Qualitative Analysis and Nurses

Iceberg Attachment for Infants The concept analysis article reviewed in this document is "Attachment icebergs: Maternal and child health nurses' evaluation of infant-caregiver attachment" by Bryant et al. This article explores salient phenomena pertaining to the concept of infant attachment. However, it analyzes this phenomena from the perspective of nurses who are observing and working with infants and caregivers. The researchers were essentially attempting to solicit information from the nurses to explicate the phenomena of infant attachment, while determining what factors proved the most influential in this occurrence.

As such, the researchers were able to glean a fair amount of insight not only about infant attachment, but about how to best treat it. Additional insight was also gleaned into factors that were germane to the nurses who observed infant attachment and who attempted to mitigate it with various degrees of success. Method of Analysis The method of analysis revolved around qualitative analysis of nurses employed in the maternal and child health segment of this profession. These nurses gave semi-structured interviews about their experience with infant-caregiver attachment.

In this respect they were valuable subject matter experts because they observe this phenomena more frequently than others do. The focus of the interview was on the different facets of nursing that nurses relied upon while observing and interacting with children who experience infant attachment. These included various nursing skills required, as well as eminent thoughts and perceptions about their jobs in regards to this issue. From a more pragmatic standpoint, these interviews were recorded and transcribed.

The basis for the majority of the interview questions stemmed from the Infant Mental Health and Carer Responsiveness Framework. They were analyzed with software and augmented via conventional note-taking to elucidate themes that were recurring. Specifically, the analysis involved "coding and team-thematic analysis" in addition to NVivo data analysis software...to organize and manage data and assist with analysis" (Bryant et al., 2016, p. 49). Apply the Concept to a Practice Situation The analysis of infant attachment to caregiver resulted in the aforementioned themes.

Nonetheless, each of those themes themselves was tied to a more prominent concept, the parallel between the markers for attachment and an actual iceberg. This parallel means that it is fairly obvious to see the indication signs of attachment between an infant and his or her caregiver. Similarly, it is fairly easy to spot the tip of an iceberg which protrudes from the ocean. However, both these indicators and the tip of the iceberg are merely signs of the fact that there are greater, underlying issues at work.

It is not sufficient merely to address the symptoms or the indicators; nursing personnel must, instead, see those signs as implications that they have to address the deeper, underlying issues associated with infant-attachment. This iceberg concept is readily applicable to other practice situations with nurses. For instance, nurses working in the field of geriatrics may find that they have a particular patient who is surly and disagreeable regarding advice for healthcare. Some nurses might think it is sufficient to simply force the patient to implement their salutary guidelines.

However, such intransigence may perhaps be indicative of a greater problem that is preventing a patient from taking more active measures to heal himself or herself. Instead of trying to force compliance, the nurse would be better suited attempting to determine the underlying issues that are causing such peevish behavior -- which may or may not be related to health -- and attempting to address those in order to effect more efficacious care.

Results of the Steps of Process The initial step in this research study (which is the assessment step) was to determine that there actually were few means to determine the emotional and mental states of infants that were experiencing attachment issues. Therefore, the outcome of this first step was to conduct the research in this article so that the researchers could help to get a more pervasive attachment assessment that was applicable to multiple infants. The second step in the nursing process is the diagnosis step.

During this step, the researchers for this article reviewed data regarding information about infant attachment. The researchers determined that there was little data that actually provided insight regarding this phenomenon. Therefore, they decided to utilize the measures that were closest in nature (the Infant Mental Health and Carer Responsiveness Framework) as the basis for assisting them with the subsequent step. That step, in turn, was the planning step, in which they planned the specific forms of research for this article.

It was during this step that they decided on qualitative interviews of nurses who worked in the maternal and child health field of specialization. Also, they devised questions based on the aforementioned framework, and decided upon appropriate measures for analyzing their data. During the fourth step they implemented their plan and actually interviewed the aforementioned nurses to determine what the most salient factors were for assessing infant attachment in an accurate and reliable way. The final step.