Research Methodologies

Abstract

The systematic investigation or inquiry established through the collection of data, its analysis and then the interpretation is known as research. Research is conducted by an individual or a group of people in order to understand describe and determine the psychological phenomena of the query. The various philosophies of research approach encompasses between what is known to be true (epistemology) as opposed to what is believed to be true (doxology). The basic aim of the research is to transform things believed into things known. Hence the research is the process of transformation of things from doxology to epistemology.

Research Methodologies

Introduction

The process of research is a developmental work conducted systematically in order to increase to increase the stock of knowledge. The knowledge sphere of researches conducted ranges from culture and society, humanity and devise and usage of new applications. The aim of any research is to reaffirm the results of the work done previously, establish new facts and reaffirm their outcomes, solve existing and new problems and develop and support theories. A research program can be conducted in various forms such as economic, business social, scientific and humanities.

Types of Research Methodologies

The research is conducted for numerous purposes. The type of research methodology merely depends upon the type of research conducted and the type of data required to go beyond the personal thoughts, experience, feelings and opinions (Kothari, 2004). There are mainly four major types of research methodologies conduct to derive solution to the prevailing problem;

Qualitative Research

Qualitative Research tends to focus on how individual or a group of people can look at a reality from different perspective and ways. While incorporating the real world context, this research accounts the complexity of the context and derives different perspective from the situation on board. Usually there is no manipulation of data in this type of research and the data gathered to conduct the studies usually accounted from the behaviors of natural setting and the general public. The focus of this research is on the reports that are expressed in the form of experiences and data. The main focus on this research is based on description and interpretation. These descriptions can further help in developing new concepts and theories (Kothari, 2004).

Quantitative Research

The quantitative research is conducted to focus on the understanding and describing the reality. This reality is well understood through the discovery of the general law. The data collected for this research take account of the precise definition of the things that are of interest. The research involves the manipulation of some variable while keeping the other variable held constant. The technique used to analyze the data collected for the research is statistical measured to analyze its reliability. The outcome derived from this type of research mainly focuses on the cause and effect relationship. This type of research requires the researcher define the research process in advance (Berkwits and Inui, 1998).

Mixed Research

The new research paradigm in the research methodologies is the mixed research. The mixed research is conducted with a ...