This paper questions the idea that there are two opposing paradigms of educational research, often called positivist versus interpretivist. It argues that the 'paradigm' term has been used to avoid philosophical discussions about the nature of educational research. This has been done by understanding 'paradigms' to reflect metaphysical positions…

In the mixed methods research (MMR) literature, the term paradigm is used in a number of ways to support very different accounts. This article aims to contribute to the ongoing dialogue about the relationship between MMR and paradigms by analyzing two main claims discussed in the literature: (a) MMR is a new paradigm and (b) MMR mixes different…

Paradigmatic pluralism in educational technology is a largely unaddressed reality, and we have heretofore not provided guidance to professionals on how to navigate it. Pushing back against mainstream views of scientific progress (e.g., linear, progressive), we must recognize the processes by which paradigms are born, adopted, and rejected and that…

Mixed methods research (MMR) is increasingly becoming a popular methodological approach in several fields due to the promise it holds for comprehensive understanding of complex problems being researched. However, researchers interested in MMR often lack reference to a guide that can explain the key issues pertaining to the paradigm wars…

Academic advising is one of the key functions in higher education. While there has been a development of advising practices in the past decade, the assessment of academic advising practices is far from satisfactory. In this article, we review major academic advising approaches and key characteristics of quality assessment practices. Based on the…

Qualitative research and quantitative research have their own advantages, so mixed use both to improve scientific research. Too many Chinese Ethnic Minority Educational Research in qualitative research, and few use quantitative research, leading the results with many subjective factors. The reason is that selecting ethnic minority educational…

This paper is premised on the fact that math can be an important tool in helping people make sense of the world. Math offers a unique and particular lens, helping people to focus on a range of characteristics from shape and amount to the relationship between the general and the particular. To promote math as a tool for making sense, early…

Background: Under the view of dynamical system theory, expertise in sports emerges from the interaction of multiple constraints. At an individual level, important interactions amongst constraints could include the relationships that evolve between one's family, playmates/coaches, and specific training activities. Or more broadly, other…

Many important educational situations such as traumatic brain injury among preschoolers, school gun violence, preadolescent eating disorders, and adolescent suicide happen relatively infrequently. In this article, the authors explain why mixed methods research designs offer more meaningful empirical results than do qualitative or quantitative…

Credibility of evidence in evaluation is examined through the lens of dialectical pluralism (DP). Principles of procedural justice are a core element of DP and help justify outcomes of its application. A key message is that DP and the associated circle of scientific evidence and knowledge model can aid the evaluation community in producing an…

Missing data are a common occurrence in survey-based research studies in education, and the way missing values are handled can significantly affect the results of analyses based on such data. Despite known problems with performance of some missing data handling methods, such as mean imputation, many researchers in education continue to use those…

This article discusses educational design-based research (DBR) as an emerging paradigm/methodology in educational enquiry that can be used as a mixed-method, problem-oriented research framework, and thus can act as an alternative to other traditional paradigms/methodologies prominent within the Egyptian context of educational enquiry. DBR is often…

This article presents a discussion of research and theoretical perspectives on creativity and instructional design, offering a conceptual model of the connection between these two constructs that was originally proposed in the dissertation work of the first author (Clinton, Creativity and design: A study of the learning experience of instructional…

Use of multivariate analysis (e.g., multivariate analysis of variance) is common when normally distributed outcomes are collected in intervention research. However, when mixed responses--a set of normal and binary outcomes--are collected, standard multivariate analyses are no longer suitable. While mixed responses are often obtained in…

The purpose of this article is to describe the use of the Concerns Based Adoption Model (Hall & Hord, 2006) as a conceptual lens and practical methodology for professional development program assessment in the vocational education and training (VET) sector. In this sequential mixed-methods study, findings from the first two phases (two of…