Mixing Methods: The Entry of Qualitative and Quantitative Approaches into the Research Process

Abstract

Qualitative and quantitative research are often presented as two fundamentally different paradigms through which we study the social world. These paradigms act as lightning conductors to which sets of epistemological assumptions, theoretical approaches and methods are attracted. Each is seen to be incompatible with the other. These paradigmatic claims have a tendency to resurface from time to time, manifesting themselves in the effects of different cultural traditions upon intellectual styles of research. There are pressures to view research in terms of this divide but perhaps more pressures to ignore such a divide.