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From Research Literacy & Design · Activity 4

Method × Paradigm Explorer

An interactive exercise from the Research Literacy & Design Interactive Learning WebApp. The same data-generation method can serve different paradigmatic purposes — try each combination below and see how the resulting research questions, strengths, and limitations shift.

Why this activity matters

Methods don’t belong to paradigms. The same focus group can be conducted from an interpretivist, constructivist, critical-realist, or critical-theory standpoint — and each combination produces different kinds of knowledge. Learning to see this is the move from method-as-technique to method-as-positioned-choice.

4

Interactive exploration

The paradigm you bring to a method determines what you look for and what claims you can make. Use this tool to explore how different combinations of method and paradigm enable different research questions.

Step 1 · Choose a data generation method

Focus Groups

Group discussions exploring shared meanings

Semi-Structured Interviews

One-to-one flexible questioning

Narrative Interviews

In-depth storytelling sessions

Step 2 · Choose a paradigm

Interpretivism

Lived experience, meaning-making

Social Constructivism

Social construction, discourse

Critical Realism

Mechanisms, structures

Critical Theory

Power, ideology, emancipation

Your exploration notes

📒 Your work on this page

Your exploration notes live only in this browser tab. Refreshing or closing the page wipes them — by design. To keep your work, download it as a .txt file you can re-import later.

This is one of many interactive activities in the WebApp

Every chapter of the Research Literacy & Design Interactive Learning WebApp contains exercises like this one — interactive tools that let you try methodological ideas hands-on rather than just read about them.

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