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Qualitative research examines life experiences (ie, the lived experience) in an effort to understand and give them meaning. This usually is done by systematically collecting and analyzing narrative materials using methods that ensure credibility of both the data and the results. Phenomenology is one of many types of qualitative research that examines the lived experiences of humans.1 Phenomenological researchers hope to gain understanding of the essential "truths" (ie, essences) of the lived experience. Examples of phenomenological research include exploring the lived experiences of women undergoing breast biopsy or the lived experiences of family members waiting for a loved one undergoing major surgery.
The term phenomenology often is used without a clear understanding of its meaning. Phenomenology has been described as a philosophy, methodology, and method.2 Furthering confusion, the term phenomenology has been used interchangeably with the term hermeneutics (ie, analyses of the written word).3 This column will provide a brief overview of phenomenological philosophy, methodology, and method.
PHENOMENOLOGICAL PHILOSOPHY
Phenomenologists believe that knowledge and understanding are embedded in our everyday world. In other words, they do not believe knowledge can be quantified or reduced to numbers or statistics.4 Phenomonologists believe that truth and understanding of life can emerge from people's life experiences. Although phenomenologists share this belief, they have developed more than one approach to gain understanding of human knowledge.
Before the seventeenth century, religion or nature often provided the basis for man's understanding of the world. Rene Descartes, however, articulated a split between man's mental being and his physical being. This viewpoint served as an impetus to link all knowledge to the realm of science. Scientists of that time heralded the scientific method, objectivity, and a fixed, orderly reality as the sole approach to knowledge discovery. Many early philosophers, however, found the scientific method too reductionistic, objective, and mechanistic; therefore, they advanced phenomenology as a preferred method to discover the meaning of life experiences.5
The father of phenomenology frequently is cited as Edmund Husserl.6 Husserl was a German philosopher as well as a mathematician.7 The works of Husserl, as well as those of Martin Heidegger, are cited in many nursing studies as the framework for the research approach and methods.8 Even though both philosophers are considered phenomenologists, their approaches to research and understanding life...