Meditation in Qualitative Research for Bracketing and Beyond
International Journal of Qualitative Methods January 15, 2025 Peer reviewed DOI: 10.1177/16094069241312826 via Semantic Scholar
Summary
The author recounts using mantra meditation to practice bracketing during a phenomenological study. Bracketing, a method to set aside biases, has been debated from Husserl's aim of objectivity to Heidegger's immersion. The author proposes an approach where meditation is inseparable from qualitative research, aiming not to eliminate subjectivity but to diminish it, enabling the researcher to be fully present and faithfully interpret participants' experiences.
Study at a glance
| Design | theoretical or philosophical paper |
|---|---|
| Key finding | Meditation as a form of bracketing allows the researcher to be fully present, diminishing subjectivity rather than eliminating it, to faithfully interpret participants' experiences. |
Abstract
In this study, I recounted my experience using mantra meditation during a phenomenological study for the purposes of bracketing. The efficacy and purpose of bracketing have been debated from Husserl (1931), whose aimed was to achieve objectivity, to Heidegger (1962) who advocated for immersion of the researcher, through the French school (Merleau-Ponty, 1964) of middle ground, by whom bracketing was seen as the process to unearth and suspend biases for the better understanding of participants’ experiences (Arsel, 2017; Creswell & Creswell, 2017; Creswell & Poth, 2016; Fischer & Guzel, 2023). In this study, however, I propose another approach to bracketing that expands beyond phenomenology and the duality of objectivity or immersion. I propose that bracketing, with the aim of meditation is inseparable from qualitative research. Meditation, as a form of bracketing, provokes the researcher to be fully present ensuring that participants’ experiences are heard and interpreted in a faithful manner. In this orientation, the goal of bracketing is not to rid one’s subjectivity but to allow subjectivity to be diminished and the researcher to be fully present to the other.