ScholarWorks@성균관대학교

초록

Questions about how to determine and justify sample size remain among the most contested issues in qualitative research. This article advances the debate by contrasting data saturation, which emphasizes the recurrence of redundant information, with theoretical saturation, which prioritizes explanatory sufficiency of emerging theory. Clarifying these forms of saturation matters because reliance on data saturation alone often leads to premature closure and weak theorization while treating data saturation as an interim milestone and continuing until theoretical saturation is reached arguably better serves the explanatory goals of qualitative research. Noteworthily, theoretical saturation often requires twice as many interviews as data saturation. Positioning saturation as more than a procedural benchmark, therefore, enables qualitative researchers to justify sample size decisions in ways that strengthen both methodological rigor and theoretical contribution. Thus, this article contributes by drawing a clear boundary between descriptive sufficiency and explanatory sufficiency, reorganizing dispersed rules of thumb into an approach-versus-method range table with a governing choice rule, operationalizing an auditable five-step procedure that blends information power with threshold monitoring of new information, and translating these advances into concrete interview and focus group heuristics that can be readily implemented.

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