Research and Analysis Paths between Positivism and Interpretivism: An Appraisal of Hay’s Via Media Chris Clarke University of Warwick Hay’s Political Analysis raises foundational issues for all social scientists, not least in its outline for a via media, or middle way, between positivist and interpretivist social science.In this view, social. PRINCIPLES AND PLANNING FOR RESEARCH16 Chapter objectives After reading this chapter you will be able to:. Distinguish between ontology and epistemology in research. Distinguish between inductive and deductive methods. Explain the different perspectives taken by positivism and interpretivism. Describe the different research methodologies and the conditions for their selection.

1. Positivism Interpretivism Critical Pragmatic
2. Interpretivist Or Positivist Methodology
3. Interpretivism Vs Positivism

What is Ontology and What is Epistemology? Ontology is the nature of reality (Hudson and Ozanne, 1988) and the epistemology can be defined as the relationship between the researcher and the reality (Carson et al., 2001) or how this reality is captured or known. There are two dominant ontological and epistemological traditions/ideologies: 1)Positivism, 2)Interpretivism. Positivism: The positivist ontology believes that the world is external (Carson et al., 1988) and that there is a single objective reality to any research phenomenon or situation regardless of the researcher’s perspective or belief (Hudson and Ozanne, 1988).

Thus, they take a controlled and structural approach in conducting research by identifying a clear research topic, constructing appropriate hypotheses and by adopting a suitable research methodology (Churchill, 1996;Carson et al., 2001). Positivist researchers remain detached from the participants of the research by creating a distance, which is important in remaining emotionally neutral to make clear distinctions between reason and feeling (Carson et al., 2001). They also maintain a clear distinction between science and personal experience and fact and value judgement. It is also important in positivist research to seek objectivity and use consistently rational and logical approaches to research (Carson et al., 2001). Statistical and mathematical techniques are central to positivist research, which adheres to specifically structured research techniques to uncover single and objective reality (Carson et al., 2001). The goal of positivist researchers is to make time and context free generalizations. They believe this is possible because human actions can be explained as a result of real causes that temporarily precedes their behaviour and the researcher and his research subjects are independent and do not influence each other (Hudson and Ozanne, 1988).

Accordingly, positivist researchers also attempt to remain detached from the participants of the research by creating distance between themselves and the participants. Especially, this is an important step in remaining emotionally neutral to make clear distinctions between reason and feeling as well as between science and personal experience.

Positivists also claim it is important to clearly distinguish between fact and value judgement. As positivist researchers they seek objectivity and use consistently rational and logical approaches to research (Carson et al. 2001; Hudson and Ozanne 1988). Interpretivism: The position of interpretivism in relation to ontology and epistemology is that interpretivists believe the reality is multiple and relative (Hudson and Ozanne, 1988). Lincoln and Guba (1985) explain that these multiple realities also depend on other systems for meanings, which make it even more difficult to interpret in terms of fixed realities (Neuman, 2000). The knowledge acquired in this discipline is socially constructed rather than objectively determined (Carson et al., 2001, p.5) and perceived (Hirschman, 1985, Berger and Luckman, 1967, p.

3: in Hudson and Ozanne, 1988). Interpretivists avoid rigid structural frameworks such as in positivist research and adopt a more personal and flexible research structures (Carson et al., 2001) which are receptive to capturing meanings in human interaction (Black, 2006) and make sense of what is perceived as reality (Carson et al., 2001). They believe the researcher and his informants are interdependent and mutually interactive (Hudson and Ozanne, 1988). The interpretivist researcher enters the field with some sort of prior insight of the research context but assumes that this is insufficient in developing a fixed research design due to complex, multiple and unpredictable nature of what is perceived as reality (Hudson and Ozanne, 1988). The researcher remains open to new knowledge throughout the study and lets it develop with the help of informants.

The use of such an emergent and collaborative approach is consistent with the interpretivist belief that humans have the ability to adapt, and that no one can gain prior knowledge of time and context bound social realities (Hudson and Ozanne, 1988). Therefore, the goal of interpretivist research is to understand and interpret the meanings in human behaviour rather than to generalize and predict causes and effects (Neuman, 2000; Hudson and Ozanne, 1988). For an interpretivist researcher it is important to understand motives, meanings, reasons and other subjective experiences which are time and context bound (Hudson and Ozanne, 1988; Neuman, 2000). The following table summarizes the differences between the two research paradigms: Ontology and epistemological differences of positivism and interpretivism (Adopted from Carson et al. References:. Berger, P. L., and Luckman, T.

The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in Sociology of Knowledge, New York: Irvington Publishers. The presentation of interpretivist research. Qualitative Market Research: An International Journal, 9(4), 319–324. Carson, D., Gilmore, A., Perry, C., and Gronhaug, K.

Qualitative Marketing Research. London: Sage. Churchill, G.

Positivism Interpretivism Critical Pragmatic

Barry harris method pdf. Basic Marketing Research ( 3 rd Ed.), Fort Worth, TX: The Dryden Press. Hirschman, E. Primitive Aspects of Consumption in Modern American Society. Journal of Consumer Research, 12, 237-249. Hudson, L., and Ozanne, J. Alternative Ways of Seeking Knowledge in Consumer Research. Journal of Consumer Research, 14(4), 508–521.

Marketing Theory. Homewood, IL: Richard D. Irwin.

Interpretivist Or Positivist Methodology

Lincoln, Y., and Guba, E. Naturalistic Inquiry. London: Sage. Social Research Methods: Qualitative and Quantitative Approaches (4 th Ed.), USA: Allyn and Bacon.

Interpretivism Vs Positivism

Prabash A Edirisingha Faculty of Business and Law Northumbria University Newcastle upon Tyne, UK. At this point, you might ask whether arts and sciences are so different. Can’t one person be an artist and a scientist? Perhaps they can, but when researching into writing theory I came across a lot of literature that would suggest there are pretty big differences between what kinds of things arts and science people value about writing – basic beliefs and attitudes.

Chandler, for example, has approached characteristic differences between Classical and Romantic ways of thinking. Classical writers value planning, logic, order, structure, purpose, rigour, and objectivity. Romantic writers, by contrast, favour discovery, freedom, lack of structure, enjoyment, and emergent form. Classical relates to the sciences, Romantic relates to the arts. Similar characteristic differences can be found between positivism and interpretivism.

Research Strategy Once you have an idea of the research approach that you are going to take, you next need to think about a research strategy that will lead you to find answers to your research question. That is, you need to think about your methodology and methods. You should get going on this near the start of your project and certainly before you do any data collection. It is at this stage that you would consider, for instance, whether your research is going to involve a survey, one or more case studies, some action research, participant observation, or some other methodology.

Whatever choice you make, you must be able to justify it in terms of your learning objectives, your research question, and your research approach. Your thinking at this stage should involve quite a high level of detail. For example, if your project were to involve in-depth interviewing, you would need to justify: who is to be interviewed, and why what questions are to be asked, and why how open ended you would like the responses to be, and why how will the responses be recorded, and why how will these responses be analysed and why how will conclusions be drawn from the analysis, and why. You are expected to be methodologically aware; – this means not only that you know what you are doing but also that you are able to provide the rationale for why you are doing it. For example, the design of interview questions should (normally) be based upon appropriate theory.

Therefore, you will be expected to read and refer to appropriate textbooks on research methodology. Your reading might begin with the recommended text book (see section 3.1 in these guidelines) and move on from there as your needs become more specific.