In this video tutorial, we will look at how we can use the paraphrase function in MAXQDA to summarize segments from texts. In paraphrases, we can summarize individual sections of our data in our own words. This way, we can use paraphrases to open up our data and create a basis for inductive category formation.
We can find the paraphrase function in the analysis tab. It can be activated via this button. Here we can now see that the paraphrase bar appears on the right, and the paraphrase segments in the text are highlighted in red. I can now create a new paraphrase by left clicking, selecting the relevant segment, and then releasing the mouse. An editor window now opens, in which I can enter my paraphrase. Alternatively, I can also create a paraphrase here using AI assist. The new paraphrase segment is now also highlighted in red. I can now easily edit the paraphrase by clicking on the paraphrase in the paraphrase bar. I could also delete the paraphrase here with the document. I can now also scroll through the individual paraphrases that I have added so far using AI assist. We can also summarize all paraphrases from one document. To do so, we simply click the AI assist icon in the document browser and select Summarize Paraphrases.
In addition to text documents, we can also paraphrase media files such as videos and audio recordings. For example, to summarize content in interviews. To do this, we can activate the paraphrase mode in the multimedia browser using this button. We then select a segment in the multimedia browser, an editor window then opens into which we can enter our paraphrase. The paraphrased segments are also used to create codes in the codes window. If I now activate these codes and some documents, all segments in the activated documents to which paraphrases have been assigned are displayed here. I can now also use my paraphrases to develop new codes from them. I can find this function here. This table lists all the paraphrases that I’ve created in my project so far. I can now add a new code by right clicking on one of the paraphrases. Codes that have been created this way on the basis of the paraphrases are displayed in a code system on the left hand side. I can now also assign a paraphrase to an existing code by dragging the paraphrase to the corresponding code in the code system. I can also display the paraphrase matrix for different documents, document groups, or sets. To do this, I simply select some documents and drag them into this window. The paraphrases that have been created in the individual documents, document groups or sets are listed here next to each other. I can also use the “Print document with paraphrases function” to print the document together with all added paraphrases.
