Data Transcription

Concerning the transcription, there are a few considerations:

  • Is your transcription partial or full? It is verbatim; in Chinese or English?
  • It is helpful to include initial utterances of your participants and develop your own transcription notes
    • Whispering and pauses (may indicate that the topic is sensitive)
    • Lengthy pauses in answering a question could indicate potential disagreement
  • Leave wide margin when using computer programs (for note taking purpose)
  • Always include the date and details of the interview and the interview context (and also who did the coding if it is a group work)
  • Use a meaningful filename for effective documentation
  • You should first try to transcribe everything you recorded  before conducting analysis