Philosophy, Methodology and Educational Research

Educational policy–makers are increasingly employing the rhetoric of research–based or evidence–based policy and practice, thus insisting on a particularly narrow definition of educational research. At the same time, educational researchers themselves are drawing on an increasingly wide variety of intellectual resources for their research methods and methodologies – methods and methodologies derived from the social sciences, broadly conceived, but also from the humanities and the creative arts.
This collection brings together twenty–two contributions that examine a wide variety of issues raised in this setting: about the nature of educational research and its claims on our attention; about the relationship between research and educational practice; about issues of generalisability and claims to truth; about the supposed conflict between qualitative and quantitative research methodologies; about the place of philosophy itself in educational research; and about the teaching of research methods and methodology.
Written by a distinguished international group of philosophers of education, it represents an authoritative contribution to the literature and will be a key point of reference both for those examining these issues at a policy level and for those teaching and studying educational research methods and methodologies in university departments, as well as for students of philosophy of education.
Cover image: St John Reconsiders Modern Epistemology © James B. Janknegt
Cover design by Design Deluxe

Spis treści:
1. Introduction: David Bridges and Richard Smith.
2. The Myth of ‘Scientific Method’ in Contemporary Educational Research: Darrell Rowbottom and Sarah Aiston.
3. As if by Machinery: the Levelling of Educational Research: Richard Smith.
4. ‘A demented form of the familiar’: Postmodernism and Educational Research: Maggie MacLure.
5. The Disciplines and Discipl ine of Educational Research: David Bridges.
6. Consistency, Understanding and Truth in Educational Research: Andrew Davis.
7. No Harm Done: The Implications for Educational Research of the Rejection of Truth: Stefan Ramaekers.
8. The Quantitative–Qualitative Distinction and the Null Hypothesis Significance Testing Procedure: Nimal Ratnesar and Jim Mackenzie.
9. A View from Somewhere: Explaining the Paradigms of Educational Research: Hanan Alexander.
10. Philosophy, Methodology and Action Research: Wilfred Carr.
11. Educational Research as a Form of Democratic Rationality: John Elliott.
12. Philosophical Research and Educational Action Research: Marianna Papastephanou.
13. Why Generalisability is not Generalisable: Lynn Fendler.
14. On Generalising from Single Case Studies: Epistemological Reflections: Colin W. Evers and Echo H. Wu.
15. Epistemological Issues in Phenomenological Research: How Authoritative are People’s Accounts of their own Perceptions?: Bas Levering.
16. Reasons and Causes in Educational Research: Overcoming Dichotomies and Other Conceptual Confusions: Paul Smeyers.
17. Philosophy’s Contribution to Social Science Research on Education: Martin Hammersley.
18. US Graduate Study in Education Research: From Methodology to Potential Totalization: Lynda Stone.
19. Shovelling Smoke? The Experience of Being a Philosopher on a Research Training Programme: Judith Suissa.
20. Induction into Educational Research Networks: The Striated and the Smooth: Naomi Hodgson and Paul Standish.
21. The Contested Nature of Empirical Educational Research (and Why Philosophy of Education Offers Little Help): D.C. Phillips.
22. On the Limits of Empirical Educational Research, Beyond the Fantasy: A Rejoinder to D.C. Phillips: Paul Smeyers.

Nota biograficzna:
David Bridges is currently Executive Director of the Association of Universities of the Eastern Region and a Professorial Fellow at the Centre for Applied Research in Education, University of East Anglia.
Richard Smith is Professor of Education at Durham University.

Okładka tylna:
Educational policy–makers are increasingly employing the rhetoric of research–based or evidence–based policy and practice, thus insisting on a particularly narrow definition of educational research. At the same time, educational researchers themselves are drawing on an increasingly wide variety of intellectual resources for their research methods and methodologies – methods and methodologies derived from the social sciences, broadly conceived, but also from the humanities and the creative arts.
This collection brings together twenty–two contributions that examine a wide variety of issues raised in this setting: about the nature of educational research and its claims on our attention; about the relationship between research and educational practice; about issues of generalisability and claims to truth; about the supposed conflict between qualitative and quantitative research methodologies; about the place of philosophy itself in educational research; and about the teaching of research methods and methodology.
Written by a distinguished international group of philosophers of education, it represents an authoritative contribution to the literature and will be a key point of reference both for those examining these issues at a policy level and for those teaching and studying educational research methods and methodologies in university departments, as well as for students of philosophy of education.
Cover image: St John Reconsiders Modern Epistemology © James B. Janknegt
Cover design by Design Deluxe