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Clive and Odd, I take your points - it is just as possible for a technique using coloured pens and folders to have the same effect as that described by Odd Lindberg for QDA sotware. However, I'm not convinced that this is actually the case. In the early celebration of the QDA programs there was certainly an element of "Ethnograph, or Nudist, or Atlas, will analyse my data". As if QDA software were an analytic technique similar to grounded theory or phenomenology. Of course, we understand that software is a tool, not a method. However, I'm not convinced that there isn't still a large number of people that think they can use QDA software without having to learn the theory behind qualitative methodology. This, of course, leads to the naive inductivism that Lindberg describes. Perhaps with the growing popularity of qualitative methods more people are trying to use the method who may not have the theoretical background required. This leads me to the following question. What is taught in all these training courses in QDA software that we keep hearing about on this list? Do they learn techniques to use the software by itself, or is this embedded in some sort of training in the theory of qualitative methods. Are there different training courses for people with different levels of knowledge about qualitative theory? Or is this left to the participant to work out? Doug Ezzy > there >is nothing about the design of QDA software that compels researchers to >analyse data in the way Lindberg says - it is equally easy to use >theoretically derived categories in coding. The problem, then, if there is >one, lies outside the issue of whether computer software is used for >analysis. Douglas Ezzy PhD Sociology University of Tasmania, Hobart, 7001, Australia Ph (613) 6226 2330 Fax (613) 6226 2279 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%