1. Narrative Research Designs Chapter 15
Stacy Gronsky
Jami O’Connor

2. What is Narrative Research?
Describes the lives of individuals
Gathers data through collecting stories
Reports individual experiences
Discuss the meaning of individual experiences
Form of qualitative research
Polkinghorne (2005) says that a narrative research design provides complementary knowledge: in-depth description, under-standing, and clarification of lived experience, with attention to specifics and complexity.
Patsiopoulos and Buchanan (2011) write that narrative research in its final account is representation of a multitude, storied through, and joint collaboration process between researchers and participant.
Patsiopoulos and Buchanan (2011) note that narrative research is a lens into how humans understand their lives within particular cultures and time.

3. The Centre for Narrative Research
~The Centre for Narrative Research is the leading international center for narrative work on social sciences (The Centre for Narrative Research, 2013). ~ Their goal is to bring researchers from all over the world into productive dialogue and develop innovative narrative research (The Centre for Narrative Research, 2013). ~ On the Centre for Narrative Research website there is a collection of papers and works in progress on narrative research design. ~ The papers found on the website include title’s like Reading Narratives, From Oral History to Narratives Research, and Analysis of Personal Narratives. ~ These papers offer a glimpse into the work that members and associates from the centre are working on. ~ The centre also produces a newsletter for current members, associates, and others interested in the conferences, seminars, papers, and books on narrative research. ~ For more information on the Centre for Narrative Research please go to (please copy and paste link)

4. When do you use Narrative Research?
How did Narrative Research develop?
When you have people willing to tell their stories and you want to report it (Creswell, 2012, pg. 502)
Stories follow a chronology of events
Qualitative approach that can be written in persuasive literary form
Focuses on individual stories
Researchers establish a bond with the participants
D. Jean Clandinin and Michael Connelly provided first overview of narrative research in 1990 for the field of education (Creswell, 2012, pg. 502)
This is a form of research that is still developing
The field of education had an impact on the development of narrative design by giving a voice to teacher’s experiences and stories
Other social scientist outside the field of education have increasingly offered procedural guidance for narrative reports as a form of qualitative research (Creswell, 2012, pg. 503)

5. Examples of the Types of Narrative Design Forms
Autobiographies
Biographies
Life Writing
Personal Narratives
Memoirs
Documents of life
Narrative Interviews
Person-Centered ethnographies

6. Five helpful questions in determining your type of narrative study….
Who writes or records the story? Biography or Autobiography How much of life is recorded or presented? Life history – entire life experience of the person Personal experience story- individuals personal experience in single or multiple experiences Who provides the story? Teachers’, administrators, children stories Is theoretical lens being used? Advocate for groups or individuals in the written report Can narrative forms be combined? Narrative forms can be combinations of different elements like biography, personal story, teacher’s story, etc.

7. Key Characteristics of Narrative Designs
There are seven characteristics of research often found in narrative design:
Individual experiences- social and personal interaction
Chronology of experiences- past, present, and future experiences
Collecting individual stories- life stories through oral account obtained through field data
Restorying- retelling from the fields texts
Coding for themes- coding the field text for themes or categories
Coding for setting- incorporating the place into the story or theme
Collaboration- occurs between the researcher and the participants in the study

8. Potential Ethical Issues in Gathering Stories
Is the story authentic?
When gathering stories, narrative researchers need to be cautious about the stories. Some common issues when gathering data using narrative research are:
The participant may “fake the data” wanting to provide a Pollyanna story or a story with a typical Hollywood ending
Participants may be traumatized from an incident making telling the story too horrific to report or too raw to recall
If individuals fear sanctions against them if they report their story
If a story has been buried too deeply into the subconscious to recall
Individuals base their stories on events that happened years ago, leading to distortion of events and providing inventions of past actions
Participant may be telling a story that they do not own. This requires researchers to obtain permission to report stories from the individual who lived the story.
Often times researchers run into the issue about whether the participants voice is lost in the final narrative report, researchers must make sure to extensive participants quotes and the precise language of the participants
Though distortion of data may occur in any research study and presents an issue for narrative researchers in particular because they rely heavily on self- reported information from participants. To help insure good data is collected:
The collection of multiple field texts The triangulation of data Member checking

9. Steps in Conducting a Narrative Study
Step 7: Validate the accuracy of the report
Step 6: Write a story about the participant’s experiences
Step 5: Collaborate with the participant-storyteller
Step 4: Restory or retell the individual’s story
Step 3: Collect the story from that individual
Step 2: Purposefully select an individual from whom you can learn about the phenomenon
Step 1: Identify a phenomenon to explore that addresses an educational problem

10. Evaluating a Narrative Study
In a high quality narrative study, the researcher: • Keeps the focus on a single individual (or two) •Reports the life experiences of individuals as told through their stories •Restories the individual’s stories and tells the story using a chronology with a beginning, middle and end (and possibly not in this order) •Describes in some details the contest of the story (i.e., the setting, the place where it occurs, the people involved and so forth) •Reports themes (5-7) to emerge out of a story •Closely collaborates with the participant providing the story and engages with the participant by having them check the evolving story frequently and examining the final story to see if it accurately reflects the individual’s experiences

11. Useful Information for Producers of Narrative Research
~Individuals planning on conducting a narrative study can employ the steps in the process described earlier in this review. ~Consider the type of narrative design you plan to use. Ask yourself the following question: Who provides the story? How much of life is recorded and presented? Who provides the story? Is a theoretical lens being used? Can narrative forms be combined? ~The three steps used in restorying provide a structure for processing a transcript and developing a retelling of the participant’s story. ~As you listen to a participant’s story, consider some of the potential issues that may arise, such as whether the story is authentic, whether data are distorted, whether individuals can tell the story and who owns the story.

12. Useful Information for Consumers of Narrative Research
*Consumers can review the steps in the research process described in this review to determine how narrative inquirers conduct a study.
*The evaluation criteria discussed in this review can be used to assess the quality of a narrative study.
*When narrative researchers conduct an inquiry, they need to report that they have checked the accuracy of their findings. Look for reports about triangulating data, member checking, or providing disconfirming evidence for themes.

13. The Practice of Self-Compassion in Counseling: A Narrative Inquiry
Article Review:
Our group selected the study by Patsiopoulos and Buchanan because it uses narrative design to investigate how counselors practice self compassion in counseling.
The research article focusses on the premise that counselor development might be absent from self-care practices.
The research question posed in the article is how do experienced counselors practice self compassion?
The researchers note a gap in research on the construct of self-compassion as a means of enhancing counselors well being and mitigating the effects of job related stress (Patsiopoulos and Buchanan 2011).
A narrative research design was used to investigate how 15 counselors practice self-compassion in counseling.
The research process that Patsiopoulos and Buchanan used involved a screening interview and two additional interviews by telephone.
The participants were asked questions the following questions:
“Could you tell me how you practice self-compassion in the context of your work as a counselor?”
“Tell me about a recent challenging counseling-related
situation when you approached yourself with self-compassion.”
“What is important to you as a counselor about being self-
compassionate?”
The researcher used a validation process to verify the trustworthiness of the narratives analysis. This was done by by member-checking, the cross-narrative thematic findings were ed to the participants to with the option to provide further feedback, and peer review was used to asses the quality of the results (Patsiopoulos and Buchanan 2011).
The findings of the study resulted in three themes
Counselors’ Stances in Session,
Workplace Relational Ways of Being
Finding that Balance through Self-Care Strategies
It was a learning experience to read a study that uses narrative design. It was useful to see how that researches went about finding literature on the counseling profession to finding counselors to interview and analyzing their responses. This article will be useful to someone using narrative research design as an example how a particular study like this is completed.

14. Please see our discussion thread for comments on Narrative Research Designs

15. References
Creswell, J. W., & , (2012). Educational research, planning, conducting, and evaluating quantitative and qualitative research. (4th ed.). Boston, MA: Addison-Wesley. Polkinghorne, D. E. (2005). Language and meaning: Data collection in qualitative research. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 52,137–145 Patsiopoulos, A. & Buchanan, B. (2011). The practice of self-compassion in counseling: A narrative inquiry. American Psychological Association.42:4, 301–307. The Centre for Narrative Research. (2013). Retrieved from