SWP 538 Chapter Neuman (2006) : The meanings of methodology
20 Sep 2018
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Positivist social science: emphasizes discovering casual laws, careful empirical observations, and value free research, these researchers prefer precise quantitative data they seek rigorous, exact measures and. "objective" research, and they test hypotheses by carefully analyzing numbers from the measures: according to positivism, "there is only one logic of science, positivists say that scientists are engaged in a never-ending quest for knowledge. Interpretive social science emphasizes meaningful social action, socially constructed meaning, and value relativism: there are several varieties of interpretive social science (iss): hermeneutics, constructionism, ethnomethodology, cognitive, idealist, phenomenological, subjectivist, and qualitative sociology. Critical social science emphasizes combating surface-level distortions, multiple levels of reality, and value- based activism for human empowerment. This is because of its emphasis on change and because it helps researchers uncover underlying structures. Css researchers differ from the others less in the research techniques they use than in how they approach a research problem, the kinds of questions they ask, and their purposes for doing research.
