Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Bringing life “back into life course research”: using the life grid as a research instrument for qualitative data collection and analysis

  • Published:
Quality & Quantity Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Life course research has been more or less dominated by quantitative methods of data analysis. The debate on life course methods has been vigorous but chiefly focused on two competing quantitative paradigms: complex descriptive analysis of sequences (in particular through sequence analysis and optimal matching) and statistical procedures that analyse the timing predictors of such events (in particular through event history analysis techniques). Recently, an important article argued that it was necessary to bring the “course” back into life course research, advocating the need to embrace complex descriptions of the order and sequence of events, which involves putting the event history analysis approach aside and focusing on social, family and work trajectories (Aisenbrey and Fasang in Sociol Methods Res 38(3):420–462, 2010). In this article, on the basis of empirical evidence and practice (Nico 2011, Nico and Van der Vaart 2012), we aim to take this argument further. Taking life, i.e. processes and stories (Becker in Sociol Quart 35(2):183–194, 1994), into consideration in the analysis of the life course unquestionably and inevitably involves the admission of qualitative data. While not dismissing but rather using the importance of chronological event data, this qualitative data includes the meanings and narratives of individuals on the matters of their own trajectories, the causal or emotional relationship between events, and the relevance and impact of certain events on the direction of their lives. For this purpose, we present and discuss the potential and procedures of the life grid—initially and primarily used to support the quantitative collection of longitudinal data—as an instrument for qualitative data collection and analysis.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Subscribe and save

Springer+ Basic
$34.99 /Month
  • Get 10 units per month
  • Download Article/Chapter or eBook
  • 1 Unit = 1 Article or 1 Chapter
  • Cancel anytime
Subscribe now

Buy Now

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. Objective information as it is related, as far as possible, to “facts”: ages at which events and changes of status occur. However, this objective information is still collected through (subjective) memory processes; it is not collected (additionally or exclusively) from archives or official documentation. Nonetheless, for the sake of the thesis of this argument, the distinction in the nature of the information collected is based on this criterion.

References

  • Abbott, A.: Time Matters: On Theory and Method. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, IL (2001)

    Google Scholar 

  • Abbott, Andrew, Tsay, Angela: Sequence Analysis and Optimal Matching Methods in Sociology. Sociol Methods Res 29(1), 3–33 (2000)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Aisenbrey, Silke, Fasang, Anette E.: New life for old ideas: the “second wave” of sequence analysis bringing the “course” back into the life course. Sociol Methods Res 38(3), 420–462 (2010)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Atkinson, P.: Qualitative research: unity and diversity. Forum: Qual. Soc. Res. 6(3), article 26 (2005)

  • Atkinson, P., Silverman, D.: Kundera’s immortality: the interview society and the invention of the self. Qual. Inq. 3(3), 304–325 (1997)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Beck, U.: Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity. Sage, London (1992)

    Google Scholar 

  • Becker, H.S.: ‘Foi por acaso’: conceptualizing coincidence. Sociol. Quart. 35(2), 183–194 (1994)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Berney, L., Blane, D.: The life grid method of collecting retrospective information from people at older ages. Res. Policy Plan. 21(2), 13–22 (2003)

    Google Scholar 

  • Blane, D.B.: Collecting retrospective data: development of a reliable method and a pilot study of its use. Soc. Sci. Med. 42(5), 751–757 (1996)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Blossfeld, H-P, Rohwer, G: Techniques of Event History Modeling. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, New Jersey (2002)

    Google Scholar 

  • Bourdieu, P.: Razões práticas: Sobre a teoria da acção [The logic of practice]. Oeiras: Celta (1997 [1994])

  • Chamberlayne, P., Bornat, J., Wengraft, T.: Introduction: the biographical turn. In: Chamberlayne, P., Bornat, J., Wengraft, T. (eds.) The Turn to Biographical Methods in Social Science: Comparative Issues and Examples. Routledge, London (2000)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Clausen, J.A.: Life reviews and life stories. In: Giele, J.Z., Elder Jr, J.H. (eds.) Methods of Life Course Research: Qualitative and Quantitative Approaches. Sage, Thousand Oaks, CA (1998)

    Google Scholar 

  • Cohler, B.J., Hostetler, A.: Linking life course and life story: social change and the narrative study of lives over time. In: Mortimer, J.T., Shanahan, M.J. (eds.) Handbook of the Life course. Kluwer, New York, NY (2002)

    Google Scholar 

  • Conde, I.: Falar da vida (I) [Talking about life]. Sociologia, Problemas e Práticas 14, 199–222 (1993a)

    Google Scholar 

  • Conde, I.: Problemas e Virtudes na defesa da biografia [Problems and virtues in the defense of the biographical method]. Sociologia, Problemas e Práticas 13, 39–57 (1993b)

    Google Scholar 

  • Denzin, N.K., Lincoln, Y.S.: The Landscape of Qualitative Research: Theories and Issues. California, Thousand Oaks, CA (1998)

    Google Scholar 

  • Elder, G.H., Johnson, M.K., Crosnoe, R.: The emergence and development of life course theory. In: Mortimer, Jeylan T., Shanahan, Michael J. (eds.) Handbook of the Life Course. Kluwer Academic Publications, New York (2002)

    Google Scholar 

  • Evers, J.: From the past into the future. How technological developments change our ways of data collection, transcription and analysis. Forum Qual. Social Res. 12(1) (2011)

  • Fielding, N.G.: The resurgence, legitimation and institutionalization of qualitative methods. In: Bergman, M.M., Thomas, S.E. (eds.) Qualitative Inquiry. Swiss Academy of Humanities and Social Sciences, Bern (2004)

    Google Scholar 

  • Freedman, D., Thornton, A., Camburn, D., Alwin, D., De Marco, L.Y.: The life history calendar: a technique for collecting retrospective data. Sociol. Methodol. 18, 37–68 (1988)

  • George, L.K.: Sociological perspectives on life transitions. Ann. Rev. Sociol. 19, 353–364 (1993)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ghiglione, R., Matalon, B.: O inquérito: Teoria e prática. Celta, Oeiras (1997)

    Google Scholar 

  • Giddens, A.: Modernity and Self-identity: Self and Society in the Late Modern Age. Polity, Cambridge (1991)

    Google Scholar 

  • Giele, J.Z.: Innovation in the typical life course. In: Giele, Janet Z., Elder Jr, G.H. (eds.) Methods of Life Course research. Qualitative and Quantitative Approaches. Sage, California (1998)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Glasner, T., Van der Vaart, W.: Applications of calendar instruments in social surveys: a review. Qual. Quant. 43, 333–349 (2009)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gobo, G.: The renaissance of qualitative methods. Forum Qual. Social Res. 6(3) (2005)

  • Henderson, S., Holland, J., McGrellis, S., Harper, S. & Thomson, R.: Inventing Aduldhoods. A Biographical Approach to Youth Transitions. London: Sage (2009 [2007])

  • Karweit, N., Kertzer, D.: Data organization and conceptualization. In: Giele, J.Z., Elder Jr., G.H. (eds.) Methods of Life Course Research. Qualitative and quantitative approaches. Sage, Thousand Oaks, CA (1998)

    Google Scholar 

  • Kelle, U.: Capabilities for theory building and hypothesis testing in software for computer aided qualitative analysis. Data Arch. Bull. 65 (1997)

  • Lahire, B.: Retratos sociológicos. Disposições e variações individuais [Sociological portraits. Individual dispositions and variations]. Porto Alegre: Artmed (2004 [2002])

  • Laub, J.H., Sampson, R.J.: Integrating quantitative and qualitative data. In: Giele, Janet Z., Elder Jr., Glen H. (eds.) Methods of Life Course Research. Qualitative and Quantitative Approaches. Sage, California (1998)

    Google Scholar 

  • Lopes, J.T.: Razão, corpo e sentimento na teoria social contemporânea’ [Reason, body and feeling in contemporary social theory]. Sociologia 12, 57–64 (2002)

    Google Scholar 

  • Mason, J.: Six strategies for mixing methods and linking data in social science research. NCRM Working Paper Series, 4/2006 (2006a)

  • Mason, J.: Mixing methods in a qualitatively driven way. Qual. Res. 6(1), 9–25 (2006)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Miller, R.: Using family histories to understand the intergenerational transmission of chronic poverty. CPRC Working Paper 103, Chronic Poverty Research Center (2007). www.isn.ethz.ch/isn/Digital-Library/Publications/Detail/?ots591=0c54e3b3-1e9c-be1e-2c24-a6a8c7060233&lng=en&id=127436

  • Mills, M.: Introducing Survival and Event History Analysis. Sage, London (2011)

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Pais, J.M.: Ganchos, tachos e biscates: Jovens, trabalho e futuro [(Idiomatic Expression): Young People, Work and Future]. Âmbar, Oporto (2001)

    Google Scholar 

  • Parry, O., Thomson, C., Fowkes, G. Life course data collection: Qualitative interviewing using the life grid. Sociol. Res. Online 4(2) (1999). www.socresonline.org.uk/4/2/parry.html. Accessed 12 May 2011

  • Pollock, G.: Contingent Identities: updating the Transitional Discourse. Young 10(1), 59–72 (2002)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Rustin, M.: Reflections on the biographical turn in social science. In: Chamberlayne, P., Bornat, J., Wengraft, T. (eds.) The Turn to Biographical Methods in Social Science: Comparative Issues and Examples. Routledge, London (2002)

    Google Scholar 

  • Smart, C.: Shifting Horizons. Reflections on Qualitative Methods. Feminist Theory 10(3), 295–308 (2009)

  • Scott, J., Alwin, D.: Retrospective versus prospective measurement of life histories in longitudinal research’. In: Giele, J.Z., Elder Jr, G.H. (eds.) Methods of Life Course Research: Qualitative and Quantitative Approaches. Sage, Thousand Oaks, CA (1998)

    Google Scholar 

  • Nico, M.: Transição biográfica inacabada. Transições para a vida adulta em Portugal e na Europa na Perspectiva do Curso de vida (Unfinished biographical Transition: Transitions to Adulthood in Portugal and Europe in the Life Course Perspective), PhD Thesis in Sociology, University Institute of Lisbon (2011)

  • Nico, M., Van der Vaart, W.: Between an "undoable science" and a "new kind of research": life course methods to study turning points and landmarks. In: Kunneman, H. (ed.) Good work: the ethics of craftsmanship, pp. 170–182. Humanistics University Press, Amsterdam (2012)

  • Shanahan, M.J., Porfeli, E.J.: Chance events in the life course. Adv. Life Course Res. 11, 97–119 (2007)

  • Shanahan, M.J., MacMillan, R.: Biography and the Sociological Imagination. Contexts and Contingencies. W. W. & Company Inc, New York (2008)

    Google Scholar 

  • Teixeira, A.N., Becker, F.: Novas possibilidades da pesquisa qualitativa via sistemas CAQDAS. Sociologias 3(5), 91–113 (2001)

    Google Scholar 

  • Thomas, W.I., Znaniecki, F.:The Polish Peasant in Europe and America. University of Illinois Press, Chicago (1984 [1928])

  • Thompson, P.: Researching family and social mobility with two eyes: some experiences of the interaction between qualitative and quantitative data. Int. J. Soc. Res. Methodol. 7(3), 237–257 (2004)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Thomson, Rachel: Unfolding Lives: Youth, Gender and Change. Polity Press, Bristol (2009)

    Google Scholar 

  • Van der Vaart, W.: The time-line as a device to enhance recall in standardized research interviews: a split ballot study. J. Off. Stat. 20(2), 301–318 (2004)

    Google Scholar 

  • Van der Vaart, W., Glasner, T., Belli, R. F.: The use of landmark events in HEC-interviews to enhance recall accuracy. AAPOR, 6280–6293 (2007)

  • Wengraf, T.: Uncovering the general from within the particular: from contingencies to typologies in the understanding of cases. In: Chamberlayne, P., Bornat, J., Wengraft, T. (eds.) The Turn to Biographical Methods in Social Science: Comparative Issues and Examples. Routledge, London (2000)

    Google Scholar 

  • Wilson, S., Cunningham-Burley, S., Bancroft, A., Backett-Milburn, K., Masters, H.: Young people, biographical narratives and the life grid: young people’s accounts of parental substance use. Qual. Res. 7(1), 135–151 (2007)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wu, L.L.: Some comments on “sequence analysis and optimal matching methods in sociology: review and prospect”. Sociol. Methods Res. 29(1), 41–64 (2000)

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Instituto Universitário de Lisboa (ISCTE-IUL), Centro de Investigação e Estudos de Sociologia (CIES-IUL), Edifício ISCTE, Av. das Forças Armadas, 1649-026, Lisbon, Portugal

    Magda Lalanda Nico

Authors
  1. Magda Lalanda Nico
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Magda Lalanda Nico.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Lalanda Nico, M. Bringing life “back into life course research”: using the life grid as a research instrument for qualitative data collection and analysis. Qual Quant 50, 2107–2120 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11135-015-0253-6

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11135-015-0253-6

Keywords

Search

Navigation