In the complex world of educational policy, causal inferences will be debated. As we review non-experimental designs in educational policy, we focus on how to clarify and focus the terms of debate. We begin by presenting the potential outcomes/counterfactual framework and then describe approximations to the counterfactual generated from the…

The Nuremberg Code established ethics for the involvement of humans in research, initially in the area of health and medical research. While aspects of the code have been extended to the social and behavioral sciences, program evaluation does not always implement those policies, procedures, and protocols for protecting research participants,…

Longitudinal studies including a time-to-event outcome in social research often use a form of event history analysis to analyse the influence of time-varying endogenous covariates on the time-to-event outcome. Many standard event history models however assume the covariates of interest to be exogenous and inclusion of an endogenous covariate may…

Purpose: This paper aims to consider ways to visually model data generated by qualitative case studies, pointing out a need for visualizations that depict both synchronic relations across representations and how those relations change diachronically. To develop an appropriate modeling approach, the paper critically examines Max Boisot's I-Space…

This research explores the process of a Participatory Research (PR) project that brought together university researchers with museum practitioners to create reflective tools that can be used to better understand real practical challenges. This project followed Bourke's (2009) definition of PR, viewing the process as a collaborative endeavour…

This paper explores the use of theory in longitudinal qualitative research, an approach to research which explores lived experiences as they unfold. The authors illustrate how the complexity of conducting qualitative research through time drives an understanding and use of theory that differs from other research approaches. Longitudinal…

This paper discusses methodological challenges in researching practice. The primary challenge discussed arises from the view that practice is inextricable from its performance, and that performance is embedded in social relations, material infrastructures and historical context. The paper argues for a philosophical hermeneutics approach that works…

The paradigm on which a methodological approach is developed determines the situations in which its application will be most appropriate. The quantitative approach implies a positivist paradigm, the basis of which is cause-and-effect relationships, as well as the questioning and verifying of existing theories. Positivism aims to prove that…

This article argues that Agent-Based Modelling, owing to its capabilities and methodology, has a distinctive contribution to make to delivering coherent social science prediction. The argument has four parts. The first identifies key elements of social science prediction induced from real research across disciplines, thus avoiding a straw person…

Since the early 1990s the number of systematic reviews (SR) of animal studies has steadily increased. There is, however, little guidance on when and how to conduct a meta-analysis of human-health-related animal studies. To gain insight about the methods that are currently used we created an overview of the key characteristics of published…

This paper presents a model for developing research questions that are aligned to research aims for research design in e-learning. The model is proposed as a solution to the on-going problem of heterogeneity of research problems. The model is based on Burrell and Morgan's four social paradigms, and integrates four research aims, namely, explore,…

The Impact Agenda, introduced with Research Excellence Framework 2014 (REF), constituted a revolution in research evaluation in the UK. 'Research impact' (impact of scholarly work outside of academia) became one of three profiles under which research quality is evaluated. This shift in the British evaluation system was followed, and often…

Social scientists have frequently sought to understand the distinct effects of age, period, and cohort, but disaggregation of the three dimensions is difficult because cohort = period - age. We argue that this technical difficulty reflects a disconnection between how the cohort effect is conceptualized and how it is modeled in the traditional…

While all learning and knowledge can be attributed to experiences, not all experiences are educative. Experiential learning is a highly utilized theory and pedagogical practice in agricultural education and has been since its inception as a discipline. The purpose of this research is to examine the theory of experiential learning as it applies to…

In comparative VET research, a model developed from the perspective of comparative politics, the so-called 'skill formation systems typology' developed by Busemeyer and Trampusch, dominates the discourse. However, models to compare VET systems often rely on a narrow set of assumptions and fail to account for their complexity. We therefore review…