Benefits of a dual focus methodology utilising IPA and FDA in understanding meaning-making around the experience of psychosis

Abstract

A dual focus methodology combining Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) and Foucauldian Discourse Analysis (FDA) was utilised to explore both language and the subjective embodied experience of psychosis. Despite arguments that combining IPA and FDA creates epistemological/ontological conflicts due to the dissonant theoretical underpinnings, adoption of a critical realist position permitted an integration of these approaches. A combined methodological approach enabled a more comprehensive understanding of the experience of psychosis, from both a discursive and subjective embodied perspective. Adoption of this binocular approach resulted in recommendations for research methodology and clinical/counselling psychology practice.