As anyone who is familiar with qualitative research studies knows, their publications almost always include “real live” data. Monographs, reports, papers, even speeches based on qualitative research are replete with illustrations: quotes from respondents, fieldnote excerpts, chunks of historical material, short case accounts, chapter-size biographies or career stories, even entire books consisting of a case history narrative or a case study of an organization. Such illustrative data are used in all of the social sciences and in professions such as social work, education, and nursing.

The reasons for that have been extensively laid out in the literature. For example, Diesing (1971), an informed philosopher of science, has discussed what he calls the case method or holistic method of doing and presenting research, as contrasted with other variants like experimentation and survey research. He has systematically explored the assumptions that lie behind this holistic style of thought and action, as well as how methods of research follow from these. There is no point, however, in reviewing here why data illustrations are used so copiously. Rather we shall discuss first, and briefly, some issues attending the use of illustrative data, then note some rules of thumb that can usefully guide the constructions of case studies, also of long case histories, whether they are published separately as monographs or as parts of them.

Illustrative data

Since qualitative researchers do not generally use or present much in the way of statistics, they face an interesting set of options. They can keep the presentation very abstract; or they can give very little theoretical commentary but give a great deal of data, allowing it to speak for itself.