Research Foundations Module 2

Front 1

Epistemology

Back 1

“theory of knowledge and its justification.” Involves studying knowledge itself — including its nature, process of generation, how it is necessary, and the standards that are used to judge its adequacy.

Front 2

Empiricism

Back 2

idea that all knowledge comes from experience

Front 3

Empirical Statement

Back 3

a statement based on observation, experiment, or experience

Front 4

Reasoning/Rationalism

Back 4

philosophical idea that reason is the primary source of knowledge

Front 5

Deductive Reasoning

Back 5

process of drawing a conclusion that is essentially true if the underlying premises are true

Front 6

Inductive Reasoning

Back 6

holds that the foundational premises act as helpful, but not decisive reasons towards acceptance of a conclusion

Front 7

Probabilistic

Back 7

stating what is probable to occur, not what will necessarily occur, thereby opening himself or herself up to a risk of being wrong

Front 8

Problem of Induction

Back 8

the future might not resemble the past

Front 9

Exploratory/Inductive Method

Back 9

3 Major Steps:

1. Observations, Data

2. Patterns, Descriptions

3. Theory

Front 10

Parsimonious

Back 10

simple, concise, and succinct

Front 11

Principle of Evidence

Back 11

strong evidence rather than proof is all that is obtained because researchers always leave open the possibility that future researchers will come up with new theories and new conclusions

Front 12

A researcher is employed by a marketing firm to conduct an exploratory study on the characteristics (imagery, words, music) of television advertising during the holiday season. In order to adhere to the exploratory method of research, what general procedure should they take for this study?

Back 12

To follow an exploratory research method, the researcher needs to follow the “bottom-up” direction as seen on the Research Wheel. For this study, he or she should observe the holiday television advertising and collect data on the characteristics relevant to the study – noting the different imagery, phrasing and music used. Once data is collected, he or she should compile descriptions of characteristics, noting any similarities or patterns that emerge from observation.

Front 13

A researcher is employed by a school district to conduct a confirmatory study on the expected effectiveness of new textbook resources in their schools. The researcher believes the focused deployment of textbooks and interactive online resources to low-performing classrooms within certain schools will increase student achievement and teacher satisfaction with the overall curriculum plan. Similar resource operations have been effective in the past. In order to adhere to the confirmatory method of research, what general procedure should the researcher take for this study?

Back 13

The confirmatory research method follows the “top-down” method on the Research Wheel, and the researcher’s overall purpose has two main parts: the hypothesis and the theory. The school district wants to test the hypothesis that these strategies will be achieve the goal of high student achievement and teacher satisfaction, and this is based on a theory created from previous experimentations. So, to frame this study in a confirmatory method, the researcher must take the school district’s theory and correctly frame the hypothesis within its scope. From there, the researcher must collect relevant data; in this case, that would be student assessments and some measurement of teacher satisfaction such as surveys, interviews or focus groups. Once the relevant data is collected, the researcher should analyze it to measure the study goals. This could include comparison with information from before the implementation of textbook deployment or with any data available from the studies which helped formulate the original theory. Once the data is considered, the researcher can reach a conclusion which either confirms or rejects the hypothesis and present their findings to the school district.