Interpretive phenomenological analysis

A qualitative research methodology focused on exploring how people make sense of their lived experiences, widely used in accessibility and disability research. IPA involves detailed analysis of individual accounts — typically through in-depth interviews — to understand participants' personal perceptions and meaning-making processes. Unlike thematic analysis which looks for patterns across a dataset, IPA prioritizes the depth of each individual's experience before identifying shared themes. In accessibility research, IPA is valued for centering disabled people's subjective experiences of technology, revealing insights that quantitative usability metrics and automated compliance testing cannot capture — such as the emotional labor of navigating inaccessible interfaces, the embodied knowledge built through adaptive technology use, and the social dimensions of access.