval Clin Pract. 2011;17(4):775–85.

Gabbay J, May A. Evidence based guidelines or collectively constructed mindlines? Ethnographic study of knowledge management in primary care. BMJ. 2004;329(7473):1013.

Maskrey N, Hutchinson A, Underhill J. Getting a better grip on research: the comfort of opinion. InnovAiT. 2009;2(11):679–86.

Driever EM, Stiggelbout AM, Brand PLP. Do consultants do what they say they do? Observational study of the extent to which clinicians involve their patients in the decision-making process. BMJ Open. 2022;12(1):e056471.

Hadvani T, Ban K, Darby J. Promoting faculty development in the practice of evidence-based medicine. In: Wallace S, Gokulakrishnan G, editors. Evidence-Based Medicine: From the Clinician and Educator Perspective. NY: Nova Science; 2022.

Essex R, Kennedy J, Miller D, Jameson J. A scoping review exploring the impact and negotiation of hierarchy in healthcare organisations. Nurs Inq. 2023;30(4):e12571.

Kitto S, Petrovic A, Gruen RL, Smith JA. Evidence-based medicine training and implementation in surgery: the role of surgical cultures. J Eval Clin Pract. 2011;17(4):819–26.

Forbes MP, Iyengar S, Kay M. Barriers to the psychological well-being of Australian junior doctors: a qualitative analysis. BMJ Open. 2019;9(6):e027558.

Salehi P, Jacobs D, Suhail-Sindhu T, Judson BL, Azizzadeh B, Lee YH. Consequences of medical hierarchy on medical students, residents, and medical education in otolaryngology. J Otolaryngol Head Neck Surg. 2020;163(5):906–14.

Soemantri D, Greviana N, Findyartini A, Azzahra TB, Suryoadji KA, Mustika R, et al. To obey or not to obey- medical students’ response towards professional dilemmas in a hierarchical and collectivist culture. PLoS ONE. 2021;16(12):e0261828.

Hunter R, Willis K, Smallwood N. The workplace and psychosocial experiences of Australian junior doctors during the COVID-19 pandemic. Intern Med J. 2022;52(5):745–54.

Lempp H, Seale C. The hidden curriculum in undergraduate medical education: qualitative study of medical students’ perceptions of teaching. BMJ. 2004;329(7469):770.

Ubbink DT, Guyatt GH, Vermeulen H. Framework of policy recommendations for implementation of evidence-based practice: a systematic scoping review. BMJ Open. 2013;3(1):e001881.

Balhatchet B, Schütze H, Williams N, Ashford B. Factors that impact burnout and psychological wellbeing in Australian postgraduate medical trainees: a systematic review. Global Surg Educ. 2023;2(1):65.

Moriates C, Silverstein WK, de Mello RB, Stammen L, Wong BM. High-value care education can learn from the evidence-based medicine movement: moving beyond competencies and curricula to culture. BMJ Evid Based Med. 2023. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjebm-2023-112270 . Epub ahead of print.

Simons MR, Zurynski Y, Cullis J, Morgan MK, Davidson AS. Does evidence-based medicine training improve doctors’ knowledge, practice and patient outcomes? A systematic review of the evidence. Med Teach. 2019;41(5):532–8.

Australian Medical Council. Standards for Assessment and Accreditation of specialist Medical Programs. Kingston, ACT: Australian Medical Council; 2023.

Albarqouni L, Hoffmann T, Glasziou P. Evidence-based practice educational intervention studies: a systematic review of what is taught and how it is measured. BMC Med Educ. 2018;18(1):1–8.

Brooks M, Reath J, McDonnell L, Abbott P. Increasing general practitioner use of evidence-based medicine in teaching and clinical practice through evidence-based journal clubs. Aust J Prim Health. 2021;27(4):271–5.

Download references

Acknowledgements

The authors wish to thank the doctors who participated in the interviews reported in this paper.

No funding was received for conducting this study.

Author information

Authors and affiliations.

Centre for Healthcare Resilience and Implementation Science, Australian Institute of Health Innovation, Macquarie University, Sydney, NSW, 2109, Australia

Mary Simons, Georgia Fisher, Samantha Spanos, Yvonne Zurynski, Frances Rapport & Louise A. Ellis

Department of Neurosurgery, The Royal Melbourne Hospital, Parkville, VIC, 3050, Australia

Andrew Davidson

Department of Clinical Medicine, Macquarie University, Sydney, NSW, 2109, Australia

Marcus Stoodley

Australian Institute of Health Innovation, 75 Talavera Rd, Macquarie Park, NSW, 2109, Australia

Mary Simons

You can also search for this author in PubMed   Google Scholar

Contributions

All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation and data collection were performed by MSi. Thematic analysis was performed by MSi, FR, YZ, GF, SS and LAE. MSt and AD prepared manuscript tables. The first draft of the manuscript was written by MSi, SS and GF. All authors contributed to each version of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Mary Simons .

Ethics declarations

Ethics approval and consent to participate.

Ethics approval was obtained in 2019 to interview junior doctors from Macquarie University Human Research Ethics Committee (Ethics no: 5201927419929), and in 2021 to add interviews with consultants (Ethics no: 52021274125020). Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

Consent for publication

Not applicable.

Competing interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

Additional information

Publisher’s note.

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Supplementary Information

Supplementary material 1., supplementary material 2., rights and permissions.

Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ . The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver ( http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ ) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data.

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article.

Simons, M., Fisher, G., Spanos, S. et al. Integrating training in evidence-based medicine and shared decision-making: a qualitative study of junior doctors and consultants. BMC Med Educ 24 , 418 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12909-024-05409-y

Download citation

Received : 04 September 2023

Accepted : 09 April 2024

Published : 18 April 2024

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1186/s12909-024-05409-y

Share this article

Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:

Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.

Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative

• Person-centered care
• Medical practice
• Medical education

BMC Medical Education

ISSN: 1472-6920

• Submission enquiries: [email protected]
• General enquiries: [email protected]

“It’s Just Lines”: A Qualitative Analysis of Emergent Structures and Experiences within STEAM Education Initiatives for Secondary-Level Students

Doctoral student John O’Meara recently published this article in the LASER (Linking Art and Science through Education and Research) Journal

Posted in: Research Publications

The article is a qualitative analysis of the experiences and discourse of high school students who participated in an art and science initiative that sought mathematics and physics education reform through an immersive and innovative approach to STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Mathematics) experiences. This work focused on the concluding task of a one-day workshop wherein students were led on a campus walk to observe the local campus architecture, and then recreated one of the observed structures within the Desmos graphing utility. Student approaches and narratives revealed a willingness to explore the complexity of the modeling task that might not otherwise be encouraged in their traditional learning environments. The analytical framework of the three worlds of mathematics proved to be a particularly useful tool in making sense of the complexity of student engagement. Implications for the future of STEAM education and interdisciplinary curricula were explored, with emphasis on the roles of creativity and a non-traditional learning environment.

Congratulations, John!

Read the Article