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Qualitative Data Analysis in NVivo

Phase 3. Generating initial themes from coded data

  • Themes in thematic analysis are patterns of shared meaning, united by a central concept or idea (Braun & Clarke, 2013).
  • It involves generating initial themes by converting codes into themes.
  • It also involves merging similar codes, renaming codes and pasting similar codes under similar themes.
  • The themes are not yet final, but it helps to get started with codes categorization.
  • When codes do not clearly fit into identified themes or not related to the purpose of the research, you could create a new theme, and call it ‘Floating Idea” or “Others".
  • See an example of connected themes from phase 3 of thematic analysis below

Connected themes example

Figure 2. Connected themes example (Source: Ayeni, 2023)