Interpretive Research Designs

Ali Djamhuri

Philosophical Questions Distinguishing Paradigms and the Issue of

Subjective-objective DimensionNominalism

Anti-positivism

Voluntarism

Ideographic

Realism

Positivism

Determinism

Nomothetic

Source: Burrell & Morgan, 1979, 3)

Ontology

Epistemology

Human Nature

Methodology

Ontology

Nominalism1. Social world external to

individual cognition is nothing more than names, concepts and labels that are used to structure reality

2. The concepts, names, and labels are artificial creations and their utility based on convenience as tool for describing, making sense, and negotiating external world

Realism1. Social world external to

individual cognition is a real world made up of hard, tangible, and relatively immutable structure. They still exist as empirical entities

2. The social world exists independently of an individual’s appreciation of it. Reality is out there and is not man made creation, but as given (as is)

Epistemology

Anti-positivism1. Social world is relativistic

and can be understood only by the point of view of the individuals who are directly involved in the activities which are to be studied

2. Social science is basically subjective

3. Anti-positivist reject objectivity in social science

Positivism1. Understanding of social world

can be performed by observer 2. social science orientation is to

explain, predict, and to control performed by identifying regularities and causal relationship

3. Positivistic social science emphasizes objectivy such as by avoiding bias and the use of personal language

Human Nature

Voluntarism1. Humankind and their

activities are completely authonomous and having free will

2. Most human activities are internally driven by human free will or by meanings owned about their activities

3. Human activities are not predictable, but stillunderstandable

Determinism1. Humankind and their activities

are being completely determined by the situation or environment where they are located

2. Most human activities are externally driven by stimulus.Human activities are just responses to stimulus

3. Human activities are predictable or even programmable

Methodology (Axiology)

Ideographic1. Closeness to the social world is

the key to understand it.2. Social theory is subjective

accounts generated from insider’s interpretation

3. Emphasizing process, interactions and the importance of natural setting

4. Narrative and story telling is viewed as effective tool to report or transmit such accounts

Nomothetic1. Empasizing on the

importance of rigid, systematic protocols (procedures, techniques)

2. Scientific rigor is placed upon its rigidity of procedures (quantification, testing and others)

3. Hypothesis testing model dominates inquiries

Four Paradigms for the Analysis of Social Theory(Burrell & Morgan, 1979,22)

Subjective Objective

The Sociology of Radical Change

The Sociology of Regulation

Interptretive Functionalist

RadicalStructuralist

RadicalHumanist

Continuity Implications in Burrell and Morgan’s Model of Paradigm Categorization

1. The number of paradigms is extremely limitless

2. It is possible to create new sociological paradigm

3. Even within a certain paradigm, there are various reserach approaches distinguihed based on their magnitude of subjectivity-objectivity polarity or change-stability polarity

Interpretive Paradigm

Subjective Objective

The Sociology of Radical Change

The Sociology of Regulation

Interptretive Functionalist

RadicalStructuralist

RadicalHumanist

Interpretive (Anti-Positive Paradigm)

• Grounded Theory• Hermeneutics• Ethnography• Transcendental Phenomenology• Existential Phenomenology• Ethnomethodology• Phenomenology Symbolic Interactionism

Existential Phenomenology(Heidegger,Schutz)

• Instead of concern to transcendental consciousness (see transcendental phenomenology), existential phenomenology go to “life-world” (more on surface and more sociological)

• Getting the meaning of human actions or phenomena through epoche or bracketting, that is examining phenomena as they are originally given to consciousness(Husserl)

Transcendental Phenomenology(Husserlian or Everyday Life Phenomenology)

• Science is characterized by intentionality ...fully subjective

• Phenomenology is created to build “strong objective foundation” of science

• Orientating to answer the central question of meaning by going out from facts to the phenomenon (structure of experience) by bracketting the facts

Phenomenology Symbolic Interactionism

• Human actions are based on their own meaning

• Reality (meaning) is costructed through human (social) interaction, a negotiated result among competing themes, definitions or interpretations

• Reality (meaning) is changing• Less subjective in viewing the social world

(reality) compared to ethnomethodology

Hermeneutics (Dilthey)

• Ontologically adopting objective-idealist view• Hermeneutics is essentially a methodology for

studying the objectification of mind• The reality should be studied as text and in

detail to reveal their essential meaning and significance

• Social world should be studied in their total context, they may have different meaning in the other context

Ethnomethodology(Garfinkel)

• Studying social daily life in detail, specifically praactical activities,practical circumstances and practical sociological reasoning

• Specific attention is usually given to extra ordinary event of an ordered situation to understand how the insiders of the culture interpret and treat such extra ordinary

• The purpose is to provide adequate accounts, adequate descriptions, and adequate evidence about daily life that may contain awesome indexicalities

Tips

• Find the language (terms, principle, key concepts ) of any design chosen

• Suit it with subject matter researched• Be consistent in teh design chosen by

following relevant methodological steps in the design

• Report the work in the language of the chosen design