Six Questions for Every Content Analysis: Revisiting the Stemler’s Overview

Content analysis (CA) is a technique widely used in various fields to systematically and objectively interpret textual, visual, or multimedia data. It facilitates the categorisation of phenomena or events for enhanced analysis and interpretation. In other words, CA is a technique for investigating social reality, which involves inferring attributes of a non-manifest context from attributes of a manifest text. This paper revisited Stemler’s work, “an overview of content analysis†with specific emphasis on salient questions every content analysis effort ought to address. Following the review of the Stemler’s, it is found that addressing the indispensable questions divulges that not all documents are amenable to CA under three conditions; substantial portions missing, improper recording and uncodability of document(s) owing to ambiguity of content or missing passages. This study also revealed some fatal flaws that inhibit the efficacy of CA: over- reliance on word-counts to attribute relevance, faulty definitions of categories and non-mutually exclusive and exhaustive categories. Thus, it is recommended that every CA should be tailored-made to answer the six indispensable questions so as to increase its credence and utility, which in turn addresses theoretical underpinnings, methodological rigor, ethical considerations, and the dynamic interplay between content, context, and interpretation.