白话《社会科学中的研究设计》:日常思考的语言与研究设计的逻辑

Research Design in Plain English: How to Address Designing Social Inquiry to Non-Quantitative Researchers

论及社会科学研究方法,《社会科学中的研究设计》是不容略过的经典。它从定量社科研究中,提炼研究设计的通则,无论定量、定性学者均能从中获益。但在表述与解说原则时,作者虽力求深入浅出,但仍偏数理语言,往往产生"定量研究不必读,定性研究不能读"的窘境。有鉴于此,文章运用日常语言,条理并阐述《设计》所提炼的原则,一方面让不习惯数理语言的研究者,也能掌握运用该书建议,另方面也盼藉此说明,研究设计的原理,也能运用日常语言加以理解与传述。

When talking about research design, Designing Social Inquiry is widely accepted as a must- read in the field. The book draws mainly from quantitative social research but offers a couple of general rules for the design of social research,and both qualitativists and quantitativists could benefit from its teachings. However,while the authors try to make straight forward arguments, the language used to articulate and illustrate these rules is essentially mathematic. As a result,the work tends to be too familiar to quantitativists but too difficult for qualitativists. This paper reinterprets therules of research design characterized in the book by using the everyday language of non- quantitativists. The purpose is two- fold: one is to help qualitativists to learn from this classic work and the other is to show that the rules of research design can be addressed and understood in everyday language.