Methodological Lenses Research Articles

Guest Editors’ Introduction: Pushing the Limits of the Anthropos

Guest Editors’ Introduction: Pushing the Limits of the <i>Anthropos</i>

Mixed Methods Research in Language Testing and Assessment

As an alternative paradigm, mixed methods research (MMR), in general, endorses pluralism to understand the complex nature of a social world from multiple perspectives and multiple methodological lenses, each of which offers partial, yet valuable, insights. This methodological mixing is not limited to mixing of methods, but extends to the entire inquiry process. Researchers in language testing and assessment (LTA) are increasingly turning to MMR in order to understand the complexities of language acquisition and interaction among various language users, and also to expand opportunities to investigate validity claims beyond the three traditional facets of construct, content, and criterion validity. We use current conceptualizations of validity as a guiding framework to review 32 empirical MMR studies that have been published in LTA since 2007. Our systematic review encompassed multiple areas of foci, including the rationale for the use of MMR, evidence of collaboration, and synergetic effects. The analyses revealed several key trends including: (a) triangulation and complementarity were the prevalent uses of MMR in LTA; (b) the majority of the studies took place predominantly in higher education learning contexts with adult immigrant or university populations; (c) aspects of writing assessment were most frequently the focus of the studies (compared to other language modalities); (d) many of the studies explicitly addressed facets of validity, and others had significant implications for expanding notions of validity in LTA; (e) the majority of the studies avoided mixing at the data analysis stage by distinguishing data types and reporting results separately; and (f) integration occurred primarily at the discussion stage. We contend that LTA should embrace MMR through creative designs and integrative analytic strategies to seek new insights into the complexities and contexts of language testing and assessment.

Imperial Agendas, Global Solidarities, and Third World Socio-Legal Studies: Methodological Reflections

This article interrogates the methodological lenses through which law in the Third World is commonly analyzed in socio-legal studies. Third World socio-legal studies, this article argues, is a field in search of philosophical foundations. It continues to rely on conceptual categories and analytical frameworks developed through the intellectual, cultural, and social histories of Western capitalist societies, which it extends uncritically to different inter-subjective orders in Third World contexts. The article examines the common grounds shared by two apparently competing discourses about law in the Third World, which I label imperial agendas and global solidarities. It is difficult to speak about the Third World without becoming mired in conceptual contradictions. One reason for the methodological problems in Third World socio-legal studies is that social philosophy, and liberal philosophy in particular, undermines the concept of society. This article begins by examining the meaning of society in social philosophy. It then interrogates three dichotomous sets of analytical frameworks that are often invoked in Third World socio-legal studies: (a) comparative law versus Third World Approaches to International Law (TWAIL); (b) economic or modern law versus cultural or traditional law; and (c) state centralism versus legal pluralism. The article argues for a differentiated understanding of society at the ontological, structural, and empirical levels, which should help transcend binary approaches and facilitate theoretical reflections about the Third World without subsuming its specificities. The article concludes by arguing for a sustained research program to put Third World Socio-legal Studies on firm methodological foundations.

Comparing autocracies: theoretical issues and empirical analyses

A quarter of the world's nation states and territories are ruled by dictators. Moreover, there are many regimes in which democratic and autocratic elements of rule are mixed in various ways. It thus behoves political scientists to study the trajectories, manifestations and perspectives of non-democratic rule in general and autocratic rule in particular. After a period of stagnation, research on autocracies has in recent years become revitalized. Much of this research has a comparative orientation and a range of global datasets that have become available, which enable the systematic testing of hypotheses. Yet, current research on autocracies goes beyond large-N studies. It is a pluralistic enterprise, characterized by the use of a multitude of theoretical, analytical and methodological approaches, lenses and tools. This special issue attempts to fill some gaps in the newer literature by addressing questions of legitimation and repression (as well as co-optation) in autocracies, by probing into the origins of a number of competitive authoritarian regimes and into pre-electoral dynamics in non-democracies, and by finally asking what happens to dictators once autocratic regimes fall.

How communities can react to crisis: Social capital as a source of empowerment and well-being

Carmencita Serino, Daniele Morciano, Anna Fausta Scardigno, & Amelia Manuti Peer Reviewed This paper provides an accounting for a repertoire of “good practices” experienced in the south of Italy, which have been read with theoretical and methodological lenses borrowed from social community psychology as well as sociology. The discussion provides two case studies (Diffused Guest House and Urban Laboratories) which are both representative in terms of social participation as well as in terms of social capital enhancement.

Comparative modeling approaches for understanding urban violence

The purpose of this paper is to provide a comparative analysis of three different modeling approaches for exploring structural theories of violence. Specifically, ordinary least squares regression, geographically weighted regression and data envelopment analysis will be utilized to evaluate violent crime. This type of analysis expands upon traditional theory testing by deepening our understanding of differences in crime generation and its underlying demographic and socio-economic stimuli via different methodological lenses. A case study for the city of Cincinnati, Ohio is presented and the results suggest that a combination of approaches is likely the best strategy for evaluating violence in urban areas.

Análisis de las muertes por accidentes de tránsito en el municipio de Lanús, Argentina, 1998-2004

The aim of this study was to analyze the socio-demographic profile of fatalities due to road traffic injuries (RTI) among residents of the Municipality of Lanús (Province of Buenos Aires, Argentina) between 1998 and 2004. A descriptive epidemiological study was carried out using official mortality data from Argentina. RTI deaths were coded by ICD-10 according to residence and occurrence. Socioeconomic and demographic variables were analyzed using univariate and bivariate analysis, calculation of proportional mortality (PM), proportional mortality ratio (PMR) and georeferencing by residence and occurrence. Lanús presents an RTI mortality profile similar to those of developed countries. The combination of techniques emerges as an interesting alternative for working with secondary data, in small areas and with small numbers. This research provides suggestions for interventions in RTI-related issues at the individual and local levels. The text emphasizes the need for transdisciplinary studies that could approach the problem with other methodological lenses.

The Unruly Salon: unfasten your seatbelts, take no prisoners, make no apologies!

This article examines the multi‐faceted contributions of disability studies including the work of artists and scholars inspired by The Unruly Salon, a disability arts, culture and scholarship series held at Green College, the University of British Columbia January–March 2008 to substantive citizenship and cultural politics. The article examines various tropes of normalcy through the new epistemological and methodological lenses and resources posed by disability studies projects. It shows how social, structural, cultural and material barriers construct some as ‘disabled’ and others as non‐disabled and puts forward ways to connect social models and human rights’ frameworks with a cultural politics of situated disability narratives that have the power to perform back to such normalizing regimes through disability arts, culture and scholarship. In so doing, the article demonstrates how disability cultural politics and scholarship lay claim to specific transformative counter‐publics. Scholars in disability studies from the Unruly Salon marshal new and transformative forms of social citizenship by, with, and for disabled people to create generative and innovative public discourses about disability as difference. Qualitative research is challenged to think anew its methodologies and epistemologies in light of the powerful difference that disability variously makes.

Tracing Causal Mechanisms

“This argument is too structural. It's under-determined and based on unrealistic assumptions. Moreover, it tells us little about how the world really works.” Among many scholars (the present author included), these are an oft-heard set of complaints. Consider two examples. The central thesis of the democratic peace literature—that democracies do not fight other democracies—is hailed as one of the few law-like propositions in international relations. Yet, as critics rightly stress, we know amazingly little about the mechanisms generating such peaceful relations (Rosato 2003:585–586, passim ; Forum 2005; Hamberg 2005). And in Europe, scholars have for years debated the identity-shaping effects of European institutions. One claim is that bureaucrats “go native” in Brussels, adopting European values at the expense of national ones. But here, too, critics correctly note that we know virtually nothing about the processes and mechanisms underlying these potentially transformative dynamics (Checkel 2005a, 2005b). So, to paraphrase a former US president, “it's the process stupid.” To invoke process is synonymous, I argue, with an understanding of theories based on causal mechanisms. To study such mechanisms, we must use a method of process tracing. But this is not easy. Proponents of process tracing should be wary of losing sight of the big picture, be aware of the method's significant data requirements, and recognize epistemological assumptions inherent in its application. Consistent with a central theme of the present Forum, I argue that process tracers are well placed to move us beyond unproductive “either/or” meta-theoretical debates to empirical applications in which both agents and structures matter as well as are explained and understood through both positivist and post-positivist epistemological–methodological lenses. Mechanisms operate at an analytic level below that of a more encompassing theory; they increase the theory's credibility by rendering more fine-grained explanations (Johnson 2002:230–231). According to …

International Marketing as a Field of Study: A Critical Assessment of Earlier Development and a Look Forward

Fundamental changes taking place in the global business environment and in the business enterprise itself compel international marketing scholars to reexamine the progress being made by the field's scholars in developing knowledge. In this article, the authors critically evaluate progress in international marketing as a field of study through ontological, thematic, and methodological lenses. They also offer a portfolio of research topics that they believe are worthy of scholarly attention.

On studying organizational knowledge

There is a sense of incompleteness pervading today's conceptualizations of knowledge in organizations. While the theorizing on knowledge from different disciplinary perspectives and intellectual foci has produced a vast and diversified body of literature on the subject, the proliferation of organizational knowledge theories has not been accompanied by a parallel development of methodologies for studying knowledge empirically. Following the tenets of the phenomenological method, this paper develops a framework to conduct description and observation of knowledge-based phenomena in organizational settings. Such framework is based on three methodological lenses: time, breakdowns, and narratives. The three lenses provide operational devices to disentangle organizational knowledge from the tacit background against which it is utilized on a day-to-day basis.

On Faith and Microscopes: Methodological Lenses for Learning About Learning

How do students learn? What facilitates or impedes learning? Of the myriad potentially important factors, which ones are the most important? These questions, at once deceptively simple and perilously complex, lie at the heart of much educational research. A universal answer has eluded scholars and philosophers for centuries and remains, for some, the holy grail of educational research today. Does the persistence of these questions suggest that we, as a community of scholars, have learned nothing in our decades of study? Or is the inquiry into student learning a perpetual search destined never to end? The importance of questions about student learning requires that we carefully consider, and as carefully evaluate, any serious attempt to address them. From this perspective, I applaud Margaret Wang, Geneva Haertel, and Herbert Walberg (1993a) for tackling difficult questions. Taken at face value, their goals-to identify and estimate the influence of educational, psychological, and social factors on learning ... [so that they may] quantify the importance and consistency of variables that influence learning-seem laudable. If these goals could be met and incontrovertible answers found, the information would be useful to many. Federal, state, and local policymakers would be better able to calibrate priorities and implement intervention strategies. School administrators and classroom teachers would be better able to develop curricula and deliver educational services. And the educational research community would be able to cite a discovery comparable to a treatment for cancer or a marker gene for Huntington's disease. Are these goals attainable? I agree with Wang, Haertel, and Walberg (1993a) that no individual study, regardless of size or design, could answer these questions once and for all. Even a large number of well-designed field experiments could not yield a universal answer for all groups of learners, in all contexts, for all times. So the authors turn to the principle of meta-analysis, one of the most significant methodological advances of the past two decades. Meta-analysis, in all its many forms, has quickly become an extraordinarily valuable component of our research repertoire; it has changed both the content, and our perceptions, of virtually every review article we read. Its principles and structure have trans-

On Faith and Microscopes: Methodological Lenses for Learning about Learning

On Faith and Microscopes: Methodological Lenses for Learning about Learning