Methodology Books

Research Design: Qualitative, Quantitative, and Mixed Methods Approaches

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 27 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

                The Bestselling Text is Completely Updated and Better than Ever!

Praise for the Third Edition:

“I have used the older edition with great success. The new one is even better.”
-Kathleen Duncan, University of La Verne

The Third Edition of the bestselling text Research Design by John W. Creswell enables readers to compare three approaches to research-qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods-in a single research methods text. The book presents these three approaches side by side within the context of the process of research from the beginning steps of philosophical assumptions to the writing and presenting of research. Written in a user-friendly manner, Creswell's text does not rely on technical jargon. He cuts to the core of what a reader needs to know to read and design research in part by showcasing ideas in a scaffold approach so that the reader understands ideas from the simple to the complex.

Key updates to the Third Edition:

• Presents the preliminary steps of using philosophical assumptions in the beginning of the book
• Provides an expanded discussion on ethical issues
• Emphasizes new Web-based technologies for literature searches
• Offers updated information about mixed methods research procedures
• Contains a glossary of terms
• Highlights “research tips” throughout the chapters incorporating the author’s experiences over the last 35 years

The Instructor’s Resource CD-ROM (ISBN:978-1-4129-6672-6) contains: 

• Sample Syllabi
• PowerPoint Slide Sets
• Sample Student Proposals
• Suggested Studies Published in Journal Articles
• Application Activities and Tutorial
• Peer-Feedback Group Activities
• Study Design Group Activities
• End-of-Chapter Checklists

The Student Study Site at www.sagepub.com/creswellstudy offers:

• Sample Student Proposals
• Application Activities and Tutorials
• Peer-Feedback Group Activities
• Study Design Group Activities
• End-of-Chapter Checklists

Research Design, Third Edition appeals to students taking research design and research methods classes throughout the social and behavioral sciences-from undergraduates to the most advanced doctoral programs.

Intelligence Analysis: A Target-centric Approach

Robert M. Clark

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 12 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

For nearly 50 years, facing a static enemy, American intelligence analysis was based on a hierarchical decision-making process that oftentimes insulated analysts from criticism and interaction with the ultimate consumers of their product. In countering asymmetric threats and non-state adversaries, the model is simply outmoded. A flatter, horizontal, networked solution has proven much more effective in today's world.

In his second edition, Robert Clark--former CIA analyst and executive in the Intelligence Directorate--explains how a collaborative, target-centric process both attends to the needs of the customer and promotes more effective collection. Based on feedback from users, early chapters introduce the concept of model synthesis more gradually. Recent intelligence events--with the Iraqi WMD Commission Report at center stage--illustrate the importance of target-centric analysis. This revision also includes broader treatment of collection strategies, systems analysis, and analyst-customer interaction as well as more attention to denial and deception, and to both counterterrorism and counterintelligence analysis.

This new edition contains updates of the practical information and day-to-day details from the previous book told as only an experienced intelligence hand could. Extensive descriptions of the art of target modeling and organizational analysis, as well as thoroughly detailed overviews of the quantitative and predictive techniques used in intelligence analysis make this book an essential tool for illuminating an often shadowy world.

Decolonizing Methodologies: Research and Indigenous Peoples

Linda Tuhiwai Smith

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Total reviews: 7 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

From the vantage point of the colonized, the term 'research' is inextricably linked with European colonialism; the ways in which scientific research has been implicated in the worst excesses of imperialism remains a powerful remembered history for many of the world's colonized peoples. Here, an indigenous researcher issues a clarion call for the decolonization of research methods.

The book is divided into two parts. In the first, the author critically examines the historical and philosophical base of Western research. Extending the work of Foucault, she explores the intersections of imperialism, knowledge and research, and the different ways in which imperialism is embedded in disciplines of knowledge and methodologies as 'regimes of truth'. Providing a history of knowledge from the Enlightenment to Postcoloniality, she also discusses the fate of concepts such as 'discovery, 'claiming' and 'naming' through which the west has incorporated and continues to incorporate the indigenous world within its own web.

The second part of the book meets the urgent need for people who are carrying out their own research projects, for literature which validates their frustrations in dealing with various western paradigms, academic traditions and methodologies, which continue to position the indigenous as 'Other'. In setting an agenda for planning and implementing indigenous research, the author shows how such programmes are part of the wider project of reclaiming control over indigenous ways of knowing and being.

Exploring the broad range of issues which have confronted, and continue to confront, indigenous peoples, in their encounters with western knowledge, this book also sets a standard for truly emancipatory research. It brilliantly demonstrates that ‘when indigenous peoples become the researchers and not merely the researched, the activity of research is transformed.’

Truth And Method (Continuum Impacts)

Hans-Georg Gadamer, Joel Weinsheimer, Donald G. Marshall

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 9 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Klassisch! 5 out of 5 stars.
31 of 33 people found this review helpful.

First, Truth and Method is a true classic. Basically, it sees Gadamer revitalise 'nonscientific' truth, i.e. the experience of truth inaccessible to method and irreducible to bare statement. The book itself does have a structure/setting that makes it difficult to get into initially (it is usefully read in tandem with a good commentary eg. Joel Weinsheimer's 'Gadamer's Hermeneutics'), but it is simply worth the effort.

Second, the review below is mistaken when it attributes to Gadamer the idea that the Old Testament should be read literally. Gadamer refers to Luther's position that "the Scripture has a univocal sense that can be derived from the text", but he does this as part of an historical overview of hermeneutics and, on the very next page, Luther gets refuted by 18thC historicism. Gadamer moves beyond both these positions to reveal how 'literalism' (and - more pressingly - 'historicism') is a projection of unproductive prejudices. It is an "obstruction", that gets in the way of the truth Gadamer seeks. Also, while T&M is relevant to theology, it should be made clear that Gadamer is writing of a philosophical-universal hermeneutics and not something regional.

Editorial Review:

Written in the 1960s, TRUTH AND METHOD is Gadamer's magnum opus. Looking behind the self-consciousness of science, he discusses the tense relationship between truth and methodology. In examining the different experiences of truth, he aims to "present the hermeneutic phenomenon in its fullest extent.

From Reliable Sources: An Introduction to Historical Methods

Martha C. Howell, Walter Prevenier

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 7 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Very helpful introduction 5 out of 5 stars.
39 of 45 people found this review helpful.

History used to be a subject that one could view as somewhat ancillary, as an interesting subject but one that was not really needed to function in the modern world. One could dispense with studying history and still maintain a proper perspective of world events. Any inaccuracies in the reporting of world events were the responsibility of reporters, and historians were viewed in general as occupiers of an ivory tower. They were held to be trustworthy because not much weight was assigned to their scholarly activities.

In general, this attitude about history and historians is now considered to be a mistake. Because of some very volatile and dangerous events in the early twenty-first century, the study of history should be viewed now as one of the most important, if not the most important scholarly activity. One can easily observe the enormous weight that is placed on events of the past, due in part to the ideological agendas that are deeply embedded in contemporary politics. And some historians have chosen to use historical analysis to justify a political agenda, or have acted as sycophants for the institutions that host them. It would be fair to say that some historians are now viewed with extreme skepticism, and many are therefore looking into the historical record and seeking answers on their own. These historical auto-didactics are hungry for tools of analysis in which to study and interpret past events.

This short book gives an introduction to these tools, and any reader, whether of the afore-mentioned type or not, will gain a lot from its perusal. It gives much insight into how historians view and find sources, and is primarily written for non-experts (such as this reviewer) in historical analysis. Philosophers and economists will also discover how the study of history also intersects to a large degree with their own fields.

There is a wealth of information in the book, and many questions are answered as well as raised. Some of these include:

1. What is the nature of historical interpretation? Can historians put themselves in a position where an historical source can be read without giving attention to the historical context that give it meaning?
2. How can an historical source be characterized?
3. Are historians ethically responsible for the content of their works, and if so, to what degree?
4. Is there any value in oral records for historical analysis? In interviewing?
5. What impact has information technology had on historical analysis?
6. How are archives useful for the historian, and does a given archive, taken to be reliable, expand or shrink with time?
7. Will the advent of software to analyze historical texts eventually result in the automation of historical analysis?
8. How do historians assess the accuracy or authenticity of sources?
9. Does the interpretation of an historical document always involve the determination of its intended meaning?
10. Should "firsthand" reports of events always be taken as true?
11. How do historians compare different sources relating to the same historical event?
12. The authors refer to `reasoning by interpolation' or `by analogy'. What exactly is the nature of this kind of reasoning?
13. When can a historian claim that his analysis is correct? Is there a way of quantifying the point at which enough evidence has been collected?
14. Can participants in events claim any special insight into these events over and above what can be obtained by an observer (an historian) who is not, or has not, participated in these events?
15. Can historians view events and documents from an apodictic point of view, i.e. free from bias and any implicit assumptions?
16. Should historians focus on what people did in the past rather than what they thought or felt?
17. Should historians concentrate on deducing the motives of the people in history from their visible actions?
18. The authors point to the use of fields such as psychology to study the "feelings in history." Could the relatively new field of cognitive neuroscience be used to do the same, or even more generally to study the motives, decisions, and mental limitations of people in history? One could view this use as a kind of "historical neurocriticism" and its use could possibly shed considerable light on how people, through their cultures, construct meanings of their experiences and make history.
19. The authors refer to human life as being "too complex" to be analyzed with historical models. What notion of complexity is being used here, and given current methods for dealing with complexity in model-building, would these be of any assistance in the study of history, especially those that attempt to understand to what extent events are caused by human actions?
20. Should historians focus more on studies of "popular culture" and not on "learned culture", i.e. should they analyze historical events in terms of what has recently been called "people's history?"
21. What is the difference between a `linear' theory of history and a `cyclical theory', and is the former always more optimistic than the latter?
22. Can technological innovations and development be used as a reference of time for historical change, i.e. as a kind of clock or calendar in which historians are to delineate events? Such a calendar would not necessarily be a linear ordering of events like the ones that are currently used. In periods of rapid technological development, time will be more compressed than in periods of slow technological development. History could thus be viewed as moving more quickly in the former than in the latter.

The Intellectual Life: Its Spirit, Conditions, Methods

A. G. Sertillanges

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 8 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Absolutely gorgeous book! 5 out of 5 stars.
12 of 16 people found this review helpful.

Still a very good book about:
Why (a lot) and how (a little bit) to become a
good thinker. Very inspiring.

The original French version is available for free online
(among others at www.inquisition.ca).

Cheers!
Stefan

Contact with Genius 5 out of 5 stars.
7 of 8 people found this review helpful.

1998 reprint of 1987 edition, Catholic University of America Press, 296 pages (of which 260 pages form the main body of the book)
Translated from the French (1934 2nd edition) by Mary Ryan

I came across this unusual book when discussing with my most well read friend the problem of deciding how much to read. He told me this topic was covered in Sertillanges' book and suggested I read it.

The title makes it sound as if the book might be pretentious, but it is not. In the same way that Peter Drucker's superb The Effective Executive is a book for any knowledge worker rather than just for managers, Sertillanges' book should be helpful for anyone who wishes to work using their intellect, rather than just for rarefied intellectuals.

The 1998 reissue (the 1992 date listed on Amazon.co.uk is incorrect) of the 1987 edition has a new forward by James Schall. I think he captures the essence of Sertillanges' book very well:

"At first sight...this is a quaint book. At second sight it is an utterly demanding book."

The subtitle of The Intellectual Life describes its contents well: "Its Spirit, Conditions, Methods". For Sertillanges, intellectual work is not something done in isolation of the rest of a person's life. He believes strongly that in order to do intellectual work to one's capacity, one must order the whole of one's life with this goal in mind. And further, that this requires habits of simplicity, detachment, note taking, memory, writing and more. His book is thus a step-by-step manual that sets out these requirements from the general (virtues, character) to the specific (note-taking, writing).

For most people who are not already members of religious orders (Sertillanges was a Dominican friar) it would be terrifically demanding to follow all of Sertillanges' prescriptions - and involve major changes to one's life. Sertillanges does believe, however, that if one takes care with the rest of one's life then intellectual work can be done satisfactorily using only a couple of hours a day. His book is thus a mixture of the extremely demanding and eminently practical - particularly as much of his advice involves cutting out and eliminating habits that waste time and disturb thought (e.g. pointless correspondence and interactions with people, reading of novels and newspapers).

After reading Ben Franklin's autobiography and Charlie Munger's Poor Charlie's Almanack at the beginning of the year, I have become increasingly aware of the crucial role of habits in determining the outcome of peoples' lives. I was stupid enough to have spent a good proportion of my life testing out the truth of Franklin's maxim: "Experience keeps a dear school, yet Fools will learn in no other." I no longer have any doubt that forming good habits - and most especially avoiding forming bad ones - is terribly important. After all, reliability - which Munger considers the single most important determining characteristic for a person's life - is really just another habit.

Sertillanges understood this very well and the importance of habits that facilitate intellectual work is a topic that he brings up repeatedly - and in my view very wisely - in his book:

"One acquires facility in thinking just as one acquires facility in playing the piano, in riding, or painting.... The mind gets into the way of doing what is often demanded of it."

This is not the only resemblance between the advice in Sertillanges' book and that given by Charlie Munger (the best source for his ideas and the most useful book I have ever read is Poor Charlie's Almanack). The importance of a broad base of knowledge, the danger of over-specialisation and the critical importance of only a few ideas in each subject are all covered in this book.

Another striking similarity is Sertillanges' view of the importance of 'contact with genius' and how one goes about acquiring wisdom:

"...the principal profit from reading, at least from reading great works, is not the acquisition of scattered truths, it is the increase of our wisdom."

I was left with somewhat mixed feelings as I progressed through The Intellectual Life. At times Sertillanges' overt religiosity became a little much for me (I am not a religious person) and I found his prescriptions rather daunting.

As I neared the end of the book, however, my view changed and I found myself extremely grateful that Sertillanges' had written this book for us. It was partly because his section on writing answered with great clarity some problems that I had been wrestling with, and partly because I realised that one could simply take what one needed from his book - rather than the whole package.

My difficulty in deciding how much to read remains somewhat unresolved: there is a tension between Sertillanges' advice on reading and that of people like Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger on investment (my own profession/hobby). Sertillanges advises cutting down on excess (particularly undirected) reading, including, for example, newspapers:

"As to newspapers, defend yourself against them with the energy that the continuity and the indiscretion of their assault make indispensable. You must know what the papers contain, but they contain so little..."

Buffett, on the other hand, claims to read five newspapers a day and urges us to read everything in sight!

I suspect the different advice is due to the type of work. Firstly, I am not sure that investing is an inherently intellectual pursuit (Buffett has often said that after an average level of intelligence the right temperament is more important). Secondly, intelligent investment is just applied opportunism - and in order to take advantage of opportunities we must first be aware of their existence.

I did not find this an easy review to write. I have had to leave out various topics that I would like to have discussed more fully (such as Sertillanges' excellent advice on writing) and still feel this review may be overlong. However, I believe a review that does not attempt to set its subject firmly in context is of limited use. I'll leave the final word to Sertillanges:

"There are books everywhere and only a few are necessary."

I commend this unusual book to you as one of the necessary ones.

Editorial Review:

This edition includes a new foreword by James V. Schall, S.J.

Sertillanges asks in the preface of the 1934 edition of The Intellectual Life: "Do you want to do intellectual work?" He follows with the prescription: "Begin by creating within you a zone of silence, a habit of recollection, a will of renunciation and detachment which puts you entirely at the disposal of work; acquire that state of soul unburdened by desire and self-will which is the state of grace of the intellectual worker. Without that you will do nothing, at least nothing worth while."

First published in 1920, this classic has been repeatedly reprinted and continues to inspire and instruct young scholars.

Language, Truth and Logic

Alfred J. Ayer, Sir Alfred Jules Ayer

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Total reviews: 21 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

A superb book about logical positivism 5 out of 5 stars.
4 of 5 people found this review helpful.

Ayer is simply fed up with metaphysical and religious claims that appear to be nonsensical. So he makes us ask the following question about any claim we feel is hard to interpret:

"Would any observations be relevant to the determination of its truth or falsehood?"

That gets us away from having to worry about what otherwise might appear to be cognitive remarks, such as "god exists."

If it is then claimed that there is indeed evidence that would be relevant, we start to interpret claims in that light. If we are told that the existence of thunder and lightning shows that god exists, we can interpret the statement "god exists" as being equivalent to "sometimes, there is thunder and lightning." That, and no more.

The idea is to connect claims to verification, and to connect meaningfulness (or cognitivity) to verifiability.

Plenty of people say that the logical positivists are Wrong, or that Ayer is Wrong. But that is silly. What they have given us is a method for arguing about potentially ambiguous statements. How we use this method is up to us. Saying that this method is Wrong is preposterous. We merely need to figure out when it is appropriate to use it and how to do so.

In this book, we learn a little about logic, and we get some good training in the law of excluded middle. That law says that a proposition has to be either true or false. It is not possible that neither it nor its contradictory are true. We may not be able to tell if it is true or false. But if we see two statements which both appear to be true, they can't truly be contradictory. Ayer gives some good examples of this and of several other elements of logic.

This is indeed a classic work. One can read it in a matter of hours, and it is well worth it for anyone who wants to use logic to seek answers to questions.

Editorial Review:

Classic introduction to objectives and methods of schools of empiricism and linguistic analysis, especially of the logical positivism derived from the Vienna Circle. Topics: elimination of metaphysics, function of philosophy, nature of philosophical analysis, the a priori, truth and probability, critique of ethics and theology, self and the common world, more.

The Philosophy of Philosophy (The Blackwell / Brown Lectures in Philosophy)

Timothy Williamson

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Editorial Review:

The second volume in the Blackwell Brown Lectures in Philosophy, this volume offers an original and provocative take on the nature and methodology of philosophy.

• Based on public lectures at Brown University, given by the pre-eminent philosopher, Timothy Williamson
  
• Rejects the ideology of the 'linguistic turn', the most distinctive trend of 20th century philosophy
  
• Explains the method of philosophy as a development from non-philosophical ways of thinking
  
• Suggests new ways of understanding what contemporary and past philosophers are doing

Configurational Comparative Methods: Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) and Related Techniques (Applied Social Research Methods)

Benoît Rihoux, Charles C. Ragin

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Editorial Review:

Configurational Comparative Methods paves the way for an innovative approach to empirical scientific work through a strategy that integrates key strengths of both qualitative (case-oriented) and quantitative (variable-oriented) approaches. This first-of-its-kind text is ideally suited for "small-N" or "intermediate-N" research situations, which both mainstream qualitative and quantitative methods find difficult to address. Benoît Rihoux and Charles C. Ragin, along with their contributing authors, offer both a basic, comparative research design overview and a technical and hands-on review of Crisp-Set QCA (csQCA), Multi-Value QCA (mvQCA), and Fuzzy-Set QCA (fsQCA).

Key Features

• Discusses existing applications in many different fields and disciplines along with state-of-the-art coverage of the strengths and limitations of these techniques
• Demonstrates further inventive ways of using QCA techniques
• Provides advice on how to develop a comparative research design (case and variable selection) as well as a specific technique called MSDO/MDSO (most similar, different outcome/most different, same outcome).
• Shows how to perform the technical operations linked to three specific QCA techniques: csQCA, mvQCA, and fsQCA
• Includes a glossary, an extensive bibliography, and a detailed list of good practices at every stage of the research process

Intended Audience

A must for any student or researcher who wants to engage in systematic cross-case comparison in the social and behavioral sciences, the book is ideal for use in upper-level undergraduate and graduate-level social science research methods courses.

The Philosophers Toolkit: A Compendium of Philosophical Concepts and Methods

Julian Baggini, Peter Fosl

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 7 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Excellent Introduction to Logic and Philosophy 5 out of 5 stars.
37 of 37 people found this review helpful.

REVIEW: This book, while sometimes reading like a condensed encyclopedia, is an excellent resource for anyone interested in Philosophical thought and Logic. It is an excellent introduction as well as a reference book. And while the title and binding may detract from it's apparent academic credibility, I assure you it is there.

The book covers several sections, beginning with basic argumentation (Fallacies, Premises, etc...) and expanding out into complex ideas such as Hume's Fork, Leibniz's Law of Identity, Ockham's Razor and similar concepts. It is also very well cross-referenced, providing an almost instantaneous ability to further investigate topics. Additionally, it has a section devoted to Philosophical Resources on the Internet. While this might not be of use in a few years, it definitely is of use now. Finally, the book also includes a small section of "Recommended Readings" at the end of every section that is very useful.

STRENGTHS: Excellent content and superb explanation of the content. The author does a wonderful job of explaining complex philosophical ideas in a clear and concise manner. It also very well thought out, cross-referencing and suggesting additional readings on every topic.

WEAKNESSES: The book is not exactly stimulating in any contemporary manner. It is written more like an encyclopedia rather than a novel and is therefore a bit dry. Also, it's appearance detracts from the seriousness of it's subject matter.

WHO SHOULD READ THIS BOOK: Those interested in understanding philosophical arguments and/or logic. This book is also helpful to Philosophy Majors/Minors as a refresher or a reference book.

FOR SIMILAR/RELATED TOPICS, CONSIDER: Informal Logic: A Handbook for Critical Argument by Douglas Walton and A Rulebook for Arguments by Anthony Weston

Editorial Review:

The Philosophers' Toolkit provides all the intellectual equipment necessary to engage with and participate in philosophical argument, reading and reflection. Each of its 87 entries explains how to use an important concept or argumentative technique accurately and effectively.