The Challenges to and Future(s) of Grounded Theory

The groundswell of grounded theory research—both the major refinements of grounded theory approaches and their applications to research projects in the United States (U.S.,) Britain, and beyond—is leading to changes and compromises in grounded theory methods. The belief that grounded theory research is easy to learn and to do, and that anyone can do it without any training or, minimally, after a single workshop, or by adhering to instructions in a book or article, has led to the oversimplification of grounded theory research. Methodological texts cannot teach how to identify inferences or how to perform processes of abstraction and conceptualization. The original descriptions of grounded theory presented the analytic processes and procedures as principles, a “canon and procedures” that “guide the researcher towards understanding”. Grounded theorists do not seek consistency in or replication of their data.