Natural Science Model Research Articles

Qualitative Research as a Form of Scientific Inquiry in Sport and Physical Education

Qualitative research includes a family of loosely related inquiry traditions rooted in psychology, sociology, and anthropology. Each differs in origins, assumptions, central questions, and methods. They are united at a deeper paradigmatic level, however, by a shared view of the nature of the world which distinguishes all qualitative research traditions from the conventional natural science model of inquiry in the domains of education, sport, and exercise. This divergence of world view is illustrated by how scientists using qualitative and conventional designs would respond to the query, "How do you know?" There, qualitative traditions yield distinctly different perspectives on questions about the social world. Despite both heuristic power and great promise for application in sport and physical education, however, unresolved questions and troublesome concerns remain. Active scholars, editors, reviewers, and research consumers will control the future for qualitative research and all must stretch to accommodate an unfamiliar way of knowing.

The Making of a Method: A Historical Reinterpretation of the Early Parsons

ion. 5. Positivism/non-(post-, anti-) positivism. A breach with positivism was no more required. is thus not unusual to find early Parsons embracing analytical theory and upholding, simultaneously, methodological model of natural sciences and, with it, search for uniform laws. The interpretive literature runs to opposite extremes on question of Parsons's positivism because it takes now analytical theory, now natural-scientific model as main focus, when to Parsons two strands were one. It is natural sciences, he wrote generalized [analytical] theory present sense-the sense required for progress of social sciences-has been most highly developed past (1937b, p. 623; 1937c, pp. 18-19). Among attractions to him of analytical method of neoclassical economics was its closenesss] form to th[is] natural science model; and by developing an equivalent method for sociology, he hoped to situate his field methodological company of sciences like theoretical physics, chemistry and general biology (1937b, pp. 301, 598). Commentators who claim that Parsons viewed social and natural sciences as distinct method contradict his stated position here (see 1937b, pp. 595, 622). 14 Misleading, as well, have been those scholars who acknowledge Parsons's belief unity of method, but contend that by conjoining this to a program of analysis and theory, he produced a synthesis of positivism and other traditions that transcended former. The historical evidence suggests that Parsons did no such thing. To champion analytical theory within his context was not to surpass positivism, but simply to throw off comparatively atheoretical brief for approach that was furnished by those like institutionalists and to align oneself with a more up-to-date and nuanced case on positivism's behalf. Parsons said as much his neglected writings on Pareto. In Parsons's view, Pareto set out to make economics and sociology positive sciences on model of physical sciences; he did 12 Common sense itself, Parsons suggested, is an amalgam of aphorisms and statements about what experience has taught men to expect (1936a, p. 359). 13 His adherence to this point of view should make one cautious of accepting prevalent opinion that, matters of method, early Parsons was a Kantian-at least insofar as is equated with epistemological activism on part of scientist. is true that, toward end of his career, Parsons welcomed attention by scholars to his 'epistemological activism' (1978a, pp. 1353-54; see also 1974a); but prior to this, nowhere, according to Bershady (1973, p. 72), had Parsons ever acknowledged followingn] Kant's procedure. In Structure, Parsons set his own position apart from (what he curiously called) empiricism, stating that in Kant's time view of analytical abstraction [advocated Structure] was not known (1937b, pp. 474, n. 1, 597; see also 1965, p. 180). Even amid his late positive assessment of Kant, Parsons insisted that he would modify Kantian stance so as to salvag[e] concept of empirical ordering (1978b, p. 400). 14 In Parsons's view, the differences [between natural and social sciences] all lie on a substantive level sense that there are basic substantive differences between concrete phenomena involved behavior of stars and of human beings (1937b, pp. 591, 623). To neglect these latter differences, to ignore human voluntaristic domain of ends, values, and like-the domain so vital campaign for sociology-was to succumb to extreme positivistic thinking; and this, of course, was a brand of (positivist) thought that Parsons strongly opposed. Treatment of this substantive issue, however, lies outside bounds of

Research on Teaching in Physical Education: Beyond the Limits of Natural Science

Recent years have seen an increase in the amount of research activity devoted to teaching in physical education. The result of these efforts has been a substantial growth in the body of knowledge regarding movement pedagogy. Most of these undertakings have been completed with the natural science mode of inquiry as the research model. Thus, the natural science research paradigm has emerged as the dominant mode of inquiry and analysis for research on teaching in physical education. In spite of the major contributions made in the engagement of the natural science model, the subscription to a dominant mode of inquiry holds serious consequences in the development of any body of knowledge. The underlying assumptions of a paradigm pose limits to the knowledge to which one has access. Therefore, this paper offers an analysis of the assumptions embedded in the operationalization of the natural science research paradigm in order to illuminate their limitations for research on teaching in physical education. The assumptions of an alternative, qualitative paradigm are also identified and discussed in terms of their potential for researching beyond the limits of the natural science model. It was not the intent of this paper to declare one paradigm superior to any other, but rather to recognize the need for alternative perspectives in researching the phenomenon of teaching physical education.

Making Policy for Complex Systems: A Medical Model for Economics

Policy science, the effort to build a systematic approach to policymaking, has burgeoned since 1970. The number of books and journals devoted to the subject has increased sharply, as well as the number of policy-related schools, centers, and courses. At the same time, however, one finds little agreement on the nature and dimensions of the discipline, on the base of knowledge from which scholars and policy advisors ought to derive their formulations. Some scholars lean toward a strict natural science model. They hope to evolve a mathematically derived set of procedures for formulating policies, and they seek a high-powered quantitative testing of propositions to determine the “best” policy.1 Others lean toward a “softer” approach, of the kind prevalent in the humanities. They seek to sensitize a policymaker to certain considerations by transmitting the lessons of previous experiences, by calling attention to nonquantitative factors that otherwise might be overlooked, and by drawing insights from case studies.

Review Essay : Social Theory and Modern Logic: Reflections on Elster's Logic and Society

This essay selectively reviews some major issues implicit in Elster's Logic and Society In particular, Elster's reliance on the utilitarian model of the actor as the basis for general social theory, his assumption that modal concepts can be reduced to extensional ones, and his adoption of the natural science model raise fundamental problems for his general approach Con sequently, despite the fact that many of Elster's discussions of particular examples are instructive and provocative, the work overall is disappointing.

"Sociological Reductionism" From Parsons to Althusser: Linking Action and Structure in Social Theory

The theories of Parsons and Althusser are compared in terms of the questions they asked, the answers they gave, and the methodological strategies they used to link the two in order to raise questions about the theoretical solutions sociologists have developed to confront methodological individualism and avoid psychological reductionism. In the theories of Parsons and Althusser action is linked to structure by a systems framework in which no theoretically relevant social action occurs outside the system. Both adapted natural science models to explanations of social phenomena by using analogies of the unconscious and of language. Because these theoretical conceptualizations do not enable one to specify the limits of structural effect, it is argued that they are reductionist. Alternative conceptualizations are suggested which conceive of social structure as setting limits but not preselecting behavior and as enabling theoretically meaningful choice out of multiple and conflicting pressures on social action. It is then argued that this choice must be incorporated in our theories of the social in order for us to explain social change. Finally, questions are raised about several underlying assumptions which may lead sociologists to sociologically reductionist theories.

Social and Scientific Method or What Do We Make of the Distinction Between the Natural and the Social Sciences?

Ever since the rise of the social sciences, social science methodology has been a much disputed issue among social scientists and philosophers of the social sciences. 1 Much like the history of social theory, the history of social science methodology is a history of controversy, and this tradition is quite naturally renewed with every appearance of a new conception of social life. Most recently, methodological discussions have centered around the discrediting of received 'positivistic' procedures by showing their essential inadequacy in dealing with the social world. In these discussions, established methodological procedures such as survey research or laboratory experimentation were linked to a model of scientific method identified with the natural sciences, and new social methodologies continuously emphasized their rejection of this model. In fact, new rules of social science method have been developed, displayed and defended in a constant dispute with the standard set by this natural science model, and they have made the departure from this standard the declared goal of an indigenuous social methodology. Perhaps not surprisingly, the standard itself has found little attention in the dispute. While the 'positivistic' conception is vigorously rejected as a model for social science methodologies, it is more or less taken at face value when it refers to the natural and technological sciences. Philosophical investigations which for some time now have directly questioned this model as correctly describing the natural sciences appear to be either ignored or declared irrelevant for the discussion. When they are introduced into the picture, they serve as some sort of back-

The Case for the Natural Science Model for Research in Organizational Behavior and Organization Theory

The Case for the Natural Science Model for Research in Organizational Behavior and Organization Theory

Society as emergent and more than rational: An essay on the inappropriateness of program evaluation

In considering the efficacy of program evaluation researchers have not put language in proper perspective. They have not acknowledged that information gained from applied research is partly determined by situational factors, that language is selective and goal-oriented, justifying activity as often as it describes it, or that some important action cannot be expressed. The importance of language distinguishes applied social assessment from the natural science models of research from which it was derived. Examples from a wide range of applied situations are used to illustrate that, as an anticedent-consequent model of objective quantified assessment, evaluation is also inconsistent with the complex, resourceful, emergent social processes it is intended to measure. Three alternatives to quantification are discussed to illustrate interventions that may be made when the disadvantages of program evaluation outweigh the advantages.

In Search of the Illusive View of Man

The author presents contemporary views of the quest for knowledge about human beings and the human experience. She then presents criticism of the natural science model as a basis for social and behavioral science research. She notes that the human being and his behavior are so complex that unidimensional research models are inadequate. However, she finds balance in the contribution of scientific rigor to careful investigation of human phenomena. The author next discusses the inclusion of new procedural options and vistas in research. Two areas of particular interest tc her are the involvement of subjects as co-designers and co-experimenters in investigations and the inclusion of religious beliefs as a subject of research. She notes the difficulties of work in this area, including the lack of theory and reliable methods. She concludes with a description of a peer counseling program for school truants which she is in the process of developing. The emphasis is on changing the school environment, and the experiment will involve the peer counselors as co-designers and participant observers. (DOW)

The First Course in Sociology: Models from the Natural Sciences

in the natural sciences: the vocational model, the inquiry model, and the humanistic model. The models are labeled negative andpositive based on their possible contributions to the design of sociology courses. The paper argues that the first course in sociology is patterned largely after a negative natural science model, the vocational model, while the two models which might be more appropriate for sociology, the inquiry and the humanistic models, have yet to make an impact on course planning in sociology.

THE DIMIGOD'S DILEMMA∗

ABSTRACT In a quite literal sense, science has become the dominant religion of the late twentieth century, effectively displacing the traditional faiths of the supernatural. Yet, despite the rapidity and near-totality of its triumph, the reign of the Church of Science may be quite brief because of basic defects in its theology (methods and philosophy) and many practical shortcomings when its tenets and findings are applied to biophysical reality and the social world of human beings. If we are to cope with our rapidly escalating social and environmental problems, brought on in part by the misapplication of the discoveries of the natural sciences, we have no alternative but to resort to the social sciences. In that direction, the current prospects are cloudy at best because of major flaws in the social structure of contemporary social science and its slavish emulation of the natural science model in theory and practice. A truly radical rethinking of the premises underlying science in general and of social s...

Tinjauan Aspek Budaya pada Pembelajaran IPA: Pentingnya Pengembangan Kurikulum IPA

: Education deals with enlightening people and developing human resources. The reasecher concluded that cultural background of students influences their learning attitude in the school. Therefore, the developing learning process of Natural Sciences insist student to elaborate principles of Natural Sciences without ignoring cultural valuesof local community. The policy of decentralization of Indonesian Government had authorized and legitimated local authorities to develop curriculum based on the local cultures. To do so, each local government through the officers of Education has to create a curiculum by involving some curriculum experts, instructures, natural sciences theachers, and the lectures of universities who adequately understand learning model of Natural Sciences.

Conceptual models in natural and social sciences and their implications for educationists

(1968). Conceptual models in natural and social sciences and their implications for educationists. Melbourne Studies in Education: Vol. 11, No. 1, pp. 72-113.

Anthropological Study of the Essence of Mathematics

Every science must be based on anthropology, not on philosophy. This is because every science is created by man; and philosophy forms part of anthropology-an anthropology of the inner sense.To explain the essence of mathematics from the viewpoint of anthropology, especially of anthropology of the inner sense, I have classified knowledge in general into five categories to define what kind of knowledge mathematics is: (1) natural knowledge and artificial knowledge; (2) knowledge of the outer sense and knowledge of the inner sense ; (3) knowledge as reality and knowledge as memory; (4) knowledge as image and knowledge as language; (5) inductive knowledge and deductive knowledge.To apply this classification to mathematical knowledge, we must clarify what mathematical entity is. The physiological transformation of images, an a priori cerebral function which plays a main role in the formation of recognition, serves as a clue to the understanding of the essence of mathematical knowledge.If one recognizes this function by the inner sense, one can grasp the inner relation of quantity as, natural knowledge by the inner sense. Artificial beings realized by this philosophical knowledge is natural mathematical entity. Elementary mathematics, therefore, is a natural science, the object of which is such entity.The basis of the validity of inductive mathematical knowledge lies in entity itself and agrees with the provabitity of mathematical knowledge by means of deduction from axiom (the principle of cre-ation). Mathematics is, in this sense, an ideal model of natural science.