CHAPTER 1
(1.1a in the exam)
● Everything is the world is subject to research
● Every field has a different meaning of research
○ Common aspects:
. Systematic investigation = a conscious effort to concentrate our thinking + to do it
in a rational, careful manner
. Empirical endeavour = an effort based on systematic observation (comparing
products, features etc.) that yields data that you can use in your decision making
– Confronts theory with data
. Public effort = decision contributes to a broad base of knowledge
. Purposeful
. Cumulative
. Critical of itself
Researchers systematically question things to improve some outcome
Learning about research method = learning a new language
Business and management research is transdisciplinary
Research = a type of systematic investigation that is empirical in nature and is designed to
contribute to public knowledge
Social research = How we interact, live, do things, feel and see ourselves
(Done in fields like sociology, education, public health, criminology, housing etc.)
Research enterprise = the macro-level effort to accumulate knowledge across multiple
empirical systematic public research projects
– No research is done in a vacuum / previous (exact or similar) project done
———
6 Translational research = the systematic effort to move research from initial discovery to
5 practice and ultimately to impacts on our lives
4
3 Research-practice continuum = the process of moving from an initial research idea to
discovery to practice, and the potential for the idea to influence lives or the world
(Translational research occurs within)
2 – Basic research = research designed to generate discoveries and to understand how the
discoveries work
1 – Conducted out of general interest or curiosity
– Expand knowledge of processes of business and management -> findings of
significance and value to society in general
– Conducted by people based in universities - they choose topic and objectives
– Flexible timescales (usually long time)
– E.g. astronomers looking at stars - won’t help society + probably won’t be shared
with world
– Applied research = research where a discovery is tested under increasingly controlled
, –
conditions in real-world contexts
– Final answers to real life problems -> improve understanding of particular business
or management problem
– New knowledge (limited to problem)
– Findings are relevant and valued to managers in organisations
– Conducted by people based in a variety of settings (including organisations and
universities)
– Objectives negotiated with originator + tight timescales (short time)
– Implementation and dissemination research = research that assesses how well an
innovation or discreet can be distributed in and carried out in a broad range of contexts
that extend beyond its original controlled studies (only if discovery survives applied
research testing)
– Impact research = research that assesses the broader effect of a discovery or innovation
on society
– Policy research = research that is designed to investigate existing policies or develop and
test new ones
Research synthesis = a systematic study of multiple prior research projects that address the
same research question that summarises the results in a manner that can be used by
practitioners
. Meta-analysis = uses statistical methods to combine the results of similar studies
quantitively to allow general conclusions to be made
. Systematic review = focuses on a specific question or issue and used preplanned
methods to identify, select, assess and summarise the findings of multiple studies
But might not always be efficient -> guidelines developed
Guideline = the result of a systematic process that leads to a specific set of research-based
recommendations for practice that usually includes some estimates of how strong the
evidence is for each recommendation
Evidence-based practice (EBP) = a movement designed to encourage or require practitioners
to employ practices that are based on research evidence as reflected in research synthesis or
practice guidelines
– Debates: some want only randomised designs, others want a broader range of studies to
qualify as evidence
Evolutionary epistemology = the brand of philosophy indicating that ideas evolve through the
process of natural selection
– Individual discoveries compete with other established discoveries
– We view research more and more as an evolutionary system
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