With qualitative methods being increasingly used in health science fields, numerous grids proposing criteria to evaluate the quality of this type of research have been produced. Expert evaluators deem that there is a lack of consensual tools to evaluate qualitative research. Based on the review of 133 quality criteria grids for qualitative research in health sciences, the authors present the results of a computerized lexicometric analysis, which confirms the variety of intra-and inter-grid constructions, including within the same field. This variety is linked to the authors' paradigmatic references underlying the criteria proposed. These references seem to be built intuitively, reflecting internal representations of qualitative research, thus making the grids and their criteria hard to compare. Consequently, the consensus on the definitions and the number of criteria becomes problematic. The paradigmatic and theoretical references of the grids should be specified so that users could better assess their contributions and limitations.
In the past years, the recording and collection of physical and physiological data from the body through wearable devices has become an increasingly common health-related practice in contemporary Western societies. The rapid development of digital self-tracking technologies has given rise to the production of different scientific discourses. The analysis of 200 published articles has led to the definition of a continuum between "technophile-promises" and "technocritical-risks" representations. However, these representations include different views of corporeality and sociality. Beyond this debate, we propose an alternative theoretical framework that links corporeality and sociality. It interrogates the psychological function that wearable devices may take (or not) for subjects to which these "tools" are addressed. We argue that such psychological function must be embraced by taking into consideration of activity done by the users of these technologies, which engages meaning: It is not the device, but the user him/herself who is confronted to the interpretation of biometric data linked to his/her own body functions on the basis of concrete lived experience. Moreover, we discuss that the activity of users can only be analysed in the sociocultural context to which the associated practices relate (health, sports, play, medicalisation). The conclusion highlights the need to further study the appropriation process of new personal experimentation instruments as to better understand the potential collaborations, risks or resistances that users may develop.
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