Troubling qualitative research/Troubling empathy

This presentation aims to trouble the concept of empathy in qualitative inquiry from two perspectives having a phenomenological approach. As a supervisor I see students regard interviews as untouchable and be reluctant to bring in theory in their analysis because of empathy towards the interviewees. As a researcher I experience problems interviewing nurses having focus on their “use of empathy” in the context of their institutional identity together with examining three other concepts: professional, personal and private. Concepts current in professions which focus on human relationships as – among others - nursing, teaching as well as the profession of psychologists. Thus, I want to problematize this dual perspective: empathy embedded in the method and as a theme or topic in interviews with professionals and the assumption that empathy might expand as well as limit the results of inquiry within different theoretical framework.