Partial book profile

The Foundations of Social Research: Meaning and Perspective in the Research Process

A scaffolding for understanding social research that shows how research methods are grounded in methodologies, theoretical perspectives, and epistemologies, and traces the meaning of the major philosophical traditions that inform inquiry.

The full book profile is not available yet.

Get the book →

What it’s about

Bewildered by the maze of methodologies, methods, and inconsistent terminology in social research? Michael Crotty offers a clarifying four-element framework—epistemology, theoretical perspective, methodology, and method—that lets researchers justify and expound their choices coherently. Rather than dictating one true way, the book provides 'scaffolding' for researchers to build their own research process, while taking readers on an erudite tour through objectivism and constructionism, positivism and post-positivism, interpretivism (symbolic interactionism, phenomenology, hermeneutics), critical inquiry (the Marxist and Frankfurt School heritage, Habermas, Freire), feminism, and postmodernism. Across these traditions, Crotty insists that the real divide in research is not qualitative versus quantitative but the assumptions about meaning, reality, and knowledge that researchers inevitably bring to their work. The result is a guide that helps researchers make their inquiry transparent, accountable, and intellectually defensible.

The through-line

Who it’s for: A research student, fledgling researcher, or seasoned investigator who wants to design and justify a sound piece of social research.
The problem: A bewildering array of methodologies, methods, and inconsistent terminology that appears more as a maze than as orderly pathways to research. Feeling confused, uncertain, and unable to justify why a chosen approach is defensible or how its findings should be regarded.
The plan: Identify the four elements of your research: methods, methodology, theoretical perspective, and epistemology.
Begin from your real-life research question and work toward methodology and methods that fulfil its purposes.
Clarify the epistemological stance (objectivism, constructionism, or subjectivism) and theoretical perspective informing your work.
Study established traditions to understand what is possible and to evaluate their strengths and weaknesses.
Forge and expound your own research process, justifying it by laying it out for the observer's scrutiny.
The payoff: You approach research with greater clarity and a better sense of direction. · Your research outcomes are convincing because their theoretical assumptions and status are made explicit. · You can defend your process as a serious form of human inquiry, whether positivist or non-positivist.

See our guide

Related profiles we’ve built

Additional reading

Language, Truth and Logic · A.J. Ayer
This book is cited as the work that popularized the philosophy of logical positivism and its Verification Principle in the English-speaking world.
Pedagogy of the Oppressed · Paulo Freire
This is the best-known work of Freire, whose ideas on 'conscientisation,' praxis, and dialogical education are central to contemporary critical inquiry.
The Second Sex · Simone de Beauvoir
This is the major text of existentialist feminism, which uses the Sartrean distinction between 'Self' and 'Other' to analyze the historical and social oppression of women.
The Structure of Scientific Revolutions · Thomas Kuhn
Presented as possibly the most influential book in modern philosophy of science, introducing the concepts of 'paradigms,' 'normal science,' and 'scientific revolutions' that challenged positivist views of scientific progress.
The Social Construction of Reality · Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann
This work is identified as a primary source for the development of social constructionism and the 'sociology of knowledge'.

Featured in these guides

Understand Human Behavior From The Foundational Canon →Cited source
The Behavioral Science Underneath It All →Cited source
Build A People Analytics Function →Cited source
Deal With Burnout, Stress And Turnover →Cited source
Make A Decision Your Biases Won't Wreck →Pole in “Objectivity Attainable Or Value-Laden”
Change A Behaviour That Won't Budge →Pole in “Objectivity Attainable Or Value-Laden”
Influence People Without Manipulating Them →Pole in “Objectivity Attainable Or Value-Laden”
Motivate People Without Bribing Them →Pole in “Objectivity Attainable Or Value-Laden”
Design The Organization And Change It →Cited source
Study People And Organizations With Scientific Rigor →Cited source
Build A Team People Speak Up In →Pole in “Objectivity Attainable Or Value-Laden”
Do Research That Holds Up →Cited source
Design Surveys People Answer Honestly →Cited source
Understand What Drives Individual Performance →Cited source