Empirical Studies in Social Science Research Dr.Addelli Ravinder ISBN NO-978-81-939248-5-3





Scientific research operates at two levels: a theoretical level and an empirical level. The theoretical level is concerned with developing abstract concepts about a natural or social phenomenon and relationships between those concepts (i.e., build “theories”), while the empirical level is concerned with testing the theoretical concepts and relationships to see how well they reflect our observations of reality, with the goal of ultimately building better theories. Over time, a theory becomes more and more refined (i.e., fits the observed reality better), and the science gains maturity. Scientific research involves continually moving back and forth between theory and observations. Both theory and observations are essential components of scientific research. For instance, relying solely on observations for making inferences and ignoring theory is not considered valid scientific research.


Depending on a researcher’s training and interest, scientific inquiry may take one of two possible forms: inductive or deductive. In inductive research, the goal of a researcher is to infer theoretical concepts and patterns from observed data. In deductive research, the goal of the researcher is to test concepts and patterns known from theory using new empirical data. Hence, inductive research is also called theory-building research, and deductive research is theory-testing research. Note here that the goal of theory-testing is not just to test a theory, but possibly to refine, improve, and extend it. Note that inductive and deductive research are two halves of the research cycle that constantly iterates between theory and observations. You cannot do inductive or deductive research if you are not familiar with both the theory and data components of research. Naturally, a complete researcher is one who can traverse the entire research cycle and can handle both inductive and deductive research.

It is important to understand that theory-building (inductive research) and theory testing (deductive research) are both critical for the advancement of science. Elegant theories are not valuable if they do not match with reality. Likewise, mountains of data are also useless until they can contribute to the construction to meaningful theories. Rather than viewing these two processes in a circular relationship. Perhaps they can be better viewed as a helix, with each iteration between theory and data contributing to better explanations of the phenomenon of interest and better theories. Though both inductive and deductive research are important for the advancement of science, it appears that inductive (theory-building) research is more valuable when there are few prior theories or explanations, while deductive (theory-testing) research is more productive when there are many competing theories of the same phenomenon and researchers are interested in knowing which theory works best and under what circumstances.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Paradigm Shifts In Management Practices R. Ramesh ISBN NO-978-81-939248-9-1

Image
Paradigm Shifts In Management Practices A paradigm shift in business process management is the understatement of the century! Every business owner or manager not only knows this fact, but has experienced the results of the “shift” up close. Consequently, the paradigm shift in business process management has transformed the business world drastically, that few could imagine just ten years ago. A paradigm shift is when a fundamental and/or monumental change or disruption occurs in current processes, models or perceptions. In other words, a monumental adjustment in norms, standards, thinking, patterns and set values, etc. These paradigm shifts have frightened some business owners to the point of departing from the world of business. However, many other entrepreneurs perceived the “shift” as opportunities and have, therefore, founded new types of businesses that led to even greater paradigm shifts. One of the radical paradigm shifts has been in business pr
Read more

International Terrorism And Women Trafficking -Challenges And Policy Options ISBN NO-978-81-939248-7-7

Image
InternationalTerrorism And Women Trafficking -Challenges And Policy Options In Human Rights Watch's documentation of Trafficking in women , we have found that while the problem varies according to the context, certain consistent patterns emerge. Furthermore, while our research has focused on the trafficking of women and children into the sex industry, reporting from numerous credible sources shows similar patterns in the trafficking of women, men, and children into forced marriage, bonded sweatshop labor, and other kinds of work. In all cases, the coercive tactics of traffickers, including deception, fraud, intimidation, isolation, threat and use of physical force, and/or debt bondage, are at the core of the problem and must be at the center of any effort to address it. In a typical case, a woman is recruited with promises of a good job in another country or province, and lacking better options at home, she agrees to migrate. There are also ca
Read more