View article

Qualitative story completion (SC) research involves the novel qualitative application of a technique previously used in quantitative research and clinical assessment, in which participants write stories in response to a story “stem” designed by the researcher. The resulting stories are analyzed to identify patterns of meaning using conventional qualitative analytic approaches such as thematic analysis. In place of the more typical self-report methods used in qualitative research, such as interviews or focus groups, the method provides a categorically different way to explore a topic, one which can offer new understandings to counseling psychology researchers. In particular, SC’s capacity to illuminate social discourses makes it particularly useful for understanding the potential ways in which socially marginalized populations are understood in therapeutic spaces as well as for understanding how clients of all kinds may …