ATLAS.ti is a powerful data analysis and management tool that, on its most basic level, functions kind of like a highlighter. When you are reading, highlighting things that strike you as interesting or writing notes to yourself is often good analytical technique. So if ATLAS is essentially just a highlighter, why use it? Well, imagine if you could highlight and take notes in a variety of books, articles, sound bites, videos, aggregate all those markings and make them searchable, create charts to visualize ideas, export reports in a variety of formats and keep all of your stuff organized while you make connections and advance your research.
Simply put, qualitative research is analyzing words rather than numbers, numbers being the meat and potatoes of quantitative research. Put another way, qualitative research investigates the why and how rather than just the what, where, and when. For example, if a researcher has interviewed 100 people and has transcripts of those interviews, he or she can look for patterns in the responses from the interviewees to try and gain a deeper understanding of that population's perceptions of the questions that were asked. ATLAS.ti helps to organize your analysis and make connections within your analysis, as well as making the process of evaluating resources and material much simpler.
If you are performing a study using qualitative methods encompassing a large amount of data, a tool such as ATLAS.ti can make your life much easier. The data management capabilities of software such as ATLAS can really help move your research forward.
Contact ICT Services to assist with access and installation: +27 51 401 2000 or SolveIT@ufs.ac.za.
There are some fundamentals to cover to acquaint yourself with ATLAS.ti.
Your ATLAS.ti project
Is essentially a container for your quotations, coding information, notes, documents, and everything else associated with an individual project. For example, if you have 100 documents in one project and 100 different documents in another project, all of them coded and annotated, the ATLAS.ti project is the architecture that keeps everything together within its own project.
Important note on saving your project!
If you want to move your project file to a different computer, or otherwise create a copy to work from, you must Export! Saving the project only saves your working copy stored in your AppData folder, which is inaccessible to the user. Exporting creates the neat .altproj file package, which you can then import into ATLAS.ti on another machine. However, if you have linked documents (usually audio/video files too large to import), you need to bring those to the new machine as well. See information about linked documents on the Creating or importing projects section of this guide.
Primary documents (PDs)
The things you are going to be analysing. They can be anything from text files to video, audio, image, and even geographic data files. When you're working with your documents, ATLAS.ti works on a copy to preserve your original files.
Codes
Capture meaning in your data and represent occurrences that cannot be found by simple text based searching. Codes can operate on different levels, depending on the depth of analysis as well as qualitative research methodology. Generally, as you are working, you will come across similar occurrences and want to classify them. This is coding. See the Coding and Auto coding sections of this guide.
Quotations
Parts of the PDs that are interesting to you. They are what correspond to codes you have assigned, and can be called up and highlighted for visualisation purposes. In a text document, the quotation will be a string of words. Quotations for other file types that do not include words will look a little different, e.g., a recurring symbol in multiple paintings, similar excerpts from multiple interviews, or a point on a map.
Memos
These are kind of like annotations you would write in the margin of a book when something interesting occurred to you. Different from codes, memos are simply jottings that come to mind as you are working, and can be linked to codes and quotations.
Networks
Networks are used to help you visualise relationships among entities in your results. You can map out what contradictions, causes and effects, or associations between your ideas, and create your own relationship labels that define your analysis.
Links
Links are like networks, but are used to connect your quotations, both coded and uncoded. You can use linke names like "contradicts" or "expands upon" to link relevant quotations together.
Almost everything you will need in ATLAS.ti is accessible from the Home tab. The layout in ATLAS.ti 8 is similar to Microsoft Office products. The Home tab will be your friend throughout your research. Take some time to familiarise yourself with the buttons' locations. Note that you won't be able to access this screen without importing some documents, like the example project outlined in the Creating a project section of this guide.
When you open ATLAS.ti for the first time, a splash screen will appear asking if you want to create a new project, or import an existing one. To start from scratch with your own documents, choose "Create New Project". If you already have an .altproj ATLAS.ti project, choose "Import Project Bundle". Mobile projects are used for projects in an iPad or Android format, and choose Legacy if you have a project from an older ATLAS.ti version. If you have a "Hermeneutic Unit/HU" project, choose Legacy import!
Important note about saving your project!
If you want to move your project file to a different computer, or otherwise create a copy to work from, you must Export! Saving the project only saves your working copy stored in your AppData folder, which is inaccessible to the user. Exporting creates the neat .altproj file package, which you can then import into ATLAS.ti on another machine. However, if you linked documents (usually audio/video files too large for import), you need to bring those to the new machine as well. See information about linked documents below.
Import your documents
If you already have some documents you want to analyse, you can certainly import your own. The program accepts a variety of document types, from text to images. When you first open ATLAS.ti, you will see "Add Documents" in the upper left-hand corner. After importing them, they will be available on the left-hand side in the "Documents" drop-down. You can also manage your Documents in the Document Manager (Home tab, Managers group).
Linking documents
If you have videos, audio, or other sizeable files that you want to analyse in ATLAS.ti, you have the option to link them instead of importing. Linking a file means it will be accessed from its original location in ATLAS.ti when you want it. This also means that if you delete or move the file, you will have to tell ATLAS.ti its new location and relink it. If you plan to work on another computer, you must bring the linked file(s) with you!
The process to add a Linked Document is similar to Adding Documents. In the Add Documents dropdown, select "Add linked video/audio". Your file browser will open and you will select the file you want to link.
All about codes
Codes are used to capture meaning in your data and represent occurrences that cannot be found by simple text based searching. Codes can operate on different levels, depending on the depth of analysis as well as qualitative research methodology. Generally, as you are working, you will come across similar occurrences and want to classify them, which we call "coding" in the context of ATLAS.ti. To reuse the "fancy highlighter" analogy, this is basically using different colour highlighters to represent different concepts, but with much more flexibility. All your coded concepts will be linked, and can be modified as needed. The way that you code your qualitative data will be unique to your strengths as a researcher and your specific research project, so there's no "right" way to code.
Types of coding:
Open Coding
Opens the Create Code dialog box, to create a new code based on your highlighted text.
Code In Vivo
Creates a new code immediately that uses the highlighted text as its name. Useful if your highlight is itself representative of a concept. For example, if you highlight text that reads "I like cats", and select Code in Vivo, a new code would be created named "I like cats" and applied to your highlight.
List Coding
Opens the List coding dialog box, to select the relevant code(s) for your highlighted text.
Quick Coding
Immediately codes the highlighted text with the most recently used code.
How do I code?
Just like when you highlight to copy and paste a portion of text, with ATLAS.ti you highlight a portion of the text that interests you in order to code it, then you have to open the coding menu. There are multiple points of access to get to the coding menu. The simplest and most conducive to workflow is right clicking the portion of the PD you just highlighted, going to codes, and selecting the type of coding you would like to perform. See below for more information on types of code.
You can also highlight your text, then select the appropriate coding button in the Coding group under the Document tab. Note: The Document tab is context-specific, meaning it will only be visible if you have a document open.
Other types of coding:
Free Coding
Creates codes without highlighting text. Useful if you have a predefined set of concepts that your data will fall into. Note: Your Free Code will show on the list of codes but, until associated with quotations, will not have any density or groundedness*.
Code Groups
Create Code Groups to find specific codes easily and filter query results. Accessible under Code Manager, Open Group Manager. You can also create Groups of Documents, Memos, and Networks.
Auto Coding
See the Auto Coding tab of this guide for information on this feature.
*Density and Grounded
As you Code things and add other information to your project, you will see values called Density and Grounded change. These values are viewable in each entity type's manager. Grounded is only shown in the Code Manager. Density shows the number of links between entities. For example, a density of 2 means the Code, Memo, or Quotation is linked to 2 other Codes, Memos, or Quotations. These links are manually applied by the researcher. Grounded shows how many times a Code has been applied.
What is Auto Coding?
The best thing about using the Auto Coding feature in ATLAS.ti is that it can be as hands-off or hands-on as you like. You may confirm every selection before the program codes the text, or allow ATLAS.ti to automatically code selections. Auto Coding is essentially performing a text search and telling ATLAS.ti to apply the selected code to matches, which will create a Quotation linked to the appropriate Code. See the Auto Coding interface below, with an outline of Auto Coding options.
Auto Coding interface
In the example below, we are looking at a sample of comments taken from a parenting blog. We want to code passages that imply the writer of the comment has a partner. Use the pipe character (|) denotes the Boolean operator OR, so this will automatically code occurrences of "wife", "husband", or "partner" as the code "marriage".
Other options:
Auto Coding multiple documents
Using the Document Manager, found on the Home tab in the Managers group, select the desired documents, right click, and select Auto Coding to open the Auto Coding interface.
Confirm matches
Checking this option switches the Auto Coder between fully and semi-automatic coding. With the option checked, ATLAS.ti will ask if you want to code or skip every highlight it finds.
Find option
Expand Match option
What you select for Expand Match will affect what text the auto coder highlights and codes. Auto Coding can automatically highlight Exact Matches, the Word you searched, or the Sentence, Paragraph, Chapter, or Document in which the searched text is found. This is mostly personal preference relating to how you have been coding passages throughout the project. You may find it helpful to go broad during the Auto Coding process and then go back and review afterward to fine tune the length of the quote.
Running reports and analysing
Now that you've coded everything, it's time to start analysing. ATLAS.ti offers multiple methods to extract information from your corpus of coded items.
Creating reports
A report will be a readout of Quotations associated with your desired codes(s). The easiest way to create a report is open and dock the Quotation Manager, from the Home tab, Managers group. From here, select the Quotations you want to include in your report. You can filter Quotations by Code in the left hand panel.
Once you have your desired Quotations selected, click the Report button to the far right to generate a PDF with your selected Quotations, and other information that you specify. You can choose to include Codes, Memos, Types of Content, and more from the Report Options section. You can also group your quotations by Type of Content, Dates, or Groups you have specified.
A note about ALL and ANY: ATLAS.ti uses ALL and ANY instead of the Boolean operators AND and OR. The yellow ribbon above your Quotations allows you to toggle between the two. Choosing ANY will show Quotations in either code, but ALL requires the quotation to be in both codes.
Code cooccurrences
One way to analyse your research is knowing how many times certain codes co-occur in the same quotation. This is done using the Cook Table under the Analyse tab. From here, select which codes you want as rows, and which you want as columns. You will end up with something like the table below.
Here we can see that 17 respondents who were female had one child, and 3 respondents who were male had one child. Clicking on each number will show you the Quotations that match the query in another window, and you can double click on the Quotation to display it in the Document. You can also see Code Cooccurrences in tree format using the Cooc Explorer. This is useful if you do not know which codes co-occur together, and you can easily view each co-occuring code in that code's tree.
Code-Document Table
The Code-Document Table allows you to compare Code frequencies across documents, thereby making conclusions about each Document. The Code-Document Table is also found under the Analyse tab. When creating this table, you can make use of Code and Document groups in your query. Your table can then be exported to Excel, plain text, or image format.
Query Tool
The Query Tool functions like traditional text queries, but with a pretty GUI overlay. Select the Codes you want to include, and how you want them to relate to one another, and see which Quotations match. Use Edit Scope to restrict your query to a specific document(s), and Boolean operators OR, AND, and NOT to build a more complex scope.
Word frequencies
ATLAS.ti has a built-in function to generate a word cloud or a detailed list of each word with its number of occurrences. To access this feature, simply right click on a document from the left-hand panel and select Word Cloud or Word List. You can also create a Word Cloud or World List from multiple documents, using the Document Manager. Open the Document Manager from the Home tab, select the desired documents, and repeat the above process. You can export these results to an Excel spreadsheet.
Stop words
Stop words are common words that are removed from the count (words like "a", "am", etc.). You can choose whether to omit stop words or not when you select Word List. If there is an additional word you want omitted, select the "Remove from text before counting" checkbox and type the word into the box below. To add a stop word to a list from a Word Cloud, right click on the word and select "Add to stop word list".
Note: if you created a new project instead of importing a project bundle, you will need to create your own stop word list and point the program towards it. Try this website for stop words in different languages.
Standard text search
As with webpages, PDFs, and just about any other computer-based text, ATLAS.ti offers exact match text search. This tool is invaluable when it comes to finding certain words or phrases quickly. This is another tool with multiple access points.
Click the "Search Project" tab at the top of the screen (CTRL/CMD+F will not work). Once you invoke the search, a box will appear prompting you for a Search Expression.
Notice you can select case sensitive and GREP options. Case Sensitive will return exact matches with the same
GREP search
The well known UNIX tool has been converted to work wonders in ATLAS.ti. Searching with GREP, a type of regular expression, allows the use of characters that specify an operation you want to carry out, allowing you to craft searches that cover a breadth of concepts. For example, you could search a variety of different spellings of a word, a specified date range, and more. To enable GREP searching, all you have to do is check the box in the text search box.
"200[0-12]" searches all years from 2000 to 2012.
"gr[ea]y" searches for both the American and English spellings of the colour.
List of operators:
^ Anchors the pattern to the beginning of a line. If used within brackets, it excludes characters from the search.
$ Anchors the entered search pattern to the end of a line.
. Matches any single character.
* Matches any number of the preceding expression.
+ Matches at least one occurrence of the preceding expression or character.
? Matches zero or one occurrence of the preceding expression or character, e.g., cars? matches both "car" and "cars".
[] Matches a range or set of characters, e.g., [0-9] will match all numeric characters.
:d Matches any digit.
\ Escape character will disable the GREP qualities of one of the above operators, e.g., \$ will find the dollar sign in the text.
Survey data in ATLAS.ti
The functionality of ATLAS.ti lends itself well to analysing results of qualitative research like surveys. There are a few steps you will want to take to be successful in survey research.
Preparing survey data for import
Your survey data must be in .xls or .xlsx Excel format (.csv may work as well if the former two do not). There are specific characters you will use to denote which categories correspond to ATLAS.ti concepts. To import survey data, use the following characters in front of the column heading.
Importing survey data
Once your Excel file is formatted correctly, navigate to Import/Export>Survey. The import process starts, and may take a while depending on the amount of data in your Excel document.
After your data is imported, it's a good idea to review to make sure everything is imported correctly and was assigned the correct category.
Working with survey data
Now that your survey research is in ATLAS.ti, you can Code your data with the methods we already discussed.
You can also query your surveys in multiple ways. Especially suited to this type of data is the Code-Document table and the Query tool, covered in the Querying Data section of this guide.
This guide is based on the University of Illinois guide on ATLAS.ti. Except where otherwise indicated, original content in this guide is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) 4.0 license. You are free to share, adopt, or adapt the materials. We encourage broad adoption of these materials for teaching and other professional development purposes, and invite you to customize them for your own needs.