Intro to Scientific Research Methods in Geography Chapter 2: Fundamental Research Concepts

Idea Concepts & Empirical Concepts What are the basic scientific concepts fundamental to conducting and interpreting scientific research?

Idea Concepts  Theory  Hypothesis  Causality  Cause / Effect  Probabilistic (Stochastic) / Deterministic  Necessary / Sufficient  Mechanistic / Functional  Model  Construct

4 Theory  Idea or conjecture about a causal relationship that answers “why” something is the way it is  Application - see handout

5 Hypothesis  Idea or conjecture about a pattern of observations of the world  Application - see handout

6 Causality  Concept that the occurrence of one state or event can bring about another state or event  Application - see handout

7 Causality  Cause  Antecedent state or event that brings about an effect  Effect  Subsequent state or event brought about by a cause  Application - see handout

8 Causality  Probabilistic (Stochastic)  Causal processes that sometimes bring about effects  Deterministic  Causal processes that necessarily bring about effects  Application - see handout

9 Causality  Necessary  Cause that must be in place for the efect to occur, but by itself may not be enough to make the effect occur  Sufficient  Cause that by itself will make the effect occur, but may not need to be in place for the effect to occur  Application - see handout

10 Causality  Mechanistic  Idea that causes move forward “densely” in space and time, with continuously connected causes and effects  Functional  Idea that causes can follow effects, providing goal states for the effects (heuristic vs. literal use)  Application - see handout

11 Model  Simplified representation of a portion of reality, expressed in conceptual, physical, graphical, or computational form  Application - see handout

12 Construct  Concept that is a piece of the idealized world comprising the subject matter of theories; the hypothetical entities that we attempt to measure when we perform our systematic empirical observations  Application - see handout

Empirical Concepts  Case  Constants  Variables ▪ Dichotomous / Discrete / Continuous ▪ Latent / Manifest  Measurement ▪ Data ▪ Measurement Level (Nominal / Ordinal / Interval / Ratio) ▪ Accuracy ▪ Precision

14 Case  The thing or entity a scientists studies  Application - see handout

15 Constant  Attributes or properties of cases that researchers measure and study; value does not vary from case to case  Application - see handout

16 Variable  Attributes or properties of cases that researchers measure and study; value varies from case to case  Application - see handout

17 Variable  Dichotomous  Simplest; takes only two values across cases  Discrete  Takes on only a limited set of distinct possible values  Continuous  Takes on an infinite number of possible values  Application - see handout

18 Variable  Latent  Hypothetical entity that we attempt to measure; synonym of construct  Manifest  Actual entity expressed by our measurements; synonym of measured variable  Application - see handout

19 Measurement  Assigning numbers or other symbols to cases to reflect their values on a variable  Application - see handout

20 Measurement  Data  Values obtained by measurement  Accuracy  Correctness of values measured  Precision  Sharpness or highest resolution of values measured  Application - see handout

21 Measurement  Nominal  Classification or naming; not quantitative  Ordinal  Rank order  Interval  Distance between scale values; no absolute zero  Ratio  Distance between scale values and absolute zero  Application - see handout

Concept of Scale What are the implications of scale to geographic research?

What is Scale?  Size  Relative  Absolute  Spatial / Temporal / Thematic  Categories  Phenomenon Scale  Analysis Scale  Cartographic Scale  Hierarchy of Scales

24 Scale  Concept that concerns size, either relative or absolute  Spatial  Temporal  Thematic  Application - see handout

25 Scale  Hierarch of scales  Fact that geographic phenomena at diferent scales often interact, existing in nested and nesting relationships to one another  Application - see handout

26 Scale  Phenomenon Scale  Size at which some human or physical earth structure or process actually exists  Analysis Scale  Size of the unit at which some problem is analyzed  Cartographic Scale  Depicted size of a feature on a map relative to its actual size in the world  Application - see handout

Research Ideas What are ways to (1) generate and (2) develop good research ideas?

Generating Research Ideas  Non-systematic  Creativity / Intuition / Experience  Systematic  Intensive case study  Paradoxical incident  Analogical extension  Practitioner’s rule of thumb  Account for conflicting results  Reduce complexity to simpler components  Account for exceptions to general findings

Generating Research Ideas  Non-systematic  Creativity / Intuition / Experience  Application - see handout

Generating Research Ideas  Systematic  Intensive case study  Paradoxical incident  Analogical extension  Practitioner’s rule of thumb  Account for conflicting results  Reduce complexity to simpler components  Account for exceptions to general findings  Application - see handout

Developing research ideas  Find a research area  Generate research ideas  Your own ideas first  Avoid groupthink / staleness  Link with other knowledge  Your own  Experts / Literature  Formulate your idea as specific hypotheses  Design research to address your hypotheses

Developing research ideas  Application - see handout  Find a research area  Generate research ideas  Link with other knowledge ▪ Your own ▪ Experts / Literature  Formulate your idea as specific hypotheses  Design research to address your hypotheses

33 Conclusion Fundamental research concepts MATTER...!!