Real Social Science Flyvbjerg, Bent; Landman, Todd; Schram, Sanford
04/2012
eBook
Real Social Science presents a new, hands-on approach to social inquiry. The theoretical and methodological ideas behind the book, inspired by Aristotelian phronesis, represent an original ...perspective within the social sciences, and this volume gives readers for the first time a set of studies exemplifying what applied phronesis looks like in practice. The reflexive analysis of values and power gives new meaning to the impact of research on policy and practice. Real Social Science is a major step forward in a novel and thriving field of research. This book will benefit scholars, researchers and students who want to make a difference in practice, not just in the academy. Its message will make it essential reading for students and academics across the social sciences.
With foreword by Kenneth J. Gergen and Mary M. Gergen. Creative research methods can help to answer complex contemporary questions, which are hard to answer using traditional methods alone. Creative ...methods can also be more ethical, helping researchers to address social injustice. This accessible book is the first to identify and examine the four areas of creative research methods: arts-based research, research using technology, mixed-method research and transformative research frameworks. Written in a practical and jargon-free style, with over 100 boxed examples, it offers numerous examples of creative methods in practice, from the social sciences, arts, and humanities around the world. Spanning the gulf between academia and practice, this useful book will inform and inspire researchers by showing readers why, when, and how to use creative methods in their research.
Rapid technological advances in devices used for data collection have led to the emergence of a new class of longitudinal data: intensive longitudinal data (ILD). Behavioral scientific studies now ...frequently utilize handheld computers, beepers, web interfaces, and other technological tools for collecting many more data points over time than previously possible. Other protocols, such as those used in fMRI and monitoring of public safety, also produce ILD, hence the statistical models in this volume are applicable to a range of data. The volume features state-of-the-art statistical modeling strategies developed by leading statisticians and methodologists working on ILD in conjunction with behavioral scientists. Chapters present applications from across the behavioral and health sciences, including coverage of substantive topics such as stress, smoking cessation, alcohol use, traffic patterns, educational performance and intimacy. Models for Intensive Longitudinal Data (MILD) is designed for those who want to learn about advanced statistical models for intensive longitudinal data and for those with an interest in selecting and applying a given model. The chapters highlight issues of general concern in modeling these kinds of data, such as a focus on regulatory systems, issues of curve registration, variable frequency and spacing of measurements, complex multivariate patterns of change, and multiple independent series. The extraordinary breadth of coverage makes this an indispensable reference for principal investigators designing new studies that will introduce ILD, applied statisticians working on related models, and methodologists, graduate students, and applied analysts working in a range of fields. (DIPF/Orig.).
Game theory is central to understanding human behavior and relevant to all of the behavioral sciences--from biology and economics, to anthropology and political science. However, as The Bounds of ...Reason demonstrates, game theory alone cannot fully explain human behavior and should instead complement other key concepts championed by the behavioral disciplines. Herbert Gintis shows that just as game theory without broader social theory is merely technical bravado, so social theory without game theory is a handicapped enterprise.
This book addresses a key issue in higher learning, university education and scientific research: the widespread difficulty researchers, experts and students from all disciplines face when trying to ...contribute to change in complex social settings characterized by uncertainty and the unknown. More than ever, researchers need flexible means and grounded theory to combine people-based and evidence-based inquiry into challenging situations that keep evolving and do not lend themselves to straightforward technical explanations and solutions.
In this book, the authors propose innovative strategies for engaged inquiry building on insights from many disciplines and lessons from the history of Participatory Action Research (PAR), including French psychosociology. The ongoing evolution of PAR has had a lasting legacy in fields ranging from community development to education, public engagement, natural resource management and problem solving in the workplace. All formulations have in common the idea that research must be done ‘with’ people and not ‘on’ or ‘for’ people. Inquiry of this kind makes sense of the world through efforts to transform it, as opposed to simply observing and studying human behaviour and people’s views about reality, in the hope that meaningful change will happen somewhere down the road.
The book contributes many new tools and conceptual foundations to this longstanding tradition, grounded in real-life examples of collective fact-finding, analysis and decision-making from around the world. It provides a modular textbook on participatory action research and related methods, theory and practice, suitable for a wide range of undergraduate and postgraduate courses, as well as working professionals.
Introduction: Engaging with Participatory Action Research
1. Action Research History 2. Society, Experience, Knowledge
Module One: Grounding and Uncertainty
3. Creating an Action Learning System 4. Managing Complexity 5. Mapping the Process 6. Walking the Talk
Module Two: Fact Finding and Listening
7. Reinventions of the Wheel 8. Seeking Evidence and Consensus
Module Three: Exploring Problems
9. Getting to the Root 10. Factors and Reasons
Module 4: Knowing the Actors
11. Stakeholder Identification 12. Stakeholder Analysis 13. Positions and Values
Module Five: Assessing Options
14. Blue Sky Thinking 15. Into the Future
Module Six: Understanding Systems
16. Contributing to Change 17. System Dynamics 18. Domain Analysis 19. Breaking the Dependency on Tobacco Production
Conclusion: Rethinking Higher Education and the Discovery Process
"This book is a must for anyone seriously committed to research that ensures the authentic participation and empowerment of people from all walks of life, be they from oral or textual traditions, women or men, old or young, articulate or hesitant, outspoken or reserved." – Farida Akhter, Executive Director, UBINIG (Policy Research for Development Alternative), Dhaka, Bangladesh
" This exciting and innovative book shows the patterns and processes that connect people and their social, practical and conceptual worlds in action. Its key themes of interdependence, relationship, and the need for dialogue make it a book today for tomorrow’s world. It should be on all reading lists as a key resource for developing socially-oriented pedagogies for a more peaceful, productive and interconnected world." – Jean McNiff, Professor of Educational Research at York St John University, York, UK and author of 'Action Research: Principles and Practice', now in its third edition (Routledge, 2013)
"...a wonderful compendium, replete with practical tools and techniques that bring rigour and vigour to the international dialogue among action researchers... This is a serious volume worth the time of any action researcher who is curious about how western (including francophone) perspectives on PAR come alive. This volume makes a significant contribution to the collective craft of scholarly-practice among action researchers." – Hilary Bradbury-Huang, Professor in the Division of Management at Oregon Health & Science University, Portland, USA and Editor of the journal Action Research
Jacques M. Chevalier is Chancellor’s Professor Emeritus in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada.
Daniel J. Buckles is Adjunct Research Professor in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada, and an independent consultant.
Research Methods Hammond, Michael; Wellington, Jerry
2021, 20200928, 2020, Letnik:
1
eBook
This book provides an overview of ninety key concepts which often trouble those who are new to researching within the social sciences. It covers theories of knowledge, methodologies and methods. Each ...entry offers a definition of a concept, shows how researchers have used that concept in their research and discusses difficulties that the concept presents. The book supports those undertaking their own social research projects by providing detailed critical commentary on key concepts in a particularly accessible way.
In exploring these concepts, a wide range of research reports across many different fields are described. These include not only classic accounts, but also a broad selection of recent studies, some written by new researchers. The book will be useful for higher-education students carrying out projects within social science faculties at the end of their first degree or during a master’s programme, though it will also be particularly helpful for those undertaking doctoral research, and some entries have been written with the production of a thesis in mind.
This second edition of Research Methods: The Key Concepts provides a more comprehensive and up-to-date coverage, as old entries have been updated and 19 new entries added. It helps new researchers to navigate the changing landscape of social research by recognising (a) the changes in the ways researchers are thinking about knowledge and acquiring knowledge, (b) the increasing use of digital tools to collect data, and (c) the desire many contemporary researchers feel to promote social justice through their research.
Nation Building Wimmer, Andreas
2018, 2018., 20180508, 2018-05-08
eBook
A new and comprehensive look at the reasons behind successful or failed nation building Nation Building presents bold new answers to an age-old question. Why is national integration achieved in some ...diverse countries, while others are destabilized by political inequality between ethnic groups, contentious politics, or even separatism and ethnic war? Traversing centuries and continents from early nineteenth-century Europe and Asia to Africa from the turn of the twenty-first century to today, Andreas Wimmer delves into the slow-moving forces that encourage political alliances to stretch across ethnic divides and build national unity. Using datasets that cover the entire world and three pairs of case studies, Wimmer’s theory of nation building focuses on slow-moving, generational processes: the spread of civil society organizations, linguistic assimilation, and the states’ capacity to provide public goods. Wimmer contrasts Switzerland and Belgium to demonstrate how the early development of voluntary organizations enhanced nation building; he examines Botswana and Somalia to illustrate how providing public goods can bring diverse political constituencies together; and he shows that the differences between China and Russia indicate how a shared linguistic space may help build political alliances across ethnic boundaries. Wimmer then reveals, based on the statistical analysis of large-scale datasets, that these mechanisms are at work around the world and explain nation building better than competing arguments such as democratic governance or colonial legacies. He also shows that when political alliances crosscut ethnic divides and when most ethnic communities are represented at the highest levels of government, the general populace will identify with the nation and its symbols, further deepening national political integration. Offering a long-term historical perspective and global outlook, Nation Building sheds important new light on the challenges of political integration in diverse countries.
How we feel about the duration of our conversations has rarely been studied. New research has asked people about the lengths of their conversations, and whether they end when they want them to.
This paper examines the development over historical time of the meaning and uses of the term resilience. The objective is to deepen our understanding of how the term came to be adopted in disaster ...risk reduction and resolve some of the conflicts and controversies that have arisen when it has been used. The paper traces the development of resilience through the sciences, humanities, and legal and political spheres. It considers how mechanics passed the word to ecology and psychology, and how from there it was adopted by social research and sustainability science. As other authors have noted, as a concept, resilience involves some potentially serious conflicts or contradictions, for example between stability and dynamism, or between dynamic equilibrium (homeostasis) and evolution. Moreover, although the resilience concept works quite well within the confines of general systems theory, in situations in which a systems formulation inhibits rather than fosters explanation, a different interpretation of the term is warranted. This may be the case for disaster risk reduction, which involves transformation rather than preservation of the "state of the system". The article concludes that the modern conception of resilience derives benefit from a rich history of meanings and applications, but that it is dangerous - or at least potentially disappointing - to read to much into the term as a model and a paradigm.
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