The SRQR reporting guideline for writing qualitative research articles

The SRQR reporting guideline for writing qualitative research articles

How to use this reporting guideline

You can use reporting guidelines throughout your research process.

When writing: Consider using a writing guide to draft your manuscript or protocol.
After writing: Complete a checklist and include it with your journal submission.
To learn: Consult the guidance whenever you need it.

Please cite SRQR, however you use it.

Applicability criteria

Use this guideline for writing qualitative research articles. You can use it when describing all kinds of qualitative approaches, methods, and designs.

You can also use this guideline for:

writing proposals or protocols (use the items within the Introduction and Method sections).
reviewing the reporting of an article, but not for appraising its quality.

Do not use this guidance for:

writing a qualitative evidence synthesis, use ENTREQ instead.
appraising the quality of qualitative research, use an appraisal tool like CASP-Qual instead.

Alternative reporting guidelines:

For writing qualitative psychology studies, you can use this guideline or JARS Qual.
For writing studies involving interviews or focus groups, you can use this guideline or COREQ.

Item order and priority

SRQR does not prescribe order nor structure. Items can be reordered or reported in different sections. For example, some authors may prefer to include some methods items (e.g. Units of Study) in their Results section. Others may call their Results section Findings, or have a completely different manuscript structure. You should include items in the article body when possible, or in tables, figures, or supplements if necessary (see FAQs). Although all items should be reported, you should prioritize items most relevant to your study, findings, context, and readership.

Summary of guidance

Title and Abstract
Title	Describe the nature and topic of the study. Identify the study as qualitative or indicate the approach or data collection methods.
Abstract	Summarise key elements of the study using the abstract format of your intended publication. You should typically include the background, purpose, methods, results, and conclusions.
Introduction
Problem Formulation	Describe the problem/phenomenon studied, its significance, relevant theory and empirical work, and gaps in current knowledge.
Purpose or research question	Describe the purpose of the study and its specific objectives or questions.
Methods
Qualitative approach and research paradigm	Describe your qualitative approach, your guiding theory (if appropriate), and research paradigm.
Researcher characteristics and reflexivity	Describe how researchers’ characteristics may influence the research, including personal attributes, qualifications/experience, relationship with participants, assumptions, and/or presuppositions; potential or actual interaction between researchers’ characteristics and the research questions, approach, methods, results and/or transferability.
Context	Describe the setting/site(s) in which the study was conducted, why it was selected, and any other salient contextual factors that may influence the study.
Sampling strategy	Describe how and why research participants, documents, or events were selected; criteria for deciding when no further sampling was necessary, and the rationale for those criteria.
Ethical issues pertaining to human subjects	Describe any approval by an appropriate ethics review board and participant consent, or explanain any lack thereof. Describe any other confidentiality and data security issues.
Data collection methods	Describe the types of data collected; details of data collection procedures including (as appropriate) start and stop dates of data collection and analysis, iterative process, triangulation of sources/methods, and modification of procedures in response to evolving study findings. Describe your rationale for these choices.
Data collection instruments and technologies	Describe any instruments (e.g., interview guides, questionnaires) and devices (e.g., audio recorders) used for data collection; describe if/how the instrument(s) changed over the course of the study.
Units of study	Describe the number and relevant characteristics of participants, documents, or events included in the study. Describe the level of participation.
Data processing	Describe methods for processing data prior to and during analysis, including transcription, data entry, data management and security, verification of data integrity, data coding and anonymization / de-identification of excerpts.
Data analysis	Describe the process by which inferences, themes, etc. were identified and developed, including the researchers involved in data analysis; usually references a specific paradigm or approach. Describe why you chose this process.
Techniques to enhance trustworthiness	Describe any techniques to enhance trustworthiness and credibility of data analysis,(e.g., member checking, triangulation, audit trail). Describe why you chose these techniques.
Results
Synthesis and interpretation	Describe the main findings (e.g., interpretations, inferences, and themes); might include development of a theory or model, or integration with prior research or theory.
Links to empirical data	Provide evidence (e.g., quotes, field notes, text excerpts, photographs) to substantiate analytic findings.
Discussion
Integration with prior work, implications, transferability, and contribution(s) to the field	Summarize the main findings, explain how findings and conclusions connect to, support, elaborate on, or challenge conclusions of earlier scholarship; discuss the scope of application/generalizability; identify unique contribution(s) to scholarship in a discipline or field.
Limitations	Discuss the trustworthiness and limitations of findings
Other
Conflicts of interest	Describe any potential sources of influence or perceived influence on study conduct and conclusions. Describe how these were managed.
Funding	Describe sources of funding and other support. Describe the role of funders in data collection, interpretation, and reporting.

How this reporting guideline was made

SRQR was made through a rigorous, evidence based process and originally published as an academic article. The UK EQUATOR Centre then worked with SRQR’s developers to make it easier to use by clarifying language, adding definitions, examples, extra information and resources. Although worded differently, the guidance on this website is conceptually the same as the original publication and can be used interchangeably. Read more about SRQR’s development in the FAQ.

How to cite this reporting guideline

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If you used the SRQR reporting guideline, writing guide, or checklist to write a publication, please state so in your methods section so that other authors can find these resources too. E.g.,

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Read more about citing SRQR in the FAQ.

We like publishing transparent research because we think it’s more likely to be used and cited. That’s why we ask authors to use reporting guidelines.

Robin Lavery

Editor, International Journal of World Medicine

The set of beliefs and assumptions that guide the research process. These commonly include positivist, post-positivist, constructivist or interpretivist, and critical theory. Qualitative research generally draws from a post-positivist or constructivist/interpretivist paradigm.”

Data collection instruments include (but are not limited to) interview or focus group guides, observational protocols and prompts for field notes, and data extraction or coding protocols for selection and analysis of documents, photographs, videos, or other artifacts”

A term drawn from quantitative research, bias technically means a systematic error, where a particular research finding deviates from a ‘true’ finding. This might come about through errors in the manner of interviewing, or by errors in sampling. In qualitative research this is a problematic concept, since by definition the qualitative researcher is part of the process, and all researchers are different. This human factor has been said to be both the greatest strength and the greatest weakness of qualitative method. What can be done in commercial qualitative research, however, is to minimise obvious and avoidable sources of bias, for example by not confining all the fieldwork to one social group or geographic location, by taking steps to recognise the personal views of the researcher, (using techniques such as bracketing), and by working in teams.

Several sampling strategies are commonly used in qualitative research, although most fall under the umbrella of purposeful (or purposive) sampling.

Purposeful sampling means that participants, documents, or events are selected for their relevance to the research question, based on guiding theory or experiences and assumptions of the researchers. Over the course of the research process, researchers may determine that additional or different participants, documents, or events should be included to address the research question.

Other sampling techniques, such as theoretical sampling (seeking examples of theoretical constructs), snowball sampling (using study participants to identify additional participants who meet study criteria), and convenience sampling (including any volunteers with no or minimal criteria for inclusion) may be appropriate depending on the question and approach, so long as the authors provide explanation and justification.

A qualitative “approach” is a general way of thinking about conducting qualitative research. It describes, either explicitly or implicitly, the purpose of the qualitative research, the role of the researcher(s), the stages of research, and the method of data analysis. Commonly used approaches include ethnography, grounded theory, case study, phenomenology, and narrative research.

Data collection methods include (but are not limited to) interviews, focus groups, observations (direct or indirect via video), and review of written text, photographs, and other documents or materials.

Qualitative research often occurs as an iterative process, meaning that researchers begin data analysis before they complete data collection. The data collection and analysis process may occur in phases or stages. As part of an iterative collection-analysis process, researchers will often alter their data collection methods to explore their preliminary impressions in greater depth and/or actively pursue confirming and disconfirming perspectives.

The start and end dates for data collection and analysis.

The scientific description of peoples and cultures with their customs, habits, and mutual differences.

The SRQR reporting guideline for writing qualitative research articles

How to use this reporting guideline

Applicability criteria

Item order and priority

Summary of guidance

How this reporting guideline was made

How to cite this reporting guideline

Research paradigm

Instruments

Bias

Sampling strategy

Approach

Data collection methods

Iterative

Study period

Ethnography

Grounded theory

Degree of participation

Unit of analysis

Reflexivity

Transferability

Generalizability

Analytic findings

Frequency counts

Reporting Guidelines are recommendations to help describe your work clearly