expressed by participants in every line of the data. You can code every key concept, idea, event, etc. For example, as opposed to developing a couple of codes for one paragraph, you may create 25 codes. Instead, you have to sort through page after page searching for where you coded something.Ĭoding in NVivo or another qualitative software program allows you the flexibility to code any size project (large or small) in more or less detail. Hand coding also takes more time to locate the coded data and does not allow you to easily query your data. On the other hand, depending on the coding approach you are using, less detail may suffice. One of the down falls is that hand coding does not allow you to see the breadth and depth of what emerges from your data as compared to using a software program. It allows you to code your data without having to purchase and learn a software program. Hand coding on paper is great for very small data sets. Here are some insights based on my experience. As a consultant, I have also used NVivo to analyze over 5000 client projects.

Over the past 16 years, I have trained students and researchers nationally and internationally to analyze their data in NVivo. I coded data by hand before learning about the benefits of using qualitative data analysis software. While many researchers still preform coding by hand on paper, a lot have switched to using qualitative data analysis software programs. NVivo training, NVivo consultant, Qualitative data analysis, Qualitative data analysis software, NVivo 11

Qualitative data coding software nvivo