Table 1.

Summary of van Manen’s methodological activities¹⁹

Van Manen’s Methodological Activities	Researchers’ Activities
Turning to the nature of lived experience	Thinking about living with CABG and asking what experience the patients have after surgery to develop the phenomenological inquiry
Investigating experience as we live it	Contemplating on the Iranian culture and the perspective of Iranian people on health and illness, having a prolonged engagement with post-CABG patients, and conducting in-depth interviews
Reflecting on essential themes	Listening to audio tapes, reading transcripts, immersing oneself in the data, and conducting thematic data analysis
Hermeneutic phenomenological writing	Writing about emerged themes and sub-themes and creating an in-depth phenomenological text
Maintaining a strong and oriented nursing relation to the phenomenon	Discussing the themes in relation to lived experience
Balancing the research context by considering parts and whole	Moving between transcripts and themes in relation to lived experience following CABG

Six methodical activities proposed by van Manen (1990)

Adapted from: Van Manen M, ed. Researching Lived Experience: Human Science for an Action Sensitive Pedagogy. New York: University of Western Ontario; 1990.