Trustworthiness reporting in peer-reviewed qualitative evaluations in African contexts: Patterns and implications

Abstract

Background: Qualitative approaches are widely applied across disciplines, yet their role in programme evaluation in Africa, where evidence is critical for accountability and learning, remains underexplored.
Objectives: This study examines how trustworthiness strategies are reported in peer-reviewed qualitative evaluation studies in African contexts, and how reporting varies across methodological orientations, thematic focus areas and Computer-Assisted Qualitative Data Analysis Software (CAQDAS) use.
Method: We conducted a scoping review of 83 Web of Science (WoS)-indexed evaluation studies in African contexts, applying directed content analysis to map trustworthiness-reporting strategies and multiple correspondence analysis to examine variation.
Results: Findings reveal a consistent pattern: the WoS-indexed evaluation studies are most transparent about structurally visible methodological elements, notably thick description and data collection, while trustworthiness strategies that demonstrate deeper analytic or relational accountability are systematically under-reported. The corpus shows that strategies requiring greater methodological accountability, such as analytic details, reflexivity and sampling, are rarely comprehensive. Participant engagement strategies (e.g. prolonged engagement) and analytic mechanisms (e.g. audit trails) are particularly underused. Multiple correspondence analysis identified three clusters: (1) comprehensive reporting in health and standalone qualitative studies, (2) partial engagement strategies in CAQDAS-supported studies and (3) limited reporting in agriculture and environment evaluations.
Conclusion: This study contributes empirical grounding to qualitative evaluation practice in Africa, showing that reporting is structured by sectoral context and technological adoption more than by methodological orientation, with strategies critical to interpretive accountability remaining under-reported.
Contribution: Addressing the gaps requires capacity building that engages evaluators, journals, professional bodies and funders with the epistemological commitments of qualitative inquiry, not merely its reporting conventions.