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Causal explanation, qualitative research, and scientific inquiry in education (2004)
| Venue: | Educational Researcher |
| Citations: | 66 - 1 self |
BibTeX
@ARTICLE{Maxwell04causalexplanation,,
author = {Joseph A. Maxwell},
title = {Causal explanation, qualitative research, and scientific inquiry in education},
journal = {Educational Researcher},
year = {2004},
volume = {33},
pages = {3--11}
}
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Abstract
has elicited considerable criticism from the education research community, but this criticism has not focused on a key assumption of the report—its Humean, regularity conception of causality. It is argued that this conception, which also underlies other arguments for “scientifically-based research, ” is narrow and philosophically outdated, and leads to a misrepresentation of the nature and value of qualitative research for causal explanation. An alternative, realist approach to causality is presented that supports the scientific legitimacy of using qualitative research for causal investigation, reframes the arguments for experimental methods in educational research, and can support a more productive collaboration between qualitative and quantitative researchers. Amajor effort to establish “scientifically-based research” (SBR) in education has been under way for some time
Keyphrases
qualitative research causal explanation scientific inquiry scientifically-based research key assumption educational research scientific legitimacy education research community experimental method regularity conception productive collaboration quantitative researcher realist approach amajor effort considerable criticism causal investigation
