Uwe Flick

Freie Universität Berlin | FUB · Institute of Education

Because their disease is largely managed in the private environment, people with chronic conditions perform “chronic homework.” The environment with which self-management is coordinated forms a kind of “chronic care infrastructure” in dealing with the disease and, in the case of young adults with chronic conditions (YACCs), is essentially formed by...

Purpose: Many young adults living with chronic illness fear being perceived as different by their peers and excluded from social activities. This forces them to consider whether to disclose or conceal their illness. This article analyses young adults' disclosure strategies and links them to peers' understanding of illness. Materials and methods:...

Zusammenfassung Hintergrund Junge Erwachsene mit chronischen Erkrankungen gelten als Gruppe, die durch Corona gefährdet ist. Ob und wie die Betroffenen sich zu schützen versuchen, welche Risikowahrnehmungen sie verdeutlichen und wie der Lockdown erlebt wird, dazu mangelt es an Erkenntnissen primär im deutschen Sprachraum. Ziele und Fragestellung...

Introduction: Forcibly displaced people are at particular risk of mental health problems and also face specific integration challenges upon resettlement. Existing literature suggests that there may be a bidirectional relationship between mental health and integration. The present study seeks to understand the relationship between integration proces...

Background Because refugees face significant adversities before, during, and after resettlement, resilience is of central importance to this population. However, strengths-based research on post-migration refugee experiences is sparse. Methods We conducted semi-structured interviews with 54 adult refugee participants who arrived in Germany between...

In Germany as elsewhere, the Covid-19 pandemic has provoked a severe crisis for the economy, the labour market, social life and public administration. This article explores how refugees, who have accessed the labour market prior to the crisis, are affected by the current situation. Focusing on the crisis-shaken labour market as a juncture for integ...

Zur Bestimmung der Qualität qualitativer Forschung werden verschiedene Ansätze verfolgt, z. B. die Anwendung „klassischer“ Kriterien (Validität, Reliabilität, Objektivität) oder deren Reformulierung an den Prinzipien qualitativer Forschung orientiert, für die als Beispiel die kommunikative Validierung behandelt wird. Darüber hinaus werden neue meth...

Die Triangulation von Methoden, Theorien, Daten und Forschenden wird in ihrer Geschichte, den maßgeblichen Diskussionen und Ansätzen vorgestellt. Dabei werden Kombinationen von Methoden, aber auch die Triangulation innerhalb einer Methode am Beispiel des episodischen Interviews behandelt. Triangulation wird dabei den Ansätzen der Mixed Methods-Fors...

In view of the growing population, which is increasingly aging in diversity, questions of social justice and of avoiding discrimination in end of life nursing care become increasingly more relevant from an ethical point of view. This article addresses the discrepancies between normative claims of an equitable approach to provision of nursing servic...

What means qualitative inquiry in the public sphere? What are public spheres for qualitative inquiry? First, to transgress the disciplinary boundaries of qualitative inquiry. Second, to identify research problems of societal relevance and target groups affected. Third, to make our results accessible for public audiences—how we write about our resea...

Über die erfolgreiche Vermittlung von Geflüchteten in den Arbeitsmarkt und die Bedingungen gelingender, bedarfsdeckender und nachhaltiger Übergänge in Arbeit für diese Gruppe in Deutschland liegen bislang kaum Erkenntnisse vor. Doch welche Faktoren erleichtern oder behindern die Übergänge in Erwerbsarbeit entscheidend? Als besondere Herausforderung...

Arbeitsmarktteilhabe spielt eine zentrale Rolle für gesellschaftliche Integration und soziale Anerkennung von Geflüchteten. Die Aufnahme einer Erwerbstätigkeit führt häufig zunächst nicht in stabile, existenzsichernde Vollzeitarbeitsverhältnisse, sondern in ›prekäre‹ Randgebiete des Arbeitsmarkts. Angesichts der Unterschiede der Bildungsbiographien...

Despite active aging discourses and labor force integration goals, unemployment and dependency on welfare institutions among older workers still prevails, especially among vulnerable groups like immigrants or women. However, little is known about how older immigrants understand or cope with unemployment. The present study investigates the interplay...

The public discourse on the integration of refugees into the German society and the labor market in Germany in particular is polarized. How does the transition of refugees to work can be made possible and how does it currently take place? There is little evidence, how refugees can be successfully placed on the labor market. Exemplary qualitative ca...

Qualitative inquiry in the public sphere is discussed with a study concerning intercultural palliative care. For the case of Russian-speaking immigrants in Germany, language problems in care are analyzed as an issue of organizational ethics. Interviews with this target group originally addressing barriers of access to professional care are reanalyz...

Eine der jüngsten soziologischen Perspektiven auf die Anorexie, die die zeitlichen und räumlichen Dimensionen der magersüchtigen Praktiken untersucht, greift auf Bourdieus Theorie des Habitus und des sozialen Raums (1979, 1980) und auf Beckers Analyse der ‘deviante Karriere’ (1961) zurück (Darmon 2003). Hierbei werden vier Phasen des ‘magersüchtig...

Qualitative inquiry always used various kinds of data for understanding social issues and participants’ perspectives. Research and methodologies were debated for what data are adequate for studying social justice issues. Current challenges for concepts of data are new, for example, virtual and digital data, question traditional data (interviews, et...

When a disease turns terminal, end-of-life care replaces questions of cure and healing. Patients and relatives face the transition from health care to end-of-life care and the decision for a type of care (family, hospital, hospice). When people with a specific cultural background tend not to use available institutional support, the question of barr...

Integration of immigrants is a major political and societal topic in societies such as Germany, although there are different ideas about when integration is achieved. For analyzing integration from the immigrants’ points of view, data triangulation of talking (episodic interviews addressing migration histories) and walking (mobile methods—go-alongs...

Current politics in Western European countries, as well as in the US under Trump, try to work with symbolic and social barriers between majority populations and migrant communities. In this context, discrimination of cultural communities in areas such as health and welfare, social justice, and accessibility of institutional support can intensify fe...

In some cases, focus groups are used as a stand-alone method, but they are also frequently combined with other approaches. When designing a study, a combination of focus groups and individual interviews may be selected because they afford access to different aspects of the phenomenon under study (with focus groups being included in order to provide...

Kindertageseinrichtungen befinden sich aktuell in differenten Veränderungsprozessen, die eine Beschäftigung mit der Bedeutung von Führung bedeutsam machen. Ein unternehmerischer Blick, wie er bereits in anderen Ländern (bspw. USA und England) sichtbar wird, ist in Deutschland noch neu. Ansatzpunkt für Innovation kann die Beschäftigung mit dem Begri...

Zusammenfassung In diesem Kommentar zu Ronald Hitzler (2016) wird die Frage aufgeworfen, ob die von Hitzler vorgeschlagene Distinktion zwischen qualitativer und interpretativer Sozialforschung disziplinintern einen systematischen Fortschritt bringt. Gleichzeitig wird die These aufgestellt, dass diese Distinktion negative Effekte auf die Verortung q...

The present study explores views on aging and how these differ according to gender and precariousness status. Semistructured interviews were conducted with 10 men and 10 women with secure and insecure pensions. Themes like fear of illness and health decline were more present in men, while fear of losing their attractiveness in old age more present...

Critiques about the development in mixed-methods research (MMR) by some of its protagonists mention the following: ignorance of earlier developments, too much focus on designs rather than issues, more a metaphor than a mode of research, the belief in paradigms, and too much focus on methods instead of theoretical and methodological issues. Myths an...

Discussions around constructing a new critical qualitative inquiry need to reflect challenges on three levels: (a) Inquiry can be critical about the issues under study—a social or political problem to be addressed in a critical perspective; (b) critical approaches to methods and approaches in current research—other forms (e.g., quantitative researc...

Migration is an issue for many countries. It affects several areas of social problems, for example, work and unemployment. A relevant issue to study in the context of unemployment and social welfare is, “Which are experiences of migrants with different language backgrounds in finding work and support?” For a running study with episodic interviews a...

La théorie des représentations sociales se caractérise par la diversité de ses approches, des niveaux d'analyse et par conséquent des outils méthodologiques à la disposition du chercheur (Bauer & Gaskell, 1999). Nombreuses sont les recherches utilisant la théorie des représentations sociales qui recourent ainsi à différentes méthodes de manière sim...

Preparing for positive aging is shaped by the social context a person lives in. The present qualitative study explores and compares representations about preparatory actions in precarious workers (i.e., with temporary job contracts and insecure pension plans) and individuals with secure pension plans living in Germany. It also examines, the discrep...

Purpose of the study: Precariousness, defined as low income combined with lack of security for retirement, can influence the way people grow old and result in health inequalities in old age. Design and methods: A sequential mixed methods approach was used to identify differences in behavioral (physical activity), social (social network), and psy...

Precariousness, defined as job insecurity and uncertain financial perspectives for retirement, might shape the kind of views that individuals imagine to represent a positive old age. The present study explored and compared positive views on aging in two different categories of middle-aged Germans. Interviews were conducted with middle-aged individu...

How the social and institutional context is structured and represented by its actors has an impact on positive aging representations. This qualitative study explores professionals' views on positive aging, how they promote positive aging in their practice and what disparities occur between their discourses and the actual practice of promoting posit...

After 20 years of Qualitative Inquiry, some current trends and challenges are outlined, which might affect the current state and further development of qualitative research in the near future. A central focus is their impact on the politics of qualitative research. Politics of inquiry addressing problems of societal relevance are challenged by the...

One Research Program – Multiple Methods From the earliest stages of the theory, social representations have been studied using different methodological approaches. Instead of linking concept and method in a monogamous way, a research program was pursued by using a variety of rather different methods. Qualitative Methods and Social Representations...

Migrants from former Soviet Union countries (FSU) with alcohol and drug problems are a target group that, despite strong needs, is "hard to reach" for the health care system. Why do migrants refrain from accepting long-term addiction-specific help? Which are their experiences, when they turn to the help system? In an ongoing study funded by the Ger...

The social and institutional context has an impact on positive aging. An increasing demand of care services to promote positive aging creates a need to clearly define what the role of health professionals is and howthey should go about promoting healthy aging. The chapter aims to explore the positive views on aging of health professionals (e.g., do...

The issue of methods in social representations theory has proved contentious for some time, although we would argue that the focus of this discussion has shifted in recent years. During the 1980s and 1990s much criticism centred on the supposed lack of focus on methods in early considerations of social representations, and an alleged methodological...

Understanding qualitative inquiry as a global endeavor leads to several challenges. First, we still live in different worlds of qualitative research—There are local traditions with limited exchanges. This has to do not only with language barriers but also with political and scientific contexts, in which research is embedded. These differences compl...

Understanding qualitative inquiry as a global endeavor and using it in a globalizing context leads to several challenges. Differences in concepts of what qualitative research is may become visible. Methods like interviews may have a different connotation in other cultures, where our interviewees come from. We may have to conduct and analyze intervi...

Age-related changes in sleep physiology, frequent occurrence of health impairments, and a sedentary lifestyle make nursing home residents particularly vulnerable to sleep disturbances. Despite the high prevalence of sleep disturbances in nursing homes, there is a lack of research concerning the use of non-pharmacological approaches for improving re...

Anliegen: Welche Versorgungsvorstellungen haben Migranten aus der früheren Sowjetunion mit Alkohol- oder Drogenproblemen, wie decken sich diese mit den Sichten des Hilfesystems? Methode: Episodische Interviews mit 46 Migranten, Experteninterviews mit 33 Mitarbeitern des Hilfesystems. Analyse: Thematisches Kodieren. Ergebnisse: Für Betroffene und Ex...

Günter Mey: Wir haben uns – nachdem wir bereits 2006 die „Frage des Lehrens und Lernens von qualitativ-sozialwissenschaftlicher Forschungsmethodik“ im Rahmen eines Symposium diskutiert haben – nun, nicht nur, aber auch vor dem Hintergrund der Proteste angesichts der Bologna-Reform – entschieden, die Frage der Lehr-/Lernbarkeit erneut zu debattieren...

Fragestellung: Die seit Ende 2013 aus dem Programm des BMBF zur Versorgungsforschung geforderte Studie untersucht die Versorgungssituation von Migrant_innen aus russischsprachigen Landern am Ende ihres Lebens. Es gibt Hinweise aus der Versorgungspraxis, dass Angebote der Hospiz- und Palliativversorgung aufgrund von Barrieren (z.B. fehlende Informat...

Das Symposium steht unter dem Rahmenthema: „Qualitative und quantitative Methoden in der Sozialforschung: Differenz oder Einheit – Differenz und Einheit?“. Quantitative und qualitative Sozialforschung – das ist ein Begriffspaar, das in der Geschichte der modernen Sozialwissenschaften schon lange und bis heute eine wichtige – nicht unbedingt glückli...

Nowadays people are growing old in a context where youth culture is the norm and where self-initiative is required in order to prepare for a good old age. However, planning old age may be more difficult for certain social groups with insecure work and living conditions. Precariousness, defined as bad financial conditions but also as having an insec...

Notes toward a theory of qualitative data analysis ‘Theory of qualitative data analysis’ can be interpreted in a number of ways. There has been a great deal written about using substantive theory – theories about the phenomena being investigated – in doing qualitative research (e.g., Anyon, 2009; Dressman, 2008; Flinders and Mills, 1994), and such...

Hintergrund Ziel der vorliegenden Untersuchung war es, den Einsatz von Hypnotika und anderen Psychopharmaka bei Schlafstörungen im Pflegeheim abzuschätzen. Patienten und Methoden Für diese Sekundäranalyse wurden klinische Zustandsdaten der Bewohner aus einem geriatrischen Assessment (Resident Assessment Instrument 2.0) mit medikationsbedingten Abre...

Das Nationale Zentrum Frühe Hilfen die Alice-Salomon-Hochschule und den Kronberger Kreis mit dem Forschungs- und Praxisentwicklungsprojekt „Aus Fehlern lernen – Qualitätsmanagement im Kinderschutz". Im Rahmen des Projekts wurde die Bedeutung der Partizipation von Kindern und Jugendlichen im Kinderschutz deutlich. Vor diesem Hintergrund wurde die v...

Sleep disorders are common among nursing home residents. However, the possible involvement of psychological factors has been given little attention up until now. We investigated nursing home residents' perspective on psychological factors and sleep disorders within the nursing home environment. We conducted a qualitative interview study comprising...

This paper aims to elucidate how global ecological problems (such as climate change) affect everyday knowledge and practices in different sociocultural contexts. A qualitative research design based on interviews and focus groups was applied in France and in Germany. Results show that 1) causes and consequences of climate change remain unfamiliar in...

In Germany, utilisation of ambulatory healthcare services is high compared with other countries: While a study based on the process data of German statutory health insurances showed an average of 17.1 physician-patient-contacts per year, the comparable figure for Norway is about five. The usual models of healthcare utilisation, such as Rosenstock's...

Background Sleep disorders are common among nursing home residents. However, the possible involvement of psychological factors has been given little attention up until now. We investigated nursing home residents’ perspective on psychological factors and sleep disorders within the nursing home environment. Materials and methods We conducted a qualit...

Dieser Band stellt die Ergebnisse des ersten umfassenden Fehlerforschungs- und Qualitätsentwicklungsprojekts im kommunalen Kinderschutz in Deutschland vor. Die AutorInnen zeigen auf, welche Bedingungen zu professionellen Fehlschlägen im Kinderschutz führen können und wie man im Dialog mit allen Akteuren aus diesen Fehlern lernen kann.

The percentage of nursing home residents treated with hypnotic medications is high, as many authors report, despite the fact that such medications are almost always associated with undesirable effects for old people. This article takes a closer look at nursing home physicians' views of prescriptions when treating sleep disorders of nursing home res...

Nursing home residents often suffer from sleep disorders. For nurses, nursing home residents' sleep disorders are a complex problem. The nursing home residents' perspective on sleep and sleep disorders has been unknown yet. The Aim of this article is to describe external barriers to good sleep from the nursing home residents' perspective and to ded...

Climate change is a major current affair for which recent United Nations climate conferences aim to build consensus and develop international solutions. The objective of this article is to compare, through the theoretical lens of social representations, the way in which French and German media, specifically newspapers, represent the Bali climate co...

This article demonstrates how a systematic triangulation of research perspectives can provide a methodological framework for the practice of mixed methods research. The authors illustrate the application of a “systematic approach” by focusing on an in-depth case study concerning the management of sleeping problems in nursing homes. Two sources of q...

Sleep disorders are a relevant problem in the nursing home and difficult to treat for the residents' GPs. No intervention has yet addressed psychological factors contributing to nursing home residents' sleep disorders. To explore what nursing home residents perceive as psychological barriers to sleeping well. A qualitative research design. We condu...

To explore the nursing home residents' self-perceived resources for good sleep. A qualitative research design. Episodic interviews were conducted, and analysis was done using thematic coding. Five German nursing homes from different providers. Thirty nursing home residents who were at least 64 years old and oriented to place and person. The nursing...

Introduction: Nursing home residents often suffer from sleep disorders. In Germany, family practitioners usually care for nursing home residents. There are narrow therapeutic possibilities to treat nursing home residents with sleep disorders due to multimorbidity and polypharmacy. Thus, our study aims to explore the nursing home residents' demands...

Introduction: Nursing home residents often suffer from sleep disorders. In Germany, family practitioners usually care for nursing home residents. There are narrow therapeutic possibilities to treat nursing home residents with sleep disorders due to multimorbidity and polypharmacy. Thus, our study aims to explore the nursing home residents’ demands...

Forschung in der sozialen Arbeit ist häufig mit komplexen Problemen und komplexen Lebenslagen beschäftigt. Fragstellungen in der Jugendhilfeforschung bspw. reichen in der Regel über den ‘Fall’ des Jugendlichen hinaus, für eine angemessene Bearbeitung ist häufig die Einbeziehung institutionell-professioneller Sichtweisen oder derjenigen im Umfeld (E...

Subjektives Wissen über einen bestimmten Bereich wird in der qualitativen Forschung in der Regel über Interviews mit mehr oder minder offenen Fragen erhoben. Subjektive Erfahrungen und Verläufe des eigenen Lebens aufgrund eines bestimmten Ereignisses oder Prozesses – bspw. eine Erkrankung oder deren Chronifizierung – werden häufig über Erzählungen,...

In der sozialen Arbeit ist empirische Forschung häufig mit dem Ziel verbunden, die Lebenssituation sozial benachteiligter Gruppen besser zu verstehen, um daraus zielgruppen- und lebensweisenspezifische Angebote abzuleiten. Die Lebenssituation von Jugendlichen und jungen Erwachsenen ‚auf der Straße’ gilt in verschiedener Hinsicht als problematisch....

Die methodische und methodologische Diskussion war lange Zeit von einer scharfen Distinktionsargumentation geprägt, die vor allem die unterschiedlichen theoretischen, epistemologischen und forschungspraktischen Ansatzpunkte von qualitativer und quantitativer Forschung hervorhob. In der amerikanischen Diskussion wurde dies mit dem Schlagwort von den...

Ethnographie als Forschungsstrategie (vgl. Hirschauer/Amann 1997; Angrosino 2007) ist in den letzten Jahren an die Stelle der Teilnehmenden Beobachtung getreten (vgl. Lüders 2000a: 384) – zumindest was die methodische Diskussion angeht. Schon für die Teilnehmende Beobachtung hat Denzin (1989: 157-158) die Triangulation verschiedener Methoden als Ch...

Vereinfacht ausgedrückt bezeichnet der Begriff der Triangulation, dass ein Forschungsgegenstand von (mindestens) zwei Punkten aus betrachtet — oder konstruktivistisch formuliert: konstituiert — wird. In der Regel wird die Betrachtung von zwei und mehr Punkten aus durch die Verwendung verschiedener methodischer Zugänge realisiert (vgl. Kapitel 3). D...

General practitioners (GPs) have a key role in providing preventive care, particularly for elderly patients. However, various factors can inhibit or promote the implementation of preventive care. In the present study, we identified and examined factors that inhibit and promote preventive care by German GPs, particularly for elderly patients, and as...