Esfuerzos de corte

All researchers are guided by abstract principles that combine beliefs about ontology, epistemology, and methodology (Denzin & Lincoln, 2011). The conceptual net that contains the researcher’s epistemological, ontological and methodological premises is termed a research paradigm or interpretative framework (Denzin & Lincoln, 2011). A research paradigm is comprised of the philosophical and meta-theoretical ideas underpinning research techniques and practice. It reflects researchers’ beliefs, conception of the world and its nature, and “their position in it as well as a multitude of potential relationships with that world” (Waring, 2012, p.17). Researchers’ belief, conception of the world, and their position in the world then guide their actions in choosing the methods of data collection and analysis. In other words, the researchers’ view about the nature of social reality and how we can know about social reality determines the kind of research problems posed, the research questions asked, and the methods used in data collection and data analysis. For this reason, a clear explication of the researcher’s paradigm or interpretative framework is crucial in any study.

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Ontology “is a branch of philosophy dealing with the essence of phenomena and the nature of their existence” (Duberley, Johnson, & Cassell, 2012, p.17). Duberley, et al (2012) emphasised that to consider the ontology of something is to consider how it constitutes or claims some form of reality. According to these authors, ontological questions take two forms: whether the phenomenon exists independently of our knowing and perceiving it; and whether the phenomenon seen and usually taken to be real is an outcome of these acts of knowing and perceiving. These questions lead to two different stances about social reality: realist (objectivist) and subjectivist ontological stances. Realist stance would consider a reality/real phenomenon to exist “out there”, independent of perceptual or cognitive structures. In this ontological stance, reality is there “to be accessed and measured” (p.17). Subjectivist stance, on the other hand, would see reality as something that does not exist, rather something that is created through everyday talk and thought. This ontological stance argues that “what we take to be social reality is a creation or projections of our consciousness and cognitions” (p.18). Similarly, Ritchie, Lewis, Nicholls, & Ormston (2012, p. 16) distinguish two broad ontological stances: realism (“an external reality exists independent of our beliefs and understanding”); idealism (“no external reality exists independent of our beliefs and understanding”); and their variants. One of the idealism variants that corresponds with my study is relativism. Relativism suggests that “reality is knowable through socially constructed meaning.”

Meanwhile, epistemology is “concerned with providing a philosophical grounding for deciding what kinds of knowledge are possible and how we can ensure that they are both adequate and legitimate” (Maynard, 1994, p.10). Epistemology concerns what we mean by the concept of truth and how we can judge whether knowledge claims are true or false (Duberley, et al., 2012). In social science, epistemological questions ask about how social reality can be known and “about which scientific procedures produce reliable social scientific knowledge” (Blaikie, 2007, p.18). Epistemological traditions include: objectivism, constructionism and subjectivism (Crotty, 1998). The proponents of objectivism hold that “meaning, and therefore meaningful reality, exists as such apart from the operation of consciousness” (p.8). Constructionists views that “truth, or meaning comes into existence in and out of our engagement with the realities in our world” (p.8). In this

view, subject and object—or researcher and research participants—emerge as partners in the generation of meaning. In subjectivist epistemology, on the other hand, “meaning does not come out of an interplay between subject and object but it is imposed on the object by the subject” (p.9).

Another component of the research paradigm, methodology, is “concerned with the method of data collection and form of analysis we use to generate knowledge” (Cunliffe, 2011, p.659). Methodology is the argument for how research should or does proceed, including discussion of how theories are generated and assessed and “how particular theoretical perspectives can be related to particular research problems” (Blaikie, 1993, p.7). Within the frame of a methodology, the methods of research are the techniques or procedures used to collect and analyse data (Blaikie, 1993).

These dimensions of research paradigms in qualitative inquiry vary across the literature and their categories have grown considerably (Blaikie, 2007; Denzin & Lincoln, 2011; Mertens, 2009). Since the categories are fluid and proliferating, the boundaries between the paradigms are shifting. Denzin and Lincoln regard this fluidity as symbolising the dynamism and impact of qualitative research “on policy formulation or the redress of social ills” (2011, p.116). They, however, emphasise that at the most general level, the five major interpretative frameworks in qualitative research are positivist, post-positivist, constructivist-interpretative, critical (Marxist, emancipator) and feminist post-structural. It is also important to consider that the category of research paradigm will also necessarily interact with the theoretical frame and ultimately how the research is to be assessed. This issue will be addressed in Section 4.10.

4.4.1 My research paradigm: Constructivist-interpretive

Given the previous discussion about the nature of social research and the research paradigm, I explain the premises of my research paradigm in this section. This explanation includes my ontological stance, epistemological commitment and the methodology informing the research.

My particular conception of the social world and its nature, the research problem, and the topic in which I am interested have led me to adopt a constructivist paradigm, a paradigm in qualitative research that has been explicated by Guba,

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Lincoln, and Denzin (Lincoln & Denzin, 2011). This paradigm assumes a relativist ontology, subjectivist epistemology and naturalistic set of methodological procedures. In contrast to the realist stance, proponents of relativist ontology acknowledge that there are multiple social realities rather than only one truth. Proponents of subjective epistemology consider knowledge to be created between the researcher and the object/subject of research. A naturalistic set of methodological procedures applies methods such as interview, observation, and analysing existing texts in order to understand social realities (Denzin & Lincoln, 2011).

Lee (2011) offers a critique towards Guba, Lincoln and Denzin’s constructivist ontology and epistemological claims. First, Lee considers the constructivist’s ontological view to be problematic as he would assert that there is only one reality. What is multiple is in fact interpretations—not the reality per se: “realities are not as many as our interpretations or constructions” (p.408). To argue this case, Lee uses an example of sexual status to probe interpretations versus reality. When Lee and the friend had different perceptions about whether a person in front of them is male or female, they need to ask the person his or her gender status. Based on this analogy, Lee concludes that the reality is one—the person is a female but there can exist two different interpretations of the person’s sexual status between Lee and the friend. Secondly, Lee argues that the terms subjective epistemology is a mismatch with another type of epistemology, constructionism, in terms of Denzin’s definition that subject and object “co-create” meaning. According to Lee, Denzin’s definition of how “subject and object co-create knowledge” for subjective epistemology is a misnomer. Lee suggests “constructionist epistemology” would be a better term than “subjective epistemology” (p.409).

Despite the critique, this research will use the categories and the criteria of the constructivist paradigm as described by Lincoln and Guba (Denzin & Lincoln, 2011). For me, the issue of the multiple realities raised by Lee is merely a problem in the conceptualisation of “reality”. A physical reality might be singular. However, what is

social reality for a subjective ontological stance is constructed and interpreted by the

actors involved, including those who will act on their interpretations. Hence, a reality is in essence realities, since many interpretations can be made of events; and these interpretations produce effects. I feel the analogy used by Lee, that is the biological category of male or female, is not a suitable concept to explore reality in social

science, because, two biological categories is more closely related to the idea of

reality in natural science and ignores other natural sex categories, for example,

intersex. Further, regarding Lee’s second point of critique, I insist on using the term

subjective epistemology rather than constructionist epistemology in this study

because shared meaning made of events will be constructed not only through the relationship between the researcher and the objects or participants of the research, but most importantly I also interrogate the meanings I ascribe to the object of study based on my beliefs and my subjectivity.

Ontologically, researchers working in the constructivist paradigm reject the notion that there is one objective social reality that can be known; and constructivist research aims to understand the layered social constructions of meaning and knowledge (Mertens, 2009). On this point, understanding or verstehen is emphasised in this paradigm. Understanding the multiple social constructions of knowledge and meanings around events entails an epistemological stance that the social construction of reality can only be accessed through interaction between the researcher and the researched. To this end, constructivist researchers opt for a more personal interactive mode of data collection. To pursue verstehen, methods such as observation, extensive formal and informal interview, and document analysis (Denzin & Lincoln, 2011) are mostly applied in this paradigm to develop classifications and descriptions that represent the beliefs of various groups (Eichelberger, 1989).