[Post supplemented & revised 19 Sept 2010] A social paradigm is "a constellation of concepts, values, perceptions, and practices shared by a community, which forms a particular vision of reality that is the basis of the way the community organizes itself" (Fritjof Capra [1996] definition in Watkins & Mohr, 2001: 2).
A research paradigm, similarly, is an assemblage usually comprising the researcher's ontology, epistemology, methodology and axiology. The popularity of the notion 'paradigm' as way to summarise a researcher's beliefs about how to create knowledge, can according to Moore (2207) be traced back to Thomas Kuhn. A research design as result is known as a metaphysical paradim (Moore 2007). Initially I struggled to grasp the various meanings (sometimes I still do):
- Ontology = ontos + logia, which means 'being' and 'study of' the nature of reality and truth. It is about clarification of the qualitative researcher's position about the nature of existence in science, the implicit and/or explicit presuppositions from which the research would be undertaken.
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Epistemology = originates from Greek epistēmē which means knowledge, from epistanai to understand, know, from epi- + histanai to cause to stand. It concerns clarification of the qualitative researcher's approach about knowledge creation, for example (there are many), two contrasting views:
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- One is about building on the foundations of accepted and rationally defensible theory of confirmation and inference
- Another is about setting aside existing knowledge and approaching discovery from internal coherence
Morgan, D.L. 2007. Paradigms lost and pragmatism regained — methodological implications of combining qualitative and quantitative methods. Journal of Mixed Method Research, 1(1), pp 48-76, January 2007.
Watkins, J. M. & Mohr, B.J. 2001. Appreciative inquiry. San Francisco: Jossey-bass/Pfeiffer.
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