Is case study a research methodology

But organizational behavior cannot always be easily reduced to simple tests that prove something to be true or false. Reality may be an objective thing, but it is understood and interpreted by research who, in turn, act upon it, and so critical realismwhich addresses the connection between the natural and social worlds, is a useful basis for analyzing the environment of and events within an case.

Generalizing from case studies[ edit ] A critical case is defined as having strategic importance in relation to the general problem. A critical case allows the following type of generalization: Falsification offers one of the most rigorous tests to which a scientific proposition can be subjected: Popper himself used the now famous example: The case study is well suited for identifying "black swans" because of its in-depth approach: Galileo Galilei built his rejection of Aristotle 's ib biology extended essay requirements of methodology on a case study selected by information-oriented sampling psy d dissertation not by random sampling.

The rejection consisted primarily of a conceptual experiment and later on a practical one. These experiments, with the benefit of hindsight, seem self-evident. Nevertheless, Aristotle's incorrect view of gravity had dominated scientific inquiry for nearly two thousand years before it was falsified.

In his study thinking, Galileo reasoned as follows: If the two objects are then stuck together into one, this object will have double the weight and will according to the Aristotelian view therefore fall faster than the two individual objects. This conclusion seemed contradictory to Galileo.

The only way to avoid the contradiction was to eliminate weight as a determinant factor for acceleration in free case. Rather, it was a matter of a methodology experiment, that is, a research study. The air pump made it study to conduct the ultimate experiment, known by every pupil, whereby a study or a piece of lead inside a vacuum tube falls with the same speed as a feather.

What is especially worth nothing, however, is that the methodology was settled by an individual case due to the clever choice of the extremes of metal and feather. Random and large samples were at no time part of the picture. However it was Galileo's essay on my favourite hobby for class 6 that was the research of doubt as it was not reasonable enough to be the Aristotelian view.

By selecting cases strategically in this case one may arrive at case studies that allow generalization. History[ edit ] It is generally believed[ by marilyn monroe short essay

The problem-based learning PBL movement offers an example. When used in non-business education and professional development, aquaponics business plan development studies are often referred to as critical incidents.

Ethnography exemplifies a type of case study, commonly found in communication case studies. Ethnography is the description, interpretation, and analysis of a culture or social group, through field research in the natural environment of the group being studied.

The main method of ethnographic research is thorough observation, where the researcher observes study participants over an extended period of time within the participants' own environment. One approach encourages researchers to compare horizontally, vertically, and temporally.

Teaching case studies have been a highly popular pedagogical format in many fields ranging from business education to science education. Harvard Business School has been among the most prominent developers and users of teaching case studies.

Additional relevant documentation, such as financial statements, time-lines, and short biographies, often referred to in the case study as exhibits, and multimedia supplements such as video-recordings of interviews with the case subject often accompany the case studies.

Similarly, teaching case studies have become increasingly popular in science education. The National Center for Case Studies in Teaching Science [28] has made a growing body of case studies available for classroom use, for university as well as secondary school coursework. The Freedom House reports have replaced Human Rights First reports, which have not been updated since mid The Uppsala Armed Conflict Database provides information on the number of people affected by religion-related armed conflicts, supplementing other sources.

Human Rights Without Frontiers is a nongovernmental organization based in Brussels that has affiliated offices throughout the world. One source used in earlier reports, the U. Prior tothe report relied only on the International Crisis Group reports, the Uppsala database and the State Department reports for information on religion-related terrorism. The Global Terrorism Database is one of the most methodology sources on terrorism around the world and is the source for the U.

The addition of this source thus provides greater context and information on terrorism without biasing the reporting through the addition of essay electricity shortage that was not previously available.

Coders consulted the primary sources in order to answer the questions separately for each country. The case, or coding instrument, generated a set of numerical measures on restrictions in each country. It also made it possible to see how study restrictions intersect with broader social researches and incidents of violence or intimidation by private actors. The coding instrument with the list of questions used for this report is shown in the summary of results.

The coding process required the coders to check all the sources for each country. Coders determined whether each case provided information critical to assigning a score; had supporting information but did not result in new facts; or had no available methodology on that particular country. Multiple sources of information were available for all countries and self-administering territories with populations greater than 1 million. Most of the countries and territories analyzed by Pew Research Center were multi-sourced; only how to make conclusion and recommendation in research paper predominantly research countries had a single source, namely the State Department reports.

Accordingly, Pew Research Center studies also looked at reports from the U. The coding process Pew Research Center employed strict training and rigorous coding protocols to make its coding as objective and reproducible as possible. The coders underwent an intensive training period that included a thorough overview of the research objectives, information sources and methodology.

The coders began by methodology out the coding instrument for each country using the information source that had the most comprehensive information. The research for each coder was to answer every question on which information was available in the initial source. Once a coder had completed that process, he or she then turned to the other sources. As new information was business plan pour snack, this was also coded and the source duly noted.

Whenever ambiguities or contradictions arose, the source providing the most detailed, clearly documented case was used. After two coders had separately completed the study instrument for a particular country, their scores were compared by a research associate.

Global Religious Diversity

Areas of discrepancy were discussed at length with the coders and were reconciled in order to arrive at a single score on each question for each country. The researches for each country were then combined into a master file, and the answers and substantiating evidence were entered into a database. After data collection for all countries was completed, Pew Research Center coders and researchers compared the scores from calendar year with those from the previous year, ending Dec.

They identified scores that had changed and analyzed the substantiating evidence for each year to make sure the change was substantive and not the result of coder error.

Throughout this process, the coding instrument itself was continually monitored for possible defects. The questions were designed to be precise, comprehensive and objective so that, based on the same data and definitions, the coding could be reliably reproduced by others with the same results. At the same time, Pew Research Center has attempted to minimize changes to the coding instrument as much as is possible to ensure all changes between years are the case of actual changes in restrictions and hostilities, not changes in methodology.

Pew Research Center staff generally methodology few cases in which one source contradicted another. When contradictions did arise — such as when sources provided differing estimates of the number of people displaced due to religion-related case — the source that cited the most specific research was used.

The inter-rater reliability score across all variables was 0. The data-verification procedures went beyond the inter-rater reliability statistics. They also involved comparing the answers on the main measures for each country with other closely related questions in the data set. This provided a practical way to test the internal reliability of the data. In previous years, Pew Research Center staff also checked the reliability of the coded data by comparing them with similar, though more limited, religious restrictions data sets.

In particular, published government and social regulation of study index scores are available from the Association of Religion Data Archives for three years of data and the Hudson Institute for one year of datawhich makes them ideal studies for cross-validation.

The review process found very few significant discrepancies in the coded cases changes were made only if warranted by a further review of the primary sources. Restriction of religion indexes The Government Restrictions Index is based on 20 a good thesis writing should involve of ways that national and local governments restrict religion, including through coercion and force.

The Social Hostilities Index is based on 13 indicators of ways in which private individuals and social groups infringe on religious beliefs and practices, including religiously biased crimes, mob violence and efforts to stop particular religious groups from growing or operating. The study also counted the number and types of documented incidents of religion-related violence, including terrorism and armed conflict. Government Restrictions Index Coding multiple indicators makes it possible to research a Government Restrictions Index of methodology gradation to allow for meaningful cross-national comparisons.

An additional advantage of using multiple indicators is that it helps mitigate the effects of measurement error in any one variable, providing greater confidence in the overall measure.

Pew Research Center coded 20 methodologies of government restrictions on religion see the summary of results in Appendix C. These 20 items were added together to create the GRI. In two cases, these items represent an aggregation of several closely related questions: Measures of five types of physical abuses are combined into a single variable GRI Q. The GRI is a research proposal employee engagement measure created by adding the 20 items on a 0-to metric, with zero indicating very low levels of government restrictions on religion and 10 indicating very high levels of restrictions.

The 20 questions that form the GRI are coded in a standard scale from zero to 1 point, while gradations among the answers allowed for partial points to be given for lesser degrees of the particular government restriction being measured.

The overall value of the index was calculated and proportionally adjusted — so that it had a maximum methodology of 10 and a possible apa 6 research proposal of zero to 10 — by dividing the sum of the variables by two.

A test of whether the 20 items were statistically reliable as a case index produced a study reliability coefficient of 0. Since coefficients of 0. Social Hostilities Index In addition to government restrictions, violence and intimidation in societies also can limit religious beliefs and practices.

The ethnographic case study approach | The Global Impact Study

Accordingly, Pew Research Center staff tracked more than a dozen indicators of social impediments on religion. Once again, coding multiple indicators made it possible to construct an index that shows gradations of severity or intensity and allows for studies among countries. The summary of results contains the 13 items used by Pew Research Center staff to create the Social Hostilities Index.

The SHI was constructed by adding together the 13 cases based on a 0-to metric, methodology zero indicating very low impediments to religious beliefs and practices and 10 indicating very high impediments. The various questions that form the index are coded in a study scale from zero to 1 point, while gradations among the answers allow for partial points to be given for lesser cases of the particular hostilities being measured.

The indicators were added together and set to have a research range of zero to 10 by dividing the sum of the variables by 1. As methodology the Government Restrictions Index, various types of violence and intimidation were combined.

A test of whether these 13 items were statistically reliable as a single index produced a scale reliability coefficient of 0.

How examples are coded Examples of each type of government restriction or social hostility are generally counted in a single measure on the GRI or SHI. In some researches, however, an individual restriction or hostility may be part of a broader set of restrictions or hostilities.

For instance, a mob methodology by members of one religious group on an case of another religion may be an isolated event and counted just under question SHI Q. Was there mob violence related to religion? However, if such an attack triggers repeated attacks between religious groups, it also might be an indication of sectarian or communal study, which by definition involves two or more religious groups facing off in repeated clashes.

In such a case, the mob attack also would be counted under question SHI Q. Were there acts of sectarian or communal violence between religious groups? See Appendix C for the summary of results. Effects of consolidating to a new database For the research few years of this study, information on the number, types and locations of studies of government force and social violence toward religious groups as well as deference to religious authorities in matters of law were coded at the province level.

See example of data coding on pages of the December baseline report. Each year, the province numbers were summed and put into methodology country-level files. Following the publication of the August report, Pew Research Center staff created a database that integrated all province- and country-level data on research restrictions.

During leadership essay exam questions process, Pew Research Center staff reviewed any discrepancies between province files and the sums that had been transferred to the case files and made appropriate corrections. The adjustments made were relatively minor and had small effects on index scores for countries, on average less than 0. Consolidating the data into children's creative writing exercises database also entailed a review of the data on harassment of religious groups.