RESEARCH METHOD DEVELOPMENT
In Chapter 6, Theory Development and Research, we envisioned an approach that "would include a phenomenological aspect which goes beyond description to an hermeneutical process, within an action research orientation" (Boykin & Schoenhofer, 1993, p. 97). Two research approaches have been developed within the context of studying Nursing as Caring, one focusing on discovering the lived meaning of everyday caring and the second directed toward understanding the value experienced in nursing situations.
There is relatively little literature that deliberately sets out to describe the multitude of ways of human caring. However, most if not all human text does reflect uniquely personal ways of caring, and can profitably be studied for this purpose. In an effort to provide a knowledge base of the variety of human caring ways, one of the authors (Schoenhofer) innovated a group phenomenology approach in which research participants not only generated data in group settings, but also led the synthesis of meaning (Schoenhofer, Bingham, & Hutchins, 1997). The group approach to data generation was chosen for several reasons—one was efficiency, but the primary reason was a belief in the synergistic potential of the group process experience. The group approach to data synthesis was added to the design based on the assumption that persons living the phenomenon being studied and generating the data may be most well qualified to intuit meaning across examples. The series of studies of everyday caring may best be understood as general foundational human science, rather than as nursing science per se. Results of the studies produced knowledge that has potential to enlighten nursing practice, rather than producing direct knowledge of nursing practice.
While initiated for research purposes, the group phenomenology approach became a form of nursing praxis. Early in the project, groups spontaneously shared a sense of pleasure and gratitude for the experience of celebrating themselves and each other as caring persons. This opportunity for reflection was then added as closure for the subsequent groups as it was recognized by the primary researchers that the tenets of Nursing as Caring were being lived: persons were known, acknowledged, affirmed and celebrated as caring; per-sonhood was enhanced as group members recapitulated, clarified and reaffirmed the meaning and value of caring in their lives; caring between nurse (researchers) and nursed in the nursing (research) situation was created and persons were nurtured in their uniquely personal ways of caring.
A second research approach was designed to study values experienced in nursing situations (Schoenhofer & Boykin, 1998a; 1998b). The design of this approach was based on several considerations: 1) the tenet that all that can be known of nursing is known through the nursing situation, the shared lived experience of caring between nurse and nursed; and, 2) the blurred lines between research and practice, between roles of researcher, practitioner and even patient. A mode of inquiry into outcomes of caring in nursing, from the perspective of Nursing as Caring, must necessarily be centered within the nursing situation. In earlier phases of this research, only the nurse participated in the research dialogue (Boykin & Schoenhofer, 1997). While this approach was fruitful, two important qualities were missing: 1) the synergism that brought a wealth of rich data when both nurse and nursed were present; and, 2) the intersubjective confirmation provided by having both the nurse and the nursed as research participants. Once again, the mutuality of the dialogue about the value of caring experienced went beyond simple data production for research purposes. The dialogue itself was an extension of the nursing relationship and the caring between nurse and nursed, with the research nurse now included in the unfolding nursing situation.