Positivist and Interpretivist Research

Positivist and Interpretivist research soft search put forward be defined as, A multi-method in focus, involving an witnessive, naturalistic approach to its subject matter. This means that qualitative look intoers study things in their natural settings, attempting to make sense of or interpret phenomena in term of the meanings stack bring to them. Qualitative look involves the studied use and collection of a variety of empirical materials case study, personal experience, introspective, life story interview, observational, historical, interactional, and optic texts-that describe routine and problematic moments and meaning in individuals lives (Denzin and capital of Nebraska, 1994). Qualitative inquiry emphasizes qualities of entities the processes and meanings that occur natur completelyy (Denzin Lincoln, 2000).Qualitative research methods wee-wee for many years make a significant contribution to management research. In this essay, I critically evaluate Gepharts paper on qualitative research, where he writes pertaining to traditional research methods such as advantageousness and post positivism, interpretive research and critical postmodernististism. In the second part of the essay, I evaluate David Silvermans On Finding and Manufacturing Qualitative information from the book A Very Short, Fairly Interesting and Reasonably Cheap Book active Qualitative interrogation where his methodology merges with the two methods highlighted in Gepharts paper.Gephart in his paper brings to light three main research traditions used in management research. They be positivism and postpositivism, interpretive research and critical post modernism, which have evolved from the behaviourist and cognitive perspectives of qualitative research. In this part of the essay I shall give an overview about the three research traditions and the distinctions between them.Positivist and post plus research traditions explicate from the behaviourist perspective of qualitative research which is based on the experience of consistent sexual congressships. The term positivism was first introduced by Auguste Comte, Our article of belief is unmatched which renders hypocrisy and oppression alike impossible. And it now stands forward as the result of all the efforts of the past, for the regeneration of regularize, which, whether considered individually or socially, is so deeply compromised by the anarchy of the present time. It establishes a primeval principle by which true philosophy and sound polity are brought into correlation a principle which can be felt as well as proved, and which is at once the recognisestone of a system and a basis of government. (Auguste Comte, 1798-1857).A major dogma of logical positivism is its thesis of the unity of experience (Hempel, 1969 Kolakowski, 1968). In its broadest sense, positivism is a position that holds the goal of knowledge. In a positivist view of the world, experience is seen as the way to get at truth , to understand the world well enough to predict and control it. In other words, Positivism assumes an a priori (truth) which is determin competent through methodical, rigorous, careful observation that can be proven through testable and repeatable methodologies.A post-positivist might begin by recognizing that the way scientists think and cut back and the way people think in their everyday life are not distinctly different. It can be defined as, non-foundational approach to human knowledge that rejects the view that knowledge is erected on absolutely secure foundation for there are not such things Post-positivists accept fallibilism (the philosophical doctrine that absolute knowledge is impossible) as an unavoidable fact of life (Phillips Burbules, 2000). It is characterized by a more nuanced belief in an ontologically realist out there veracity that can only be known within some level of probability (Groat Wang, 2002). Additionally, Post-positivists concede that the experimen tal methodologies employed in the natural sciences are often inappropriate for research involving people (Groat Wang, 2002). Within Post-positivist methodologies, the researcher is autonomous from the subject of inquiry, objectivity is important, and the inquirer manipulates and observes in a dispassionate, objective manner. This perspective assumes modified experimental, manipulative methodologies that can include some(prenominal) qualitative and quantitative practices (Denzin Lincoln, 2003). Positivism and post-positivism are al just about similar, the only difference is, Post-positivism takes into account the reprehensions against and weakness of the rigidity of positivism, and now informs much contemporary social science research, including reality-oriented qualitative inquiry (Patton, 1990). informative research tradition arises from the cognitive perspective of qualitative research which is based on shared intelligence and awareness of fourfold social and organisational realities. The foundation assumption for interpretive research is that knowledge is gained or at least filtered, through social constructions such as language, consciousness, and shared meanings (Klein Myers, 1999). In gain to the emphasis on the socially constructed nature of reality, interpretive research acknowledges the intimate relationship between the researcher and what is being explored, and the homeal constraints shaping this process. Interpretive research traditions take the position that humans are social animals that live in societies and as such investigate and interpret lived experience and their inter inhering realities (Bruce H. Rowlands, 2005). Interpretive researchers thus attempt to understand phenomena through accessing the meanings participants assign to them (Orlikowski Baroudi, 1991). Unlike atoms, molecules and electrons, people create and attach their own meanings to the world around them and to the behaviour that they manifest in that world (Schutz, 19 73). Interpretive studies assume that people create and associate their own subjective and inter-subjective meanings as they interact with the world around them.Positivism and Interpretive research can be distinguished as objective versus subjective (Burrell Morgan, 1979), nomothetic versus idiographic (Luthans Davis, 1982), quantitative versus qualitative ( cutting edge Maanen, 1979), outsider versus insider (Evered Louis, 1981), and etic versus emic (Morey Luthans, 1984). full of life postmodernism transcends mere description or reconstructs reality and derives meaning from situations through its critical approach. Critical postmodern system is about the play of differences of micro political movements and impulses of ecology, feminism, multiculturalism, and spirituality without any unifying select for theoretical integration or methodological consistency (Boje, Fitzgibbons Steingard, 1996). Critical postmodern is definable as the nexus of critical theory, post colonialism, critical pedagogy and postmodern theory (Boje, 2001). Critical postmodern theory is a way to get a clearer understanding of the relation between modern and postmodern, and take a Deleuzian expedition into the middle of the hybridity of pre-modern, modern, and postmodern (Boje, 1995). Critical postmodern spatial theory privileges the lived spatialities of left-margined communities as sites of socio-spatial critique. A postmodern identity politics enacts critical postmodern spatial theory by nurturing the development of, and solidarity between, counter publics, which are subaltern community spaces where private spatialities of alienation are brought to public discourse (Allen, 1999).This tradition is focused on how meanings and reality are shaped over time and seeks to uncover and understand the historical evolution of these meanings, practices, contradictions and expose recondite inequalities in societies.The five distinguishing characteristics of the three research traditions (i ) positivism and post positivism (ii) interpretive research and (iii) critical postmodernism, are as follows.First is in terms of the underlying assumptions about reality. Positivism and postpositivism adheres to realism and curse on the assumption of an objective world external to the mind that is reverberateed by scientific entropy and theories interpretive approach proceeds through the protagonism of relativism with investigation proceeding with selective information derived from interlinking circumstanceual realities so that data holds both objective and subjective characters while critical postmodernism adheres to historical realism or the assumption that material or symbolic reality comprised by multidimensional values that crystallizes over time so that the investigation involves the collection of objective and subjective data.Second is in terms of the goal of the investigation. Positivism and post-positivism proceeds with the goal of discovering truths, interpretive re search is in line with the goal of describing and understanding of meanings, and critical postmodernism is control by the goal to uncover hidden interests and contradictions in order to arrive at criticisms that in rung facilitate change.Third is in terms of the tasks intricate in the investigation. Positivism and postpositivism involves the identification, explanation and control of variables directed towards the verification of hypothesis or non-falsified hypotheses, interpretive research applies through producing descriptions of members meaning and definitions of situation in order to have a clear understanding of the manner that reality is constructed, while critical postmodernism involves the task of determining insights from the structures of relationships and historical changes that reveal contradictions.Fourth is in relation to the unit of analysis of the research traditions. Positivism and postpositivism utilises variables as the core unit of analysis, interpretive resea rch focuses on verbal and non verbal actions, while critical postmodernism centres on contradictions, criticism, signs and symbolism as key elements of the research. Variables become the core unit of analyses because of their objective reality. Verbal and non verbal are the units of analyses in interpretive research because of their subjective nature. Conflict, criticism and symbolism are the core unit of analyses of postmodernism because these elements appropriately capture historical realism.Fifth is with regard to the focus of the methods. Positivism and postpositivism involves the discovery of facts and the comparison of these facts with predefined hypothesis or propositions, interpretive research does not predefine dependent or independent variables, does not set out to test hypotheses, but aims to produce an understanding of the social context of the phenomenon and the process whereby the phenomenon influences and is influenced by the social context (Walsham, 1995), while crit ical postmodernism involves the derivation and understanding of historical evolution of meanings, conflicts and inequities evolving through time as the method of data gathering and analyses.Since positivism and post positivism involve objective reality, the methods that apply in these research are those useful in gathering facts while methods able to derive meaning appropriately applies to interpretive research and critical postmodernism because these should be able to capture subjective realities in order to derive meaning.Over the blend in generation there has been a shift in qualitative methods, from a scientist-oriented research, toward a more dynamic representational strategy .Beginning in the late nineteenth century, Antipositivism was perhaps the first movement to challenge the rigid nature of dominant Positivism. Early Antipositivists like Wilhelm Dilthey (1833-1911), Heinrich Rickert (1863-1936) and later, Max Weber (1864-1920), addresses the Positivist failure to apprecia te the fundamental experience of life, and instead favour physical and mental regularities, neglecting the meaningful experience that was really the defining characteristic of human phenomena. Adorno, 1969 (cited in Fuchs. C Sandoval. M., Positivism, Postmodernism, or Critical possible action? A Case discover of Communications Students Understanding of Criticism) stresses that positivism is only oriented on appearance, whereas critical theory stresses the difference between shopping center and appearance. Above all, critical theory, poststructuralism, and postmodernism are effective as critiques of positivism, interrogating taken-for-granted assumptions about the ways in which people write and read science (Stockman, 1984). Such opinions against positivism atomic number 82 to a breakthrough from positivism to other research traditions such as interpretive research and critical postmodernism which meet the needs of current researchers.In contradiction to Gephart, Silverman take s a rather interpretive and critical postmodernist stance when writing his piece about manufactured data and found data. Silverman in his paper uses Sacks insights to condescend the positive things that can be learnt through observations (found data) and the critique view on the use of interview data (manufactured data). He also states that researchers prefer to manufacture data using artificial research settings such as interviews and focus group which use pre-determined research questions. Manufacture of data to event a specified research problem is precisely the method which quantitative or positivist researchers prefer as explained by Gephart. Alternatively, course occurring (found) data arises from being aware that the research situation is not straight forward as eliciting data from interviews. Indeed collecting data through reading, looking, listening, facial expressions, sights, sounds, smells etc are taken into account. It provides a broader perspective of the research pr oblem in hand when compared to manufactured data. info manufactured through interview talk is approached with very different expectations, this can be explained by, The meaning of an answer is not a straightforward matter of external or internal reference, but also depends on the local and broader discursive system in which the phonation is embedded (Wetherell potter around, 1988). Positivist might interpret interviews in a different manner when compared to interpretive and critical postmodernist.Positivist researchers believe that their research methods and data mirror reality. The positivist researcher might strive to discover objectively the truth hidden in the subjects mind, Rather than an interviewee providing prepared/manufactured responses to standard questions designed to be unbiased and neutral, we strive to engage in social construction of a narrative with our participants. In this way we hope to activate the respondents stock of knowledge. (Richie and Rigano, 2001 744, cited in Post-Positivist Approaches To Research Anne B Ryan). We regard ourselves as people who conduct research among other people, learning with them, rather than conducting research on them (Wolcott, 1990). Researchers dont ask themselves is this the truth? Rather, we talk about the issues raised during the interviews, the participants reactions, and our variants of these interwoven ideas. In this context, it seems right to open up the interpretive discussions to our respondents, not for them to confirm or disconfirm them, but to share our thinking and how the ideas might be used. (Richie and Rigano, 2001 752, cited in Post-Positivist Approaches To Research Anne B Ryan)Use of manufactured data in qualitative research might make the respondent bias his result, as give tongue to by Crotty (1998) Leading to the epistemological idea that the very act of observation causes a particle to behave differently. Sacks states that, we can treat what people say as an account which positi ons itself in a particular context. Here the researcher is viewing what people say as an activity awaiting analysis, thus the researchers interpretations play a key role in manufacturing data. Bringing such subjectivity to the fore, backed with quality arguments rather than statistical exactness (Garcia Quek, 1997).Many researchers have criticized the use of manufactured data in qualitative research, which is the positivist view as stated by Gephart and the greater use of naturally occurring data or found data which is the interpretivistic approach. The defunct sociable Scientist Test describes manufactured data as, The test is whether the interaction would have taken place in the form that it did had the researcher not been born or if the researcher had got run over on the way to the university that morning(Potter, 1996). In all research, the choice of data depends on the research problem. Equally, there is no question that all polarities should be investigated particularly wher e, as here, they involve an appeal to nature (Speer 2002). As Kuhn (1964) stated in his publication The structure of Scientific Knowledge, scientists work withinand are constrained byprevailing paradigms while questioning the alleged objectivity and value-free neutrality of scientific discovery.Interpretive approach is synonymous with ethnography. Doing ethnography is doing an interpretation of the behaviour of human subjects in their local settings. Interpretivistic do not reject the concept of a real world out there but presented the reality which mattered most and they try to understand the respondents response in their own terms. Researchers are the measuring instruments and their understanding will derive from personal experience rather than manipulation of variables, as Hirschman(1986) puts it, personally experienced knowledge serves as scientific data. Reality has to be constructed through the researchers interpretation and ability to communicate the respondents reality hence the researcher has to be a part of the research to conduct a successful research. Qualitative researchers can access naturally occurring data by finding everyday features in extraordinary settings, this is an interpretive approach.Naturally occurring data can serve as a wonderful basis for theorizing about things that the researcher would never imagine. What ordinarily happens in the world around us means we can start with things that are not currently imaginable, by showing that they happened (Sacks, 1992). Sanday (1979) states that, empathy and identification with the observed people are needed to go about the understanding held by the human subjects. Geertz says that, the trick is not to get yourself into some inner correspondence with your informants. The researcher uses ethnography and manages to interpret an individual behaviour in such a way that it no longer appears to be absurd but appears rational. A successful interpretation is one which makes clear the meaning originall y present in a confused, fragmented, cloudy form.. what is initially strange, mystifying, puzzling, contradictory (for the researcher) is no longer so, is accounted for (Taylor, 1979).As stated by Potter (2002), naturally occurring data opens up a wide variety of novel issues that are outside the prior expectations embedded in interview questions. In addition to the interpretive approach through the critical approach, the researcher is able to delve into the determination of differential characteristics, nature of conflict, aspects underlying differences and conflicts, and consequences of differences and conflict which help to address the issues that arise in naturally occurring data. With these types of information derived through the application of critical postmodernist tradition, the investigative approach is able to assess data and explain reasons for these differences and conflicts that in turn catalyses the determination of solutions that leads to eventual change.It can be su pported as with the following evidence. Critical postmodern theory is a way to get a clearer understanding of the relation between modern and postmodern, and take a Deleuzian journey into the middle of the hybridity of pre-modern, modern, and postmodern (Boje, 1995). A critical postmodern project can move us beyond exploitation, racism, sexism, and abuse by reframing and restoring organization theory away from its patriarchal lingo in order to reaffirm social justice, equality, democracy, and the wonders of multiplicity (Boje, 1995 1004). In a critical postmodern theory, such as Tamara, we can explore the micro-practices of organizational life, as well as contextualize the stories of the marginal Other, within the workings of a post-industrial go forth and distribution chain addicted to sweatshops, and the cover-stories produced and distributed by the postmodern storytelling organizations that turn out consumer identities and spectacles for mass consumption (Boje, 1995 998-2). On t he plus side, there is always impedance to the forces of global and individual domination and exploitation that stem from the strange hybridity of premodern, modern, and postmodern organizing amalgams. Ultimately, the criticism provides insights into historical events to catalyse change that should be for the betterment of relationships and systems.It can be summarised that good qualitative research is difficult and challenging to undertake. Data manufactured through artificial research settings such as interviews and focus groups restricts the information on hand(predicate) to the researcher and it also leads to biased results since the respondent is aware of the researchers need. The positivist researcher might strive to manufacture data by discovering objectively the truth hidden in the subjects mind while interpretivist tries to collect naturally occurring data by understanding the respondents response in their own terms. Reality has to be constructed through the researchers i nterpretation and ability to communicate the respondents reality hence as Silverman states the researcher has to be a part of the research to conduct a successful research.Thus naturally occurring data (interpretivist) is more suitable for qualitative research than manufactured data (positivist) because,Naturally occurring data does not flood the research setting with the researchers own categories (embedded in questions, probes, stimuli, vignette and so on)It does not put people on the position of disinterested experts on their own and others practices and thoughts.It does not croak the researcher does not leave the researcher to make a range of more or else problematic inferences from the data collection arena to topic as the topic itself is directly studied.It opens a wide variety of novel issues that are outside the prior expectations embedded in, say, interview questions.It is a rich record of peoples living their lives, pursuing goals, managing institutional tasks and so on. 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