-H i s t o r y- Content analysis is a research method that has come into wide use in health studies in recent years. Asearch of content analysis as a subject heading term in the Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature produced more than 4,000 articles published between 1991 and 2002. The number of studies reporting the use of content analysis grew from only 97 in 1991 to 332 in 1997 and 601 in 2002. The differentiation of content analysis is usually limited to classifying it as primarily a qualitative versus quantitative research method. The purpose in this article is to present the breadth of approaches categorized as qualitative content analysis. We have identified three distinct approaches: conventional, directed, and summative. All three approaches are used to interpret text data from a predominately naturalistic paradigm. We begin with a brief review of the history and definitions of content analysis. We then illustrate the three different approaches t...