SOCIAL RESEARCH AND ITS IMPORTANCE

What is Research?

• Research is an attempt to gain new knowledge, facts, and information in a scientific manner.
• The main purpose of research is to diffuse knowledge and establish theories based on believable facts.
• According to L.V. Redman and A.V. H. Mory, research is a “systematised effort to gain new knowledge.”
• A research scientist makes an untiring effort to collect new facts, information, and knowledge, but success may not always follow.
• F.A. Ogg points out that research may or may not add new knowledge, but it must aim for knowledge or a new mode of knowledge.
• The method used in research is the scientific method, which is the means of achieving the research objective.
• All scientific research, regardless of the discipline, follows the same scientific method.
• C.R. Kothari emphasizes that the philosophy common to all research methods, despite variations across sciences, is known as the scientific method.
• The basic purpose of science is to establish systematic relationships between facts.
• All sciences are bound to follow the scientific method, which aims to uncover the truth or ultimate reality.
• Karl Pearson states that the scientific method is the same across all branches of science and is the method of all logically trained minds.
• The unity of all sciences lies in the methods they apply, not in their material.
• Anyone who classifies facts, sees their mutual relations, and describes their sequences is applying the scientific methodand is considered a man of science.

Social Research: Meaning and Definition

• Research is not only conducted in the field of physical science but also in the social sciences, with sociology being one of the youngest disciplines engaging in significant research.
• Sociological research is described as highly interesting and exciting, akin to systematic detective work.
• It involves facing numerous puzzles, overcoming disappointments and discouragements, challenging blind faith and hearsay, and ultimately unraveling the truth.
• Research has become an integral part of sociology, where the real action occurs.
• Sociological enterprise consists of two interconnected aspects: theory and research.
• Both theory and research are essential, with each depending on and influencing the other.
• Facts without theory are meaningless, while theories without facts are speculative and unverified, offering little practical value.
• Theory and research go hand in hand, with theory inspiring research to either verify or disprove it.
• The findings of research can confirm, reject, or modify existing theories, and may even lead to the formation of new theories.
• This process of theory and research influencing each other is endless.

Definition of Social Research

• Pauline V. Young defines social research as a systematic method to explore, analyze, and conceptualize social life in order to extend, correct, or verify knowledge, aiding in the construction of theories or the practice of an art.
• Social research seeks to find explanations for unexplained social phenomena, clarify the doubtful, and correct misconceived facts of social life.
• Pauline V. Young further defines social research as a scientific undertaking using logical and systematized techniques to:
  1. Discover new facts or verify and test old facts.
  2. Analyze sequences, interrelationships, and causal explanations.
  3. Develop new scientific tools, concepts, and theories to facilitate reliable and valid study of human behavior.
• According to Wallace and Wallace, sociological research refers to the structural observation of social behavior.