Introduction

Interpretation of what is contained (content) in a message is called content analysis.

According to Cole (1988), it is a “method of analysing written, verbal or visual
communication messages.” Content analysis is the study of recorded human communications
such as dairy entries, books, newspaper, videos, text messages, tweets, Facebook updates etc.
Being the scientific study of the content of communication, content analysis is actually the
study of contexts, meanings, subtexts, intentions contained in the messages. In simple terms,
content analysis is the analysis of what is being said, written or recorded. Through systematic
classification process of coding and identifying themes or patterns, content analysis is a
“research method for the subjective interpretation of the content of text data,” (Hsieh &
Shannon, 2005). To further make it easy to understand, we can say content is a message, and
analysis its meaning. For example; If a researcher wishes to study whether Indian newspapers
promote violence, she can draw the sample from some important Indian newspapers and
analyse the content selected from the newspaper. Analysis of the selected content will help to
unearth the real picture. Content analysis can be done both quantitatively as well as
qualitatively. On the basis of this, we can broadly divide it into two categories

Qualitative Content Analysis & Quantitative Content Analysis

Primarily, content analysis had been used as a quantitative research method. Now, it’s being
used as a qualitative research technique or both. The qualitative approach of this technique
has been able to address grey areas of the quantitative approach. Now, instead of being a
single-method, content analysis has three different approaches; conventional, directed, or
summative. Even though coding schemes are directly derived from the text data in the
conventional content analysis, the theory or earlier researchers lay the foundations for
primary codes in the directed approach of the scheme. Counting and comparisons of the
keywords or content followed by analysis are cardinal in the third and the final approach,
summative content analysis. Unlike the earlier approach, the qualitative approach enables to
provide a detailed and in-depth description of the content. As per Zhang & Wildemuth
(2009), “Through careful data preparation, coding, and interpretation, the results of the
qualitative content analysis can support the development of new theories and models, as well
as validate existing theories and provide thick descriptions of particular settings or
phenomena.” There are generally two types of content analysis;

1. Conceptual Analysis: deals with the analysis of the existence and frequency of concepts in
human communication.

2. Rational Analysis: Analysing the relationship of concepts in human communication.

Process of Content Analysis

There are few simple steps to understand the whole process of content analysis. To start with;

1. Identify your research question: For example; Does media portray violence?
2. Select your sample: For example; You have decided to study the content of The Indian
Express newspaper. Through multi-stage systematic sampling, you may select 12 issues of
the newspaper of a particular year following any systematic scheme like 1st Jan, 2nd Feb, 3
March, 4th April, 5th May…. 12th Dec. This will be your sample.

3. Skim the material selected through the aforementioned procedure and make a list of main
themes you plan to analyse. For example; If you are studying the portrayal of women in
media. During the review of the material like films, videos, soap operas etc., you can
categorise themes like Women as Leaders, Women in Education, Women in Private Sector
and many other negative and positive categories. Keeping those themes in mind, you can
classify the content accordingly.

4. This would become your coding system or scheme.

Note: Coding means to put information into a quantifiable form. You need trained coders for
coding. Both the training and the experience of the coder are necessary for reliable coding
(Neuendorf, 2002). To ensure the consistency of coding, especially when multiple coders are
involved, you should develop a coding manual, which usually consists of category names,
definitions or rules for assigning codes, and examples (Weber, 1990).

5. Keep in mind, the categories made during the preliminary study shouldn’t overlap each
other. The categories or themes must be defined in a way that would be easily
understandable. In this regard, operational definitions are cardinal.

6. You can classify the content on basis of these themes or categories.

7. In case, some content doesn’t fit any of the categories but is related to the topic under
study, you can make few new categories like miscellaneous or others and list the content
accordingly.

8. After qualitative analysis of the content, you can also quantify these themes simply by
counting the frequencies. Hence, analysis of the content can be done in both qualitative as
well as quantitative manner at the same time. Enlisting the uses of content analysis into the
context of basic communication paradigm, eminent political scientist and academician, Holsti
(1969) has amassed fifteen different features of the content into three sets.

1. Make inferences about the antecedents of a communication.

2. Describe and make inferences about characteristics of a communication.

3. Make inferences about the effects of a communication.

Berelson (1952) suggests that content analysis is "objective, systematic, and quantitative.”
Content analysis is based on the three basic doctrines of the scientific method like all other
methods of research. They are as below;

1. Objectivity: Different researchers will be enabled to obtain the same result from the same
sources as the analysis is guided by some clear-cut rules.
2. Systematic: By eradicating the chances of incorporating the only material supporting the
researcher’s idea, the exclusion and inclusion of the content are guided by strongly reliable
rules.

3. External validity or Generalizability: The extent to which results obtained by the researcher
can be generalised or applied to other similar situations.

Before going further into the terminology, let’s do an interesting exercise on our daily basis
practices to understand this very simple concept of content analysis. Suppose, you reached
ABC hotel to eat something very special today with only Rs. 120 in your pocket. Problem.
You will pick up the menu and read it thoroughly. There may be food items listed in different
categories like Chinese, Japanese, Indian, Arabic etc. Population. As you feel to eat Indian
food only so Indian category becomes your target. Sample. You will go through the menu
card and check almost all the food items including the prices listed under this category. While
selecting a food item which could satisfy your taste buds, you will continuously think of your
budget. Your whole search has been revolving around your taste buds and your budget.
Coding Scheme. You will finally reach a conclusion to order a dish, selected from a range of
food items which suits both the aforementioned conditions. So, what did you understand?
You did a content analysis following the whole process. With a problem, special food on a
limited budget, you perused the list of food items keeping these two themes or categories in
mind. These two themes became the de facto coding scheme for your search.

Unit of Analysis

The analysts reduce the content to small units so that they can measure it. This small
discretely defined element becomes the basic unit of measurement or analysis. In content
analysis, the basic unit of analysis can be a word, a phrase, a sentence, a paragraph, an article,
an image, a video, a MMS, a TV programme etc. For example; a 30-seconds video, or one
minute or audio may form the unit of analysis. During the 19th century, according to
Harwood & Garry (2003), content analysis was used to analyse newspaper articles,
magazines, hymns, advertisements and other political speeches. Over the period of time, this
method has witnessed a steady growth in the others fields of social science, arts and
humanities. The method of content analysis can be applied to study majorly five types of
texts.

1. Written texts – Including documents, books, papers, newspapers etc.

2. Oral texts– including sound, speeches, audio-messages, lectures etc.

3. Iconic texts– Including graphs, paintings, posters, drawings etc.

4. Audio-Visual texts– including films, MMS, videos etc. 5. Hypertexts – texts on the internet

Significance of Content Analysis

Communication research has been gaining significant importance. There is an important need
to study the areas of communication untouched yet. In this regard, the filed of communication
research is predominantly dependent on content analysis. Being one of the most employed
analytical tools used in this multi-discipline, content analysis is basically a set of procedures
used to transfer discrete information into an organised format allowing analysts to make
inferences. It is a research technique of coding and interpreting text to make a valid and
replicable inference. Through this method of data analysis, inferences about the
characteristics and meaning of written and other forms of recorded communication can be
gauged effectively. For example; through the framing of the media content, researchers can
analyse the tone (negative, positive or neutral) of the news stories published by the selected
newspapers. Content analysis can be used to study the documents, artefacts, films, audios and
other forms of communication text. It can be referred to a method of extracting meaningful
information from complex, lengthy messages or text. Through content analysis, we actually
assign meaning to the content (messages) and draw significant conclusions. For example; If a
researcher is studying the coverage given by The Indian Express newspaper to sanitation
issues in India, through the help of pre-determined keywords, she will collect all the articles
related to sanitation of a particular time period and then make inferences. Note: Pre-
determined keywords are the important words used in the text. For example; If you want to
study Coverage of Climate Change in India. Climate Change, Global Warming, Green House
Gases etc. are the important keywords or themes you have to search in the headlines and
leads of the news stories while sifting the newspaper. Mostly these keywords are listed or
collected through a pilot study. A pilot study is a primarily or small study conducted in
advance or before the actual research. In addition to obtrusive research in few cases, content
analysis is one of the most effective methods of conducting an unobtrusive research (the
research that doesn’t collect data directly from people). Through content analysis, we actually
study material rather than people directly.

As per Krippendorff (1980), in content analysis, six questions must be addressed.

1. Which data are analysed?

2. How are they defined?

3. What is the population from which they are drawn?

4. What is the context relative to which the data are analysed?

5. What are the boundaries of the analysis?

6. What is the target of the inferences?

Many scholars have undermined the importance of content analysis when compared with
discourse analysis. Even though scholars believe that there is a significant difference between
discourse and content analysis, but no discourse analysis is actually possible without content
analysis. Content analysis is key to the discourse, document, policy analysis, framing etc.
Framing, discourse, document and policy analysis may be categorised as the second-level
methods of content analysis. Being the backbone of the communication research, content
analysis is proved to be instrumental in both exploratory as well as descriptive research
studies. It may be used with either qualitative or quantitative data or both and in an inductive
or deductive way. For example; content analysis will enable a researcher to understand in
terms of variables of frequency and prominence given to the topics under study at the same
time. It enables the researcher to systematically identify the properties of the content. Even
though content is central to the communication, but content is not all bout the plain text.
Multiple interpretations of the same content could be drawn by different analysts. There is
always a hidden text within the visible text. Subtexts, contexts are always attached with all
sort of content. Mostly the text is an easily and commonly understandable unit of
communication. We need interpretation to understand subtext and contexts. Analysis of the
content is actually a multi-dimensional approach to understand or trace out various meanings
or dimensions of a simple text. Analysis of content is as important as content itself. In content
analysis, mostly two types of content can be analysed;

1. Manifest Content

2. Latent Content

Manifest content is a type of content which can be directly observed, looked at, see or hear.
This is why it’s also called observable content. On the other side, latent content is the hidden
meaning of the manifest content.

Let’s repeat the earlier exercise. Congratulations, you got the first salary of your life. On this
great occasion, now you wish to serve best Indian food to your mother and father but you
don’t know how to sample the best Indian cuisine. Problem. You ask your friends but they
have a range of suggestions. One of your friends solves the puzzle by informing that in the
year 2015, XYZ newspaper has published some 20 articles on Tuesdays only rating different
famous Indian foods served in Delhi. Happy?

No, there is ananother small problem. You can’t just go and pick one issue of the
aforementioned newspaper and get to know the best food. You have to do a lot of homework
for your parents whom you owe all this.

Visualising the hardships endured by your parents to bring you up, you made your mind to go
for it, whatever may be the condition. You were still picturing the past, another problem
suddenly came to your mind; there were 52 Tuesdays in 2015 and the articles published were
only 20. So, how to solve the puzzle of this best food?

Simply, you need to go to the library and collect all the issues of XYZ newspaper published
in 2015. After that, you will select all the issues published on Tuesdays. In total, you have to
collect 52 issues of the newspaper. You are choosing your sample. You need to skim all the
52 issues so that you could identify those 20 issues containing stories on best ratings. Here
you are choosing your content. Once, all the 20 issues are identified, you have to select the
stories about Indian dishes. Rating is a coding scheme. Read the stories thoroughly and note
the ratings. You need to compare the ratings to find an answer to your problem. Conclusion.
So, through the help of this content analysis, you can serve your parents best Indian cuisine
now.
Strengths and Limitations of Content Analysis

Content analysis has many advantages over other research techniques;

• Content analysis method is economical.

• The method can be applied to both qualitative as well as quantitative research.

• It’s unobtrusive.

Apart from the above-listed strengths of this research method, there are few shortcomings of
this technique as well;

• One of the most quoted problems of content analysis, it remains to be the timeconsuming
process.

• As Riffe, Lacy, and Fico (1998) suggest the “essence of the validity problem in content
analysis…,” there are concerns about the reliability and validity of the method.

• The personal bias of the researcher can’t be minimised.

Conclusion

In this paper, we have learned the importance, process and methods of content analysis
research method. After understanding the concept, we have explored the processes of
conducting a qualitative as well as quantitative research through the help of content analysis.
We have discussed the issues to be taken care of while applying the method. The paper
further highlights few strengths and weaknesses of this research method. With proper
examples, we have demonstrated how we can deconstruct or construct a meaning or concept
of the content of text data. Now, we can apply this method in our research for the
interpretation of the content to draw meaningful conclusions. Through the help of this
technique, we have learned to explore theories, and further contribute paramount literature to
the body of knowledge.