Don’t Panic! 4 Common Qualitative Research Struggles (and how to fix them)

Qualitative research is supposed to be messy.

But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t freak us out from time to time.

One minute, you’re reading through interview transcripts thinking, “This is so rich and interesting!”

The next, you’re spiralling:

"Wait… none of my participants said the same thing. What am I even supposed to do with this?!"

If that’s you, hi. You’re in exactly the right place.

Whether you’re in the wild world of interviews, focus groups, or open-text survey responses, I want to walk you through four of the most common qualitative research struggles students face, and how to get past them.

Let’s go.

“All my participants said different things — how do I make sense of this?”

This is probably the most common panic point I hear. You’ve collected your data. You’ve got pages and pages of transcripts. You start to read them over and realise…

Everyone had a different experience.

Cue the panic: “Am I allowed to summarise this? Is that going to misrepresent them? How do I write up findings when they don’t agree on anything?”

Here’s the thing: that’s not a problem. That’s literally what qualitative research is for.

Your job is to explore those different experiences and look for the patterns in the mess. And those patterns don’t have to be neat. In fact, they rarely are. Your participants can contradict each other. That’s fine. You’re not looking for a single truth. You’re looking for meaning.

So breathe. You’re doing it right. Really!

“I’m scared I’ll interpret my participants’ words wrongly.”

This one comes up especially when you really care about the people you interviewed. Maybe they shared difficult experiences or opened up to you in a powerful way. You’re worried about doing them justice.

That’s good. It means you’re taking your responsibilities seriously.

But don’t let that fear stop you.

Qualitative research is interpretive. You are the research instrument. That means you’re always filtering your data through your lens. Your worldview, your experiences, your training. That’s not a flaw; it’s part of the process.

You’re not deciding what your participants meant. You’re showing how you’ve made sense of what they said, and you’re being transparent about that sense-making process.

It’s not about being “right.” It’s about being thoughtful, reflexive, and honest.

“I feel bad for leaving out certain quotes.”

There’s that one amazing quote you really wanted to use… but it just didn’t fit.

Or you had six people say something fascinating, but you only had space for three.

Welcome to the heartbreak of writing up qualitative research.

Here’s what I want you to remember: you’re not excluding people’s experiences just because you didn’t include a quote.

If you’ve read their transcript, reflected on it, and let it shape your analysis, then it has informed your findings. Even if it didn’t get name-checked in the final report.

Think of it like making soup. Just because you can’t taste the garlic individually doesn’t mean it didn’t add flavour.

Be intentional with your quotes, and don’t feel guilty. They’re there to illustrate, not represent everything.

“My data feels like a total mess.”

Yes. Of course it does.

Because real life is a bit of a mess.

That’s why qualitative data is so powerful, and so overwhelming. People ramble. They contradict themselves. They go off-topic, use metaphors, and tell long stories that don’t always have a punchline.

Messy doesn’t mean bad. It means authentic.

So what do you do?

You trust yourself.

You stop trying to force objectivity (that’s a hangover from quantitative training). Instead, you lean into trustworthiness and authenticity, the markers of good qualitative research.

You reflect on your process. You write memo notes. You explain your decisions. You show how you got to your themes, rather than pretending they just “emerged.”

Meaning-making is creative and rigorous. And you’ve got what it takes to do both.

If any of this felt familiar, if you’ve had these worries swirling in your head, please know that you are not alone.

Qualitative research is supposed to be full of nuance and uncertainty. You’re not doing it wrong. You’re doing it well.