ARTICLE: PDF OnlyQuality of life a phenomenological perspective on explanation, prediction, and understanding in nursing scienceBenner, Patricia RN, PhD Author Information Associate Professor School of Nursing Department of Physiological Nursing University of California San Francisco, Californi Advances in Nursing Science 8(1):p 1-14, October 1985. Buy Abstract A Heideggerian phenomenological approach to explanation, prediction, and understanding in the study of health, illness, and disease is presented. The extremes of objectification and subjectivism as barriers to understanding illness and suffering are explored. It is argued that meaning terms are essential when studying practical activity and relational issues, and that a privileged position is not gained by developing structural analyses or power terms that get behind or beyond meaning. Hermeneutics, or interpretive methodology, is a holistic strategy because it seeks to study the person in the situation rather than isolating person variables and situation variables and then trying to put them back together. Paradigm cases, exemplars, and thematic analysis are described as interpretive and presentational strategies. © 1985 Aspen Publishers, Inc.
