Quantity and Quality in Social Research:

Positivism and Phenemenology

B. B. Mohanty
 What is Research?
A Scientific undertaking which, by means of logical
and systematized techniques aims to:
1. Discover new facts or verify old facts.
2. Analyse their sequences, relationship and causal
explanations derived within an appropriate
theoretical frame of reference.
3. Develop new scientific tools, concepts and
theories.
• Scientific research, a systematic quest for knowledge,
which follows different research paradigms that
make assumptions about how the world operates.
 Elements of research paradigms
These research paradigms are the philosophies of
science, which guide the way science is conducted by
shaping the following five core elements:
1. Ontology (how reality is viewed)
2. Epistemology (how the nature of knowledge is
conceived)
3. Axiology (the role and values of the research process)
4. Methodology (processes associated with conducting
research)
5. Rigor (the criteria used to justify the quality of
research)
Quantitative vs Qualitative approach
Background
Construction of belief system
Legitimization of these beliefs (Production and display
of data)
Normative standards on collection, display and use of
data.
No consensus on what constitutes legitimate data
What is that one has to explain? What should be
described? and How?
Qualitative approach- report, observation in natural
language
Quantitative approach- assigned numbers to qualitative
observation (counting/measuring)
Goal of Social science research
 To build up understanding
 To develop ways of gaining access to life world of other
individuals (use of natural language in qualitative approach).
 Motives, meanings, emotions and other subjective aspects
(action of chess players).
 Daily actions and behaviours in ordinary setting.
 Structure of those actions and objective condition that accompany
and influence them.
 Some of them are directly observable-objective

 To develop itself into a full-fledged science

 rigorous and reliable data leading to testing of empirical
hypotheses.
The logical structure of the quantitative research process
Positivism
Positivism relies on the hypothetico-deductive method to
verify a priori hypotheses that are often stated quantitatively,
where functional relationships can be derived between causal
and explanatory factors (independent variables) and outcomes
(dependent variables).
Positivist research, however, does not always rely on
quantitative methods. For example, an experimental study
examining the effects of an intervention through qualitative
analysis fits within the positivist paradigm.
The hypothetico-deductive method is a circular process:
Theory → hypothesis → operationalizing variables→ experimentation →
theory.
 Principles of positivist inquiry
A primary goal of positivist inquiry is to generate explanatory associations
or causal relationships that ultimately lead to prediction and control of the
phenomena in question. Positivism is rooted in the following principles :
 Goals of science: Social and natural sciences should focus on
discovery of laws that facilitate explanation and prediction.
 Methodology: Social and natural sciences should use the same
methodology based on the hypothetico-deductive model of science
(theory, hypothesis, operationalization, experimentation).
 Laws of nature: Basic laws of nature, formed through replication and
syntheses of scientific discoveries and theories, assert the existence of a
single true and identifiable reality.
 Evidence for law: Laws of nature are derived from empirical data.
 Sampling and inference: Larger samples are favorable over smaller,
idiosyncratic samples; larger samples reveal generalizable tendencies,
causes, and the nature of reality.
 Data: data are always knowable, retrievable facts; clean up lay concept
by precise data
Key Terms Related to Understanding Research Paradigm of Positivism:

 Independent variable: Factors that influence outcomes of the study;

independent variables can be manipulated or measured.
 Dependent variable: Measures of interest (outcomes) in the study; unlike
independent variables, dependent variables can only be measured, not
manipulated.
 Dualism: Separation of researcher and participants in study design and data
collection to minimize bias.
 Hypothesis: A statement or idea derived from theory or literature that can be
tested through experimentation.
 Hypothetico-deductive model: Scientific model based on forming a testable
hypothesis and developing an empirical study to confirm or reject the hypothesis
 Internal validity: Evidence and inference supporting the “causal” relationship
between the independent and dependent variables.
 Laws of nature: Synthesis of scientific discoveries and theories that form the
foundation of how nature operates; examples include our scientific
understanding of how time and space operate, through scientific findings in
physics.
 Objectivity: Absence of bias due to researcher influences, flaws in experimental
design, or outliers in data.
 Philosophical Foundations of the Positivist Paradigm
• Ontology (Nature of reality):
A single tangible reality exists—one that can be understood, identified, and measured.
This allows explanation and prediction in a causal framework to operate naturally, as
causal inferences rely on (1) temporal precedence (i.e., for X to cause Y, X must
precede Y in time), (2) association (i.e., X and Y are correlated), and (3) lack of
confounders (i.e., no other factors besides the identified factors affect the outcome; X is
the only cause of Y within the space identified).
• Epistemology (Nature of knowledge):
Knowledge can and must be developed objectively, without the values of the
researchers or participants influencing its development. Knowledge, when appropriately
developed, is truth—that is, it is certain, congruent with reality, and accurate. To
appropriately develop truth, absolute separation must exist between the research
participant and the researcher.
• Axiology ( Values of the research process):
Dismisses the importance of individuals’ subjective experiences and values. These
subjective experiences and values are seen as unimportant in positivist thinking. This
requires the researcher to stay objective and not interact with participants during data
collection. Further, it requires the researcher to not be involved in the experiment in any
meaningful way.
(Continued...)
Philosophical Foundations of the Positivist Paradigm
 Methodology: How to conduct scientific research
Emphasizes engaging in research in settings where variables can be controlled and
manipulated. The researcher creates somewhat artificial environments where other
extraneous factors, beyond the study variables, are minimized. The sole focus of the
study is to examine the explanatory or causal relationships between variables in the
study, as is done in the natural sciences. As such, experimental designs are favored
in the positivist paradigm and results from experiments are used to confirm or refine
theories, which, in turn, can lead to new hypotheses and questions for new studies.

 Rigor: Criteria for evaluating quality of research

A key goal in positivist experimentation is to isolate and control the influence of all
factors so that only the key variables of interest are studied (e.g., only X could have
caused Y). In this regard, positivist researchers are most interested in the
study’s internal validity—how well the study design and evidence gathered support
claims for causal inference. Internal validity that focuses on causality should not to
be confused with assessment validity that deals with how well a particular construct
(e.g., educational assessment, psychological measure) is measured.
 Qualitative Research: Building an Understanding
Qualitative approaches to research are based on a real “worldview”
which is holistic (a view that an organic or integrated whole has a
reality independent of and greater than the sum of its parts) and has
the following beliefs:
There is not a single reality for each person and change over time.
 What we know has meaning only within a given situation or
context. The reasoning process used in qualitative research
involves perceptually putting pieces together to make wholes
Reality based upon perceptions are different. From this process
meaning is produced. However, because perception varies with the
individual, many different meanings are possible.
A qualitative research technique which aims to understand, identify
and describe a phenomena by how the experience is perceived by
its members objective study of subjective things (phenomenas).
Phenomenology
• Defined as “a method in philosophy that begins with the individual
and his own conscious experience and tries to avoid prior
assumptions, prejudices, and philosophical dogmas”.
• A phenomenological approach to qualitative research study wants to
focus on describing the meaning for many individuals of their
combined lived experience of a single aspect, concept, or simply
phenomenon.
 Phenomenology examines phenomena as they are apprehended in
their immediacy by the social actor.
 Phenomenologists study how people define their social situations once
they have suspended or “bracketed” their learned cultural notions.
 The basic proposition states that everyday reality is a socially
constructed system of ideas that has accumulated overtime and is
taken for granted by group members.
 Phenomenology made inroads through ethnomethodology- Garfinkel (1967)
 Edmund Husserl
Phenomenology was founded at the beginning of the twentieth century by
Edmund Husserl (1859-1938).
According to Husserl:
 Philosophical analysis should turn to the things themselves
 The next question was: what are the things themselves? How to perceive
and conceive them? (This is what phenomenology, the science of
phenomena).
 Started his analysis with subjective consciousness; the locus of cognition
with the best of evidence, there is no cognition without consciousness
 Subjective consciousness is always a consciousness of something
 Methods to phenomenological analysis:
 Free imaginative variation (finding the essence of phenomena) For ex.
Cube (six equal sides and all angles are rectangular)
 Bracketing of the assumptions
 Bracketing of existence of things-Transcendental reduction
(Phenomenological reduction) -whatness of phenomena.
Alfred Schutz
 He introduced Phenomenology into Sociology.
 Two pillars in Methodology of social sciences (Logic of Scientific explanation
and Constitutive analysis of the social world- Schutz emphasizes on the later).
 His writings were concerned with Weber’s Verstehen. Weber overlooked
that the modes of givenness of social actions- and therefore their meanings-
are different to the actor himself (1) Observer in everyday life (2) and to
social scientist (3)
 He focuses on an aspect of social world called -life-world or the world of
everyday life which is intersubjective in which people both create social
reality and are constrained by the pre-existing social and cultural
structurers created by their predecessors.
 Schutz was concerned with the dialectical relationship between the way
people construct social reality and the obdurate social and cultural reality
that they inherit from those who preceded them in in the social world.
 Schutz’s view: the constructs that people use in order to render the world
meaningful and intelligible to them as the key focus of a
phenomenologically grounded social science.
 Central focus of Phenomenology
1. People and their social reality—is fundamentally different from the subject matter
of the natural sciences- rejection of the positivist position
2. Understanding of social reality must be grounded in people’s experience of that
social reality. Failure to recognize and encapsulate the meaningful nature of
everyday experience runs the risk of losing touch with social reality and imposing
instead ‘a fictional non-existing world constructed by the scientific observer’
3. Phenomenology is concerned with the subjective experience, which is considered
to be more real and more important in the understanding of human nature and
human experience. It focuses on the person’s lived experience within a
phenomenon, including shared meanings and commonalities.
4. Phenomenologists view the person as integral with the environment. The focus of
phenomenological research is people's experience in regard to a phenomenon and
how they interpret their experiences. All phenomenologists agree that there is not
a single reality; each individual has his or her own reality. This is considered true
even of the researcher’s experience in collecting data and analyzing it. There are
four aspects of the human experience, which are of interest to the
phenomenological researcher: Lived space (spatiality), Lived body (corporeality),
Lived human relationships (relationality), Lived time (temporality).All of these
aspects are taken into consideration, hence, people see different realities in
Methodology in Phenomenology
 Most data collected in phenomenology are in the form of language that
includes methods such as accounts of conversations, group dialogue,
diary, autobiography, and personal narratives.
 Interviews remain the most common means of collecting data in
phenomenology.
 Also used research methods include: conceptual analysis; linguistic
analysis; hermeneutical method and praxis; historical-critical method;
literary philosophy; and formal logic
 Collection of data from participants who have experienced the
phenomenon. This is accomplished by observations, interactive
interviews, videotapes and written descriptions by the subject participants.
 Composite description of the essence of the experience by all of the
individual participants (“what” they experienced & “how” they
experienced the phenomenon).
 In most instances data is collected through in-depth interactive
conversations between the researcher and the participant.
Thank You