Research Methodology

Iraj Ratnayake, PhD

Department of Tourism Management
Sabaragamuwa University of Sri Lanka
 Lecture outline

1. Introduction
1.1 What is scientific knowledge?
1.2 Defining research and types of research
1.3 Introduction to research process
1.4 Researcher motivations, issues and perspectives

2. Paradigms of research
2.1 Introduction
2.2 Philosophical underpinnings of research

2
DOING RESEARCH IN THE BUSINESS WORLD

Why do managers need to know about research?

3
 Introduction

Science and scientific research

What is scientific research?
- it contributes to the body of science, and
- it follows the scientific method

What is science?
- Etymologically, the word “science” is derived from the Latin word scientia
meaning knowledge.
- Science refers to a systematic and organized body of knowledge in any
area of inquiry that is acquired using “the scientific method”.

4
 Introduction Cont’d.

Natural Science
Natural sciences can be further classified into physical
sciences, earth sciences, life sciences, and others

Science

Social Science
Science of people or collections of people, such as groups, firms,
societies, or economies, and their individual or collective
behaviours. Social sciences can be classified into disciplines
such as psychology (the science of human behaviours),
sociology (the science of social groups), and economics (the
science of firms, markets, and economies).

5
 Introduction Cont’d.

Scientific Knowledge: The purpose of science is to create scientific

knowledge.

Scientific knowledge refers to a generalized body of laws and theories to explain a

phenomenon or behaviour of interest that are acquired using the scientific method.

Phenomenon: a fact or situation that is observed to exist or happen,

especially one whose cause or explanation is in
question.

something that exists and can be seen, felt, tested, etc.,

especially something unusual or interesting.

Examples: Gravity, biological processes, tides (natural phenomena)

Social networking, child abuse, CKD (social phenomena)
Hawthorne effect (psychological phenomena)
6
 Introduction Cont’d.

Scientific method- What is scientific method?

Refers to a standardised set of techniques for building scientific knowledge.

Scientific method must satisfy four characteristic:

1. Replicability
2. Precision
3. Falsifiability
4. Parsimony

7
 What is research?

Research (Re + Search ) = Repeatedly searching.

If you want to discover something not fathomable or not easily

comprehend, you have to search it repeatedly.

8
 What is research? Cont’d.

We all possess the vital instinct of inquisitiveness for, when the unknown
confronts us, we wonder and our inquisitiveness makes us probe and attain full
and fuller understanding of the unknown.

This inquisitiveness is the mother of all knowledge and the method, which man
employs for obtaining the knowledge of whatever the unknown, can be termed
as research.

Research is, thus, an original contribution to the existing stock of knowledge

making for its advancement.

9
 What is research? Cont’d.

Research in common parlance refers to a search for knowledge.

In other words, it:

provides examples of perception
corrects or verifies knowledge
gathers information on subject or phenomena people lacks or have little
knowledge about
develops and evaluates concepts
develops practices and theories
evaluates methods that test concepts
obtains knowledge for practical purpose like solving problems that
encountered by the society

10
 What is research? Cont’d.

Research is an academic activity and as such the term should be used in a

technical sense.

A research basically comprises

defining and redefining problems,
formulating hypothesis or research questions;
collecting, organising and evaluating data;
making either deductions, inductions or adductions and reaching
conclusions;
and at last carefully testing the conclusions to determine whether they
accept or reject the hypothesis or formulating tentative hypothesis that
lead to theory building.

11
 What is research? Cont’d.

In conclusion, the functions of research are:

Answers questions, solve problems and make decisions;

See and understand how and why a situation or a problem exists;
Discover new things and ideas;
Validated existing theories or generate new ones; and
Identify and understand the causes and effects of a situation or a phenomenon.

12
 Types of research

Dimension Types of Research

Core Function Pure Applied

Approach Deduction Induction Abduction

Information Need Exploratory Descriptive Explanatory Casual Evaluative Predictive Comparative

Methodology Quantitative Qualitative Mixed

Time Longitudinal Cross-

sectional

13
 Induction, deduction and abduction

Theory

Propositions

Pattern

Induction Observation

Abduction

Deduction Theory

Hypothesis

Observation

Confirmation

14
Steps in the research process

Phase I
Identify the research problem

Phase II
Select and develop the research design

Phase III
Implement the research design

Phase IV
Report the findings

15
Research process:Schematic Representation
Step Quantitative Research Process Qualitative Research Process

1 Research idea generation (Selecting topic) Research idea generation (Acknowledging social self)

2 Formulating the research problem (Defining the research Formulating the research problem (Defining the research
problem) problem)

3 Literature search and review (Focusing question) Literature search and review (Adapting perspectives)

4 Designing study in the backdrop of philosophical assumption Designing study in the backdrop of philosophical assumption
(Developing research questions, objectives, and hypothesis) (Developing research questions, objectives, and propositions
or working ideas)

5 Designing study (Conceptualisation, operationalisation, and Designing study and taking measures for quality assurance
developing instruments for data collection and taking (Conceptualise by refining the rudimentary working Ideas and
measures for quality assurance ). concepts). Operationalize by forming concepts from data and
working ideas and developing instruments for data collection
and taking measures for quality assurance.

6 Implementing the research design (Collecting and organizing Implementing the research design (Collecting and organising
data for analysis) data for analysis). Usually data analysis is done from time to
time during data collection (usually data collection and
analysis is a zigzag process).

7 Analysing data, interpreting results and drawing conclusions Interpreting results and drawing conclusions (Analysing data
(Analysing data to test the hypothesis and answer the research to identify themes and connecting themes and results to
questions) research questions). Generating conceptual frameworks,
tentative hypothesis and/or developing new theories.

8 Dissemination of research findings (Informed others) Dissemination of research findings (Informed others)
16
 Motivations of researchers

What makes people to undertake research? This is a question of

fundamental importance. The possible motives for doing research may be
either one or more of the following:

1. Desire to get a research degree along with its consequential benefits;

2. Desire to face the challenge in solving the unsolved problems, i.e.,
concern over practical problems initiates research;
3. Desire to get intellectual joy of doing some creative work;
4. Desire to be of service to society;
5. Desire to get respectability.

17
 Issues in research

First, if the statements about the intent of the study is unclear the researcher
fails to establish strong justification on the purpose of the study.

Similarly, the inarticulate rendering of the research problem left the study
unfocused. Therefore, a researcher must carefully work for fine tuning the
research idea and then the definition of the problem. Then he/she mush
need to understand the nature of the research problem.

Second, the lack of full disclosure of the data collection procedure leaves
reasonable doubts on the accuracy of the whole data collection process.

And this may lead to questionable data that affect the accuracy, reliability or
credibility of the findings to a greater extent. The flaws in research
methodology are accountable for most failures in research. This happens
mainly if the case is not strong enough to justify your methodological stance.

18
 Issues in research Cont’d.

Third, if the findings are contradictory or vague, that will substantially

deteriorate the quality of the final outcome of the research and thereby lead to
unrealistic conclusions.

19
 Perspectives in research

Emic and Etic Perspectives

The words emic and etic refer to two different approaches to researching human
beings. The terms originated in linguistics and anthropology in the 1950’s and 1960’s;
over the following decades researchers in numerous fields and disciplines, including
education, have found the concepts useful (Headland, Pike & Marvin, 1990). Precise
definitions vary drastically across authors, but a basic understanding is as follows:

An emic approach (sometimes referred to as “insider”, “inductive” or “bottom- up”)

takes as its starting point the perspectives and words of research participants.

An etic approach (sometimes referred to as “outsider,” “deductive,” or “top-down”)

uses as its starting point theories, hypothesis, perspectives, and concepts from outside
of the setting being studied.

20