New videos added: research process

The e-learning videos of chapter 4 introduce you to the research process and its cornerstones. Every research project starts with an open-ended indirect research question, which is implicitly or explicitly accompanied by a research hypothesis. Often a research problem is substantiated by an ad-hoc hypothesis, which advances to a working hypothesis and ultimately will be developed into a scientific hypothesis. The logic and quality of hypotheses can differ and determine the success of the research process. Depending on their inner logic, scientific hypotheses can be formulated as cause-effect hypotheses, distribution hypotheses, correlation hypotheses and difference hypotheses. Based on their quality, scientific hypotheses can be differentiated into nomological hypotheses, quasi-nomological hypotheses and statistical hypotheses. The research approach has to match the research problem to be investigated. Literature-based research, theoretical research, developmental research, quantitative research, qualitative research or a mixture of the aforementioned approaches provide means to tackle a research problem at hand. Different academic disciplines favour different scientific styles that predetermine the applicable research approaches. Three general types of scientific styles are introduced and critically reflected: the theoretical solution-driven style, the empirical solution-driven style and the hypothesis-driven style.

Link to e-learning videos: Overview of chapter 4

New videos added: research logic

Research logic

The e-learning videos of chapter 3 “Research logic” introduce you to the underlying philosophical or, more precisely, logical aspects of research. The basic understanding of research logic is a necessary foundation for every research project. Induction and deduction are the two major types of reasoning and are frequently applied in research. Both types provide a framework for generating inter-subjectively comprehensible conclusions and projections. The understanding of the basic structure of syllogisms, the ancient Greek sets of logical conclusions as laid out by Aristotle, helps to differentiate between universal and existential propositions as well as affirmative and negative statements. The deductive-nomological model and the inductive statistical model provide techniques to formally describe logical reasoning. These thoughts and ideas help to comprehend the concepts of falsification and falsifiability. Finally, indicator and causal hypotheses are introduced in order to discuss individual limitations of induction and deduction and the benefit of a combination of both types of reasoning.

Link to e-learning videos: Overview of chapter 3