Commentary: An overview of the qualitative descriptive design within nursing research

Choosing an appropriate study design to answer the research question is a crucial stage in the research process. Adopting a specific methodological approach, such as ethnography or phenomenology, can help the researcher undertake a logical and theoretically informed study. However, some research questions are not suited to a specific methodological approach and a qualitative descriptive study may be more appropriate. The reviewed paper therefore provides an accessible and thoughtful overview of adopting a qualitative descriptive design in nursing research.

The paper covers selecting a qualitative descriptive approach, highly suitable for studies that aim to remain close to participants’ descriptions of their experiences, rather than being overly theoretical. The reviewed paper highlights the potential philosophical underpinnings of qualitative descriptive studies, including constructionism or pragmatism, and the importance of researcher reflexivity when making these choices. Purposive sampling and determining sample size are then discussed, recognising the contentiousness of data saturation in qualitative research. A useful overview of qualitive methods explores interviews, focus groups and observation, before the authors discuss thematic and content analysis. The authors then suggest how trustworthiness can be determined in a qualitative descriptive study using Lincoln and Guba’s (1985) framework, before finally acknowledging the challenges of a qualitative descriptive design. These challenges relate to criticisms of qualitative descriptive approaches for being atheoretical and cursory, which are robustly refuted by the authors with supporting evidence.

A real strength of this paper is the inclusion of several examples of studies that have adopted a qualitative descriptive approach, including a focus group study, recorded responses to open-ended survey questions and a mixed-method study encompassing a randomised controlled trial (RCT) and qualitative process evaluation. These real-world examples demonstrate the flexibility of a qualitative descriptive design, while highlighting the implications of these studies for policy, practice and future research. As a researcher I contributed to a mixed-method study incorporating an RCT with a nested qualitative study, using interviews and focus groups. The RCT was unable to recruit sufficient numbers of participants and therefore did not progress to a full trial. However, the qualitative descriptive study was able to explain why patients did not want to participate and why healthcare professionals were unwilling to recruit participants (Noble et al., 2015). A specific methodological approach would not have answered the research question, whereas a qualitative descriptive design generated in-depth information that would help when designing a future RCT.

Those of us who teach and supervise Master’s students who are writing protocols and undertaking primary research will be aware that some students struggle with choosing an appropriate approach to answer their research questions. Therefore, the paper will be particularly important for Master’s students, supporting and informing their decisions to use a qualitative descriptive approach if appropriate. However, the reviewed paper will be valuable for a variety of researchers undertaking qualitative research or mixed-method studies that include a qualitative component. The authors reference many seminal resources to signpost readers to further appropriate reading. Overall, this comprehensive, yet accessible, paper makes an important contribution to the literature.

Biography

Jessica Baillie is a Lecturer in adult nursing and Research Capacity Building Collaboration Wales Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Cardiff University. She has used different methodological approaches in her qualitative research, including qualitative descriptive designs.