Phenomenology research method aims at explaining the lived experiences of a people or explaining a phenomenon (Groenwald, 2004). Larsen et al (2006) assessed the risk factors that children in the intermountain area experienced and described this phenomenon in their research article “Childhood obesity: Prevention practices of Nurse Practitioners”. The article appeared in the Journal of American Academy of Advanced Nurse Practitioners.

Convenient sampling with the use of questionnaires is the method that was used by the authors in the data collection of their study. They administered questionnaires to nurse practitioners. The checked that questionnaires were fully filled. They then analyzed data by the use of SPSS-Statistical Package for Social Sciences, version 18.0. They presented their data and found out that 73.3% of the nurses were not consistently examining obesity in children.

A major strength of using questionnaires in data collection is that it enables measuring of attitudes. It is cheap and can be administered to a group. It has a quick turnaround, and it’s easy to analyze data. The weakness of the method is that it needs to be kept short, and data analysis is time consuming. This SPSS method of data analysis has strength in that it brings out the analysis in forms of tables and graphs (University of Bristol, 2010). In addition, it points to a breakdown of data presentation. A weakness of SPSS is that it requires specialized knowledge to use and is very tiresome.

The research article provides additional knowledge to the existing knowledge on the subject. It adds to the health profession’s body of knowledge and theory. It challenges practice by calling upon nurses to practice application of BMI monitoring and preventing obesity in children.

References

Groenwald, T. (2004). A phenomenological research design illustrated. International Journal of Qualitative methods, 3 (1), 1-24.

Larsen, L., Mandleco, B., Williams, M. & Tiedemann, M. (2006). Childhood obesity: Prevention practices for nurse practitioners. Journal of American Academy of Advanced Nurse Practitioners, 18 (2), 70-79.

University of Bristol. (2010). Introduction to SPSS (Version 18) for windows. University of Bristol.