Abstract
This chapter examines the philosophical standpoints of interpretive research contrasted with positivist approaches. The interpretive approach, also known as constructionist philosophy, emerged among other qualitative methodologies as a challenge to positivists' empiricist approaches to conducting research. The interpretive researchers advance a view that all data needs interpretation and that the researcher assesses and interprets data to establish meanings and understanding. Whereas a positivist researcher would normally seek to control the subjects, the research environment and the related variables, in the interpretive paradigm, the participants are not treated as subjects by the researcher, but as helpers in the construction of meanings under a more equal relationship.
TopIntroduction
This chapter considers the meanings associated with interpretive research, its origins, assumptions and underpinnings. The interpretive paradigm asserts that people construct their subjective meanings in their day to day interaction with the world around them and tend to look upon human life and meanings as an interpretive process (1959; Packer, 2011), where people, subjectively describe and define their social worlds. The interpretive researcher, therefore, seeks to apprehend the study by accessing the meanings that participants attach to the studied social worlds. The interpretive inquiry tends to concern itself, not about whether facts exist in each context, but how facts are interpreted. The interpretive researcher posits a view that social life is a product of human life complexities, and that the aim of social science research should be ‘interpretation’, and not mere scientific descriptions and explanations of studied phenomena. For a qualitative researcher, this chapter provides a philosophical grounding necessary for use in research design and rationale in some methodological choices. The areas covered will include the following:
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Illustration of interpretive understanding
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Background
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Interpretive research underpinnings
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Interpretive paradigm explored
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Triangulated understanding
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Notions of validity and reliability
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Interpretive analytic strategies
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Evaluating interpretive research
By the end of this chapter, the reader should be able to apply appropriate designs and rationale when conducting an interpretive research study, develop knowledge on interpretive philosophical underpinnings, differentiate between interpretive and positivist approaches and establish knowledge of interpretive research’s strengths and limitations.
Most beginners in research tend to have an empiricist view to conducting research and that through ‘objectivity’, a researcher achieves validity and credibility in an inquiry. On the other hand, the Interpretive philosophy rejects such perceptions and assumptions and this chapter engenders much of that rejection and provides a detailed rationale for interpretivism.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Ontological: Relates to the nature of being or existence of phenomena.
Epistemological: Relates to the theory of knowledge, its construction and what it is to know.
Phenomena: This refers to a representation of something/things under study.
Empiricist: A view that knowledge only comes from sensory experience.
Validity: In qualitative research it is a summation of efforts made in an enquiry, through honesty, depth, richness, and scope of the data achieved and participants approached.