MET 17 (part b) - Similarities and differences between TA and CA

Question 1

What are the similarities between content analysis and thematic analysis?

Answer 1

• They both involve examining qualitative data
• Both are used to generate new knowledge from the data
• Both are iterative processes that require intimate knowledge of the data you study
• Both approaches can be used to inform theoretical claims in research studies

Question 2

What are the differences between content analysis and thematic analysis?

Answer 2

• Thematic analysis (TA) is a qualitative method used to uncover themes in textual data, while content analysis (CA) is either a quantitative or a qualitative approach that also involves some quantification of data
• CA generally counts the occurrence of concepts or keywords to infer meaning, while TA assigns meaning by extracting high-level ideas
• TA focuses on the overarching themes in the data and how those themes relate to one another, while in CA researchers count instances of coded concepts and keywords within large amounts of textual data with less focus on comparing or contrasting those codes.