Theory and research

1.Empiricism

• research has no obvious connections with theories
• only knowledge gained through experience and senses is acceptable
• ideas must be subjected to the rigors of testing before they can be considered knowledge.
• accumulation of "facts" is a legitimate goal in its own right.

2.Deductive and Inductive

• The process of deduction: theory-->hypothesis-->data collection-->findings-->hypotheses confirmed of rejected-->revision of theory
• deductive research usually associated with quantitative research
• deductive process appears very linear, one step follows another, logical sequence.
• in inductive research, theory is the outcome of research
• the process of induction involves drawing generalizable inferences out of observations, with the opposite sequences with deduction.
  -however, deduction entails an element of induction, the induction process likes to entail a modicum of deduction.

Epistemological

key issue: whether the social world can and should be studied according to the same principles, procedures, and ethos as the natural sciences.

1.Positivism: a natural science epistemology

an epistemological position that advocates the application of the methods of the natural sciences to the study of social reality and beyond. Positivism entails the following principles.

• phenomenalism only phenomena and hence knowledge confirmed by the senses can genuinely be warranted as knowledge.
• deductivism approach purpose of theory is to generate hypotheses that can be tested and that will thereby allow explanation of laws to be assessed.
  the role of research is to test theories and to provide material for the development of laws.
• inductive strategy knowledge is arrived through the gathering of facts that provide the basis for laws.
  it is possible to collect observations in a manner that is not influenced by pre-existing theories.
• objective science must and presumably be conducted in a way that is value free.
• A clear distinction between scientific statements and normative statements and a belief that the former are the true domain of the scientist.

Realism

share two features with positivism:

• natural and social sciences can and should apply the same kind of approach to collection of data and explanation
• external reality to which scientists direct their attention (reality is separate from descriptions)
  empirical realism also called naive realism: appropriate methods could help to perfectly understand reality. There is perfect or at least very close correspondence between reality and the term used to describe it.
  critical realism we will only be able to understand and so change the social world if we identify the structures at work the generates those events and discourses.
  there are distinctions between objects that are the focus of their inquiries and the terms they use to describe.
  gerative mechanisms are not directly observable, but their effects are observable.
  retroductive reasoning: entails making an inference about the causal mechanism that lies behind and is responsible for regularities that are observed in the social world.

2.Interpretivism

• devotes an alternative to the positivist orthodoxy
• a strategy is required that respects the differences between people of social action.

(1)Verstehen

• described sociology as a "science which attempts the interpretive understanding of social action in order to arrive at a causal explanation of its course and effects"
• casual explanation is undertaken with reference to the "interpretive understanding of social action" rather than to external forces that have no meaning for those involved in the social action.

(2)Hermeneutic-phenomenological tradition

• understanding of human action rather than with the forces that are deemed to act on it
• key question: how individuals make sense of the world around them and how in particular the philosopher should bracket out preconceptions in his or her grasp of that world.
• social reality has a meaning for human beings and therefore human action is meaningful
• individuals act on the basis of the meanings that they attribute to their acts and to the acts of others.
• the job of social scientist is to gain access to people's common-sense thinks and hence to interpret their actions and their social world from their point of view.
• Allegiance to phenomenology
• view human behavior as a product of how people interpret the world.

(3)Symbolic interactionism

• occupying similar intellectual space to the hermeneutic-phenomenological tradition and so as broadly interpretative in approach
• interaction takes place in such a way that the individual is continually interpreting the symbolic meaning of his or her environment, which includes the actions of other, and acts on the basis of this imputed meaning.

Ontology

Concern with the nature of social entities.
Whether social entities can and should be considered objective entities that have a reality external to social actors(objectivism), or whether they can and should be considered social constructions built up from the perceptions and actions of social actors(constructionism).

1.Objectivism

objectivism is an ontology position that asserts that social phenomena and their meanings have an existence (tangible reality) that is independent of social actors.
organisation and cultural are Pre-given
Social actors as external realities that they have no role in fashioning.

• Organisation: rules, regulations, procedures, positions,
• Cultural: widely shared values and beliefs

2.Constructionism

Is an ontology position that asserts that social phenomenon and their meaning are continually accomplished by social actors.
Antithetical to objectivism
It implies that social phenomenon and categories are not only** produced through social interaction**, but that they are in a constant state of revision.
Researchers presents a specific version of social reality, rather than that can be regarded as definitive.
Knowledge is viewed as indeterminate--->The world is constituted in one way or another as people talk it write it and argue it. Antithetical to realism.

• Organisation: rules were far less extensive and less rigorously imposed, much less like commands, and much more like general understandings.
  Social order of hospital was an outcome of agreed-upon patterns of actions that were themselves the products of negotiations between the different parties involved.
• cultural: emergent reality in a continuous state of construction and reconstruction.
  it acts as a point of reference but is always in the process of being formed.

fundamental differences between quantitative and qualitative research strategies

| quantitative |qualitative
-------|----------------------|------------
principal orientation to the role of theory in relation to research |deductive, testing of theory |inductive, generation of theory
epistemological orientation |natural science model, in particular, positivism |interpretivism
ontological orientation|objectivism|constructionism