The Purpose of Research

If someone were asked why he or she was undertaking a social research project, the obvious answer would be: "to find something out" or "to answer a question." But in a larger sense, the purpose(s) behind any research project is guided by the topic of inquiry itself -- a research project can only be as specific as the research which came before allows. For example, before knowledge can be refined about a given topic it needs to be explored and described. As such, the traditional model of science depends upon a systematic building of knowledge and re-evaluation of ideas before results can be inferred with a great degree of confidence. Therefore, any one research project takes on a general purpose, or framework. These are outlined below and it is important to understand that these general research purposes are NOT mutually exclusive, meaning that a project may in fact have more than one purpose set forth in proposal form.

[Notes: The following is a flash movie. Please click here for a text file.]

We will be looking in much greater depth at two of the research purposes, i.e. explanation and application, later in the semester, but suffice it to say that the past 25 years have seen much greater cooperation between the research and the practitioner communities, so the strategies put into place have some empirical backing and are scientifically evaluated after they are in place. And this is something that was very rare, if not unheard of , 50 years ago.