Qualitative Research for Practical Theology

Book excerpt: Qualitative research fits naturally within the field of practical theology as it delves deeper into the essence of human experience and the meaning of lived experiences. With a great diversity of data collection and analysis methods, it provides a wide spectrum of resources to evaluate, explore, and understand and address issues related to practice, context, and application of Christian faith to everyday life. It is highly flexible in dealing with multiple data sources to ensure the multidimensional perspective of the issue under exploration.This book is an indispensable tool for Christian researchers as it presents a balanced approach to a practical research from scientific and theological perspective. It brings together the strengths of social science research methods and practical theology. Moreover, this book guides the researchers step by step through the process of qualitative research from conceptualizing the study to collecting, analyzing, interpreting data, and reporting the results. Graduate and doctoral students, as well as novice and experienced qualitative researchers in practical theology will find this book very useful, user-friendly, and practical. To make writing the dissertation project a successful enterprise, the book provides essential exemplars of various parts of the research paper. Last, the book provides several illustrations in different chapters.