Research Diary Mapping: Enhancing Reflectivity in Process Research

The purpose of this paper is to propose a methodological tool that helps interpreting data in a reflective way: the visual mapping of the research diary. This tool is consistent with the concept of data reduction proposed by Miles and Huberman (1994) and relies on the methodological insight provided by Langley and Truax’ (1994) implementation of visual mappings of organizations’ processes. The tool proposed here aims at providing a mean of reaching a higher level of reflectivity, and of providing help in overcoming the limits inherent to the research diary. The research diary is a specific self-report, and provides reflexivity by situating the phenomenon in the eye of the researcher. However, qualitative data gathered following ethnographic method is hard to grasp for whom has not being involved. These considerations lead us to develop a methodological tool allowing the use of data gathered during a collaborative research to create a visual mapping of the associated research diary. Beside the visualization interest lying into the visual mapping of the diary, the process of mapping extend the explicatory power of diary because it brings a reflective dimension. It is valuable for process studies since longitudinal studies help to better comprehend phenomenon arising on mid-term period. It also helps in making sense of links between elaborated knowledge and empirical data.