Issues in Educational Research

The customary distinction advanced by the physical and biological sciences between pure and applied research, or that proposed by social scientists between policy and disciplinary oriented research are generally unhelpful when extended to the field of educational research. These distinctions not only fail to take into account the multidisiplinary nature of educational research, but they also ignore the fact that education itself is at the core of the change processes which apply in human affairs. Furthermore, the distinctions that are commonly drawn between quantitative and qualitative approaches, or between the causal and the interpretative paradigms, would not seem to portray accurately the manner in which educational research proceeds. In general, the methods employed to investigate a particular problem situation depend on the nature of the problem, and the extent to which previous research has been conducted into the problem. This book provides a collection of the many different facets of educational research that are advanced by different scholars each from their own particular orientation.