Business Research Methods
Chapter 1: The nature of business and management research
Business research = a systematic inquiry whose objective is to provide the information that
will allow managerial problems to be solved
Management dilemma = any problem or opportunity that requires a management decision
Three factors have stimulated an interest in this scientific approach to decision-making:
1. The need for more and better information as decisions become more complex
2. The availability of improved techniques and tools to meet this need
3. The resulting information overload if discipline is not employed in the process
The business organization has evolved in response to the social and political mandates of national
public policy, explosive technology growth and continuing innovations in global communications.
Types of studies
Reporting overview of information without getting to explanations
- To provide an account of some data/ to generate some statistics
- Calls for little in the way of conclusion drawing
Descriptive overview of information without getting to explanations
- More detailed than reporting
- Tries to discover answers to the questions who, what, when, where and how
- Describe or define a subject, often by creating a profile of a group of problems, people, or
events
- May involve the collection of data and an examination of the distribution and number of
times the researcher observes a single event = research variable
- May or may not have the potential for drawing powerful conclusions
- Cannot explain why an event has occurred
Explanatory why and how questions
- Goes beyond description and attempts to explain the reasons for the phenomenon that the
descriptive study has only observed
- Use of theories or at least hypotheses to account for the forces that caused something
Predictive why and how questions
- If we can provide a plausible explanation for an event after it has occurred, it is desirable for
us to be able to predict when and in what situations such an event might reoccur.
Being able to replicate a scenario and dictate a particular outcome is the objective of control.
Applied research has a practical problem-solving emphasis, although the need for problem-solving is
not always generated by a negative circumstance. Pure or basic research is also problem-solving
based, but in a different sense. It aims to solve perplexing questions (problems) of a theoretical
nature that have little direct impact on action, performance, or policy decisions is not often
conducted as business is an applied science (it is too narrowly defined).
Good research generates dependable data, which is derived through practices that are conducted
professionally and that can be used and relied upon. Good research follows the structure of the
scientific method.
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,Criteria for good research important because …
1. Purpose clearly defined failure may raise legitimate doubts in the minds of research
report readers as to whether the researchers has sufficient understanding of the problem to
make a sound proposal for action
2. Research process presented in detail to permit another researcher to repeat the research
(to estimate the validity and reliability)
3. Research design thoroughly planned to yield results that are as objective as possible
4. High ethical standards applied the research requirements must be weighed against the
potential for adverse effects
5. Limitations frankly revealed the research should report any flaws in procedural design,
and estimate their effect on the research findings
6. Adequate analysis for decision maker’s need analysis of the data should be extensive
enough to reveal its significance, and the methods of analysis used should be appropriate
7. Findings presented unambiguously generalizations that outrun the evidence on which
they are based, exaggerations and unnecessary verbiage are not valuable. The presentation
of data should be comprehensive, easily understood by the decision-maker, and organized so
that the decision-maker can readily locate critical findings
8. Conclusion justified good researchers always specify the conditions under which their
conclusions are valid to increase the objectivity and the readers’ confidence in its findings
9. Researchers’ experience reflected to gain greater confidence
Exam: you have to understand why those things are important. For example: why is it important that
your purpose is clearly defined? Because your research has a goal. What is a research design?
Methodology. The plan how you want to do research, who you are going to interview? It is important
that you mention your limitations because the people may not agree with your limitations. How can
you apply findings unambiguously? Why is it important that you reflect on the researchers’
experience (the previous jobs he had, university he went to)? Because it might be relevant to know
when you want to read someone’s work.
Research philosophies
Positivism
- Social world is viewed objectively
- Research is value-free
- Researcher is independent; objective analyst
- Quantitative questions
- The social world can be reduced to simple elements distilling its elements and reducing
them to fundamental laws is the best way to investigate a phenomenon
- Assumption: The social world is observed by collecting objective facts
- Assumption 2: The social world consists of simple elements to which it can be reduced
Interpretivism
- Social world is given meaning subjectively
- Researcher is part of what is being observed
- Research is driven by interests can never be objective
- Why is something happening?
- More difficult to generalize than positivism
- Human interests channel our thinking and guide how we investigate the world (which
questions we ask) and how we construct our knowledge (how we formulate the answers)
- Assumption: The social world is observed by seeing what meanings people give to it and
interpreting these meanings from their viewpoint
- Assumption 2: Social phenomena can only be understood by looking at the totality
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, Realism = in the middle
- Objective reality but you do have some influence of the researchers (how they want to do
their research, type of questions). You are never entirely value-free because the researcher
chooses the type of questions he/she wants
- Like positivism, it accepts the existence of a reality independent of human beliefs and
behaviour (people share similar interpretations because the external forces at the macro
level influence everyone)
- Like interpretivism, it concedes that understanding people and their behaviour requires
acknowledgement of the subjectivity inherent to humans
- Research requires the identification of external factors describing general forces and
processes influencing humans, as well as the investigation of how people interpret and give
meaning to the setting they are situated in
Scientific reasoning the inclusion of theory
Deductive reasoning
- Close with theoretical considerations drawn from your observations
- The conclusion must necessarily follow from the reasons given; strong link between reasons
and conclusions
- Premises (reasons) given for the conclusion must agree with the real world (true)
- The conclusion must necessarily follow from the premises (valid) it is impossible for the
conclusion to be false if the premises are true
- Confirmation
- Based on previous theories/findings
- One main reason
Inductive reasoning
- Start with theory in order to test it or solve a theoretical contradiction
- No strong relationship between reasons and conclusions to induce something is to draw a
conclusion from one or more particular facts or pieces of evidence. The conclusion explains
the facts, and the facts support the conclusion
- The conclusion is only a hypothesis it is one explanation, but there are others that fit the
facts just as well
- The task of research is to: determine the nature of the evidence needed to confirm or reject
hypotheses and design methods by which to discover and measure this other evidence
- Assume
- Problem based
- More reasons
Induction and deduction are used in research reasoning in a sequential manner double
movement of reflective thought. Induction occurs when we observe a fact and ask, ‘Why is
this?’ The answer is a hypothesis which is plausible if it explains the event or condition that
prompted the question. Deduction is the process by which we test whether the hypothesis is
capable of explaining the fact. One must be able to deduce the initiating fact from the
hypothesis advanced to explain a fact. A second critical point is to test a hypothesis, one
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, must be able to deduce from it other facts that can then be investigated. This is what
classical research is all about. We must deduce other specific facts or events from the
hypothesis and then gather information to see if the deductions are true.
The scientific method
Exam:
Difference between deductive, inductive + give examples
Different kind of studies descriptive, exploratory, etc. Examples and you have to tell which kind of
study it is. You have to apply certain things; understand things!
Components and connections
A concept is a generally accepted collection of meanings or characteristics associated with certain
events, objects, conditions, situations, and behaviours. (e.g. first-line supervisor, assembly line,
overdue account, line management,
The success of research hinges on:
How clearly we conceptualize
How well others understand the concepts we use
- Fairly concrete
- Culturally shared and accepted
- Proper definition still necessary
Constructs = an abstract concept like personality which is much more difficult to visualize than
objective concepts such as a table (it cannot be observed). Construct refers to an image or idea
specifically invented for a given research and/or theory-building purpose. Can combine more
concepts. Hypothetical constructs = constructs which can be inferred only from data; thus, they are
presumed to exist but must await confirmation from further testing. (e.g. employee morale,
leadership, ethical standards)
- More abstract
- Specifically developed for research purposes
- Can combine multiple concepts
An operational definition is one stated in terms of specific testing or measurement criteria; we must
be able to count, measure or gather the information via our senses; very clear so that any person
would be able to classify the objects in the same way to provide a way of understanding and
measuring concepts.
One ever-present danger is thinking that a concept and its operational definition are the same thing.
We forget that our definitions provide only a limited insight into what a concept or construct really is.
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