1. PARADIGMS OF RESEARCH
Dr Ayaz Afsar

2. STRUCTURE OF THE LECTURE
The search for truth
Two conceptions of social reality
Positivism
The assumptions, nature and tools of science
The scientific method
Criticisms of positivism and the scientific method
Naturalistic approaches
Normative and interpretive paradigms
Phenomenology, ethnomethodology, symbolic interactionism
Criticisms of naturalistic and interpretive approaches
Mixed methods research
Post-positivism, post modernism and post-structuralism
Complexity theory

3. PARADIGMS OF SOCIAL RESEARCH
POSITIVIST
INTERPRETIVE
MIXED METHODS
POST- POSITIVIST
POST- STRUCTURALIST
POST-MODERNIST
COMPLEXITY THEORY

4. QUANTIFICATION, LARGE SCALE
POSITIVISM (MACRO)
NATURAL SCIENCE BASIS
GENERALIZATION
OBJECTIVITY
PREDICTION
CAUSALITY
NOMOTHETIC, LAWS
CONTROL, MANIPULATION
QUANTIFICATION, LARGE SCALE

5. POSITIVIST DESIGN IDENTIFY TOPIC REVIEW PREVIOUS LITERATURE LOOK FOR
ALTERNATIVE
EXPLANATIONS
FORMULATE
HYPOTHESIS
DESIGN
RESEARCH
START PROCESS
AGAIN
COLLECT DATA NO
ANALYZE DATA
REPORT
FINDINGS
YES

6. POSITIVIST METHODS
EXPERIMENTS
SURVEYS
TESTS

7. INTERPRETIVE PARADIGM (MICRO)
NATURALISTIC
UNDERSTANDING/
INTERPRETATION
SUBJECTIVITY, INTENTIONALITY
INTERPRETATION
AGENCY
IDIOGRAPHIC
FLUIDITY, CHANGE
CONTEXT-BOUND
MULTIPLE PERSPECTIVES
SPECIFIC/NON-GENERALIZABLE

8. INTERPRETIVE/ETHNOGRAPHIC
IDENTIFY TOPIC
LITERATURE REVIEW
RESEARCH DESIGN
DATA COLLECTION
DATA ANALYSIS
ELABORATION OF
CONCEPTS/THEORIES
REPORT OF FINDINGS

9. ETHNOGRAPHY OBSERVATION INTERVIEWS NATURALISTIC METHODS NARRATIVES,
DOCUMENTS
ETHNOGRAPHY
THICK
DESCRIPTION
OBSERVATION
INTERVIEWS

10. NUMBERS,
MEASUREMENT
POSITIVIST
APPROACHES
SURVEY,
EXPERIMENT
ETHNOGRAPHY
INTERVIEW
NATURALISTIC
APPROACHES
OBSERVATION
CASE STUDY
ACTION RESEARCH

11. MIXED METHODS SURVEY NUMBERS, MEASUREMENT INTERVIEW CASE STUDY
ETHNOGRAPHY
META-
ANALYSIS
MIXED
METHODS
OBSERVATION
HISTORICAL &
DOCUMENTARY
EXPERIMENT
VIRTUAL WORLDS
ACTION
RESEARCH

12. POST-POSITIVISM, POST- STRUCTURALISM & POSTMODERNISM
MULTIPLE REALITIES
INTERPRETIVE
PHENOMENOLOGY
NO GRAND
NARRATIVES
MULTIPLE MEANINGS
DIFFERENCE &
DIVERSITY
CONTRADICTORY
DISCOURSES
CONTEXT &
TEMPORALITY
AGENCY &
INDIVIDUALISM
RELATIVIST
DISCOURSES

13. Open
systems
Holism
Relationships
Emergence
Complex
adaptive
systems
Non-linear
systems
COMPLEXITY
THEORY
Self-
organization
Connected-
ness
Feedback/
communi-
cation
Order
without
control
Distributed
control