Approaches to research
The proposal developer needs to consider three framework elements: philosophical assumptions about what constitutes knowledge claims; general procedures of research called strategies of inquiry; and detailed procedures of data collection, analysis, and writing, called methods.
Knowledge claims
Stating a knowledge claim means that researchers start a project with certain assumptions about how they will learn and what they will learn during their inquiry. These claims might be called paradigms, or worldview. These world views are shaped by the discipline area of the student, the beliefs of advisers and faculty in a student's area, and past research experiences.
Postpositive knowledge claims
This position is sometimes called the “scientific method” or doing “science” research. Postpositivism reflects ad deterministic philosophy in which causes probably determine effects or outcomes. It is also reductionistic in that the intent is to reduce he ideas into a small, discrete set of ides to test, such as the variable that constitute hypotheses and research questions. The knowledge that develops through a postpositivist lens is based on careful observation and measurement of the objective reality that exists “out there” in the world. Developing numeric measures of observations and studying the behaviour of individual become paramount for a postpositvist. There are laws or theories that govern the world, and these need to be tested or verified and refined so that we can understand the world. Thus, in the scientific method an individual begins with a theory, collects data that either supports or refutes the theory, and then makes necessary revisions before additional tests are conducted.
Key assumptions:
knowledge is conjectural: absolute truth can never be found
research is the process of making claims and then refining or abandoning some of them for other claims more strongly warranted
data, evidence, and rational considerations shape...