Course Qualitative data analysis: Using NVivo

The course P265/10 Qualitative data analysis: Using NVivo is being offered by the Graduate School of Health, Aarhus University, fall 2025.

Criteria for participation: University degree in medicine, dentistry, nursing, or master’s degree in other health related fields and/or postgraduate research fellows (PhD students and research-year medical students).

Requirements for participation: Participants must have NVivo installed on their computer. Also, knowledge regarding qualitative research methods is expected.

Aim: The course aims to provide students with the skills necessary to critically use the qualitative software programme NVivo and to train the students in using NVivo to organise and analyse different types of qualitative data.

Learning outcomes: The students will learn how NVivo supports the qualitative study process from the beginning to the end. Having completed this course, the student will be able to use NVivo’s most important functions:

• Create projects.
• Describe units of analysis relevant for the student’s own project.
• Critical identify element (sources and cases) as a foundation for making queries.
• Create memos, annotations, and links.
• Know how to use NVivo together with bibliographic software such as EndNote and RefWorks.
• Code data in relation to different types of qualitative data analysis techniques.
• Analyse data, visualise data analysis and make different kinds of queries.
• Be able to explain and visualise the data analysis the students use in their own PhD-project.
• Know how to build models and make different kinds of graphic presentations and diagrams.

Workload: The full workload of the course is expected to be 58 hours

Content: NVivo is a software programme for data analysis, which is useful for organising and analysing large quantities of qualitative data. Qualitative data covers a range of different data such as data from interviews, focus groups, field observations, videos, pictures, journal articles and web pages. NVivo can be used in different types of research including data analysis based on e.g., content analysis, grounded theory, discourse analysis, and taxonomic analysis. Furthermore, it is useful in systematic reviews, e.g., meta-synthesis and mixed methods reviews.

The course will guide the student through NVivo’s own systematic approach to a qualitative project and outline how NVivo supports a stringent and well-documented approach to the entire data handling process. NVivo's user interface and basic functions are introduced starting with the logical process of loading data, followed by the handling of different kinds of data and coding and different types of data analysis. Finally, the course will teach and train the students on how to use NVivo to present the results of a project.

Instructors: 

• Annesofie Lunde Jensen, Associated professor, Department of Clinical Medicine Public Health, Health, Aarhus University
• Jeanette Finderup, Associated professor, Department of Clinical Medicine, Health, Aarhus University
• Louise Engelbrecht Buur, Clinical nurse specialists, Aarhus University Hospital
• Anne Poder, Ph.D. student, Department of Clinical medicine, Health, Aarhus University
• Sarah Cecilie Tscherning, Ph.D. student, Department of Public Health, Health, Aarhus University

Venue: Aarhus University, Aarhus 

Participation in the course is without cost for:

• PhD students, Health Research Year students from Aarhus University
• PhD students enrolled at partner universities of the Nordoc collaboration
• PhD students from other institutions in the open market agreement for PhD courses

Course dates:

• 03 November 2025 10:00 - 16:00
• 10 November 2025 10:00 - 16:00
• 24 November 2025 10:00 - 16:00