Questionare

Ques. 7
What do you understand by the Ontological, Epistemological and methodological
assumptions in research.

Ans.7
Ontological assumption concerns on the nature of the world and human being in social
contexts. There are different assumptions to see the world as outside individual. There-
fore, ontology in normative emphasis that social phenomenon is independent from other
factors. The world is one that there are no other perceptions. In contrast, interpretive em-
phasize that the world in social phenomena has different meanings. One factor influences
the change in social context. As a result, different researches can have different conclu-
sions for one observation. On the other hand, critical theory paradigm tends to see the
world as something that has to change. It involves criticizing and the social phenomena
and changing it based on the interrogations of the phenomena both social and individual.

Epistemological refers to the ways to acquire the knowledge. The knowledge those are
acceptable in certain paradigms. For example, epistemological in the normative paradigm
is how the social world can investigate as natural science. Hypotheses have to test by
empirical approaches. The results have to be objective through scientific method. In con-
trast, epistemology in interpretive is acquire the knowledge by investigate the phenomena
in many ways, because the social context is different from natural science. Therefore,
investigation the social phenomena can result many interpretations. Furthermore, in criti-
cal theory, practical issues can construct the knowledge. It tends to change the certain
conditions through criticizing the practical, politics, and social issues. Therefore, the
results can be subjective.

Methodological assumption focuses on analysis of the methods used for gaining the data.
In normative paradigms, scientific method, quantitative is used to observe the objects. It
uses mathematics calculation to generalize the finding and test the theory. In contrast, an
interpretive paradigm uses observation, fieldwork note to investigate the object. In short,
an interpretive paradigm tends to use qualitative methods for observation. As a result, the
findings can be open to many interpretations. On the other hand, methodology in critical
theory tends to use both quantitative and qualitative approaches. Quantitative to control
the social setting when doing the actions and qualitative to observe the changes that
happened after the actions are given.
Ques. 8
Differentiate between Qualitative and quantitative research. What are the various measures
of Qualitative and quantitative research?

Ans.8
Qualitative research is one which provides insights and understanding of the problem set-
ting. It is an unstructured, exploratory research method that studies highly complex phe-
nomena that are impossible to elucidate with the quantitative research. Although, it gener-
ates ideas or hypothesis for later quantitative research.

Qualitative research is used to gain an in-depth understanding of human behaviour, experi-

ence, attitudes, intentions, and motivations, on the basis of observation and interpretation,
to find out the way people think and feel. It is a form of research in which the researcher
gives more weight to the views of the participants. Case study, grounded theory, ethnogra-
phy, historical and phenomenology are the types of qualitative research.

Quantitative research is a form of research that relies on the methods of natural sciences,
which produces numerical data and hard facts. It aims at establishing cause and effect
relationship between two variables by using mathematical, computational and statistical
methods. The research is also known as empirical research as it can be accurately and
precisely measured.

The data collected by the researcher can be divided into categories or put into rank, or it can
be measured in terms of units of measurement. Graphs and tables of raw data can be con-
structed with the help quantitative research, making it easier for the researcher to analyse
the results.