ABSTRACT

This chapter focuses on four fundamental principles that B. G. Glaser asserts to every successful grounded theory project. The principles include discovery never verification, explanation never description, emergence never forcing, and the matrix operation. In the 1960s, sociologist Barney G. Glaser and social psychologist Anselm L. Strauss developed inductive, generational methodology that they named grounded theory. The grounded theorist embarks on an inductive generational pathway as opposed to a deductive verificational pathway. Grounded theories come from data about firsthand experiences, but grounded theories are never accurate descriptions of the data from which they emerge. Grounded theory methodology makes possible explanatory theory, never long detailed descriptive narratives. The grounded theory project is a matrix operation where everything goes on at once. The researcher collects data, then analyzes this data, and then based on the analysis, collects more data.