Action Research

Action Research
Action research differs from conventional research methods in three fundamental ways. First, its primary goal is social change. Second, members of the study sample accept responsibility for helping resolve issues that are the focus of the inquiry. Third, relationships between researcher and study participants are more complex and less hierarchical. Most often, action research is viewed as a process of linking theory and practice in which scholar-practitioners explore a social situation by posing a question, collecting data, and testing a hypothesis through several cycles of action. The most common purpose of action research is to guide practitioners as they seek to uncover answers to complex problems in disciplines such as education, health sciences, sociology, or anthropology. Action research is typically underpinned by ideals of social justice and an ethical commitment to improve the quality of life in particular social settings. Accordingly, the goals of action research are as unique to each study as participants’ contexts; both determine the type of data-gathering methods that will be used. Because action research can embrace natural and social science methods of scholarship, its use is not limited to either positivist or heuristic approaches. It is, as John Dewey pointed out, an attitude of inquiry rather than a single research methodology.
This entry presents a brief history of action research, describes several critical elements of action research, and offers cases for and against the use of action research.
Historical Development
Although not officially credited with authoring the term action research , Dewey proposed five phases of inquiry that parallel several of the most commonly used action research processes, including curiosity, intellectualization, hypothesizing, reasoning, and testing hypotheses through action. This recursive process in scientific investigation is essential to most contemporary action research models. The work...