Creating Postgraduate Collaborations › Forums › CPC Supervision Development Course 2 › Module 3 › Module 3, Session 3: Disciplinary differences
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Although research across various disciplines is based on similar basic principles/guidelines it is true that knowledge differs and the approach across disciplines greatly vary.
I found the four-quadrant figure regarding mono-, multi-, inter-, and trans-disciplinary research very informative. It challenges me to think where the field of biological invasive ecology fits. It is certainly hierarchical in structure with a positivist worldview. It is a field that is pragmatic and tries to be interdisciplinary.
Sure, and paradigms approach explains it well
Urban and Regional Planning is multidisciplinary in nature. It encampuses both horizontal and hierarchical knowledge structure.It hence falls under both the multi and trans disciplinary approaches.
The most suitable research design is the mixed method .The knowledge structure in my field of study, Journalism and media studies, is predominantly horizontal knowledge. Researchers in my field conduct research utilising any of the four worldviews. Many of the research is conducted from a monodisciplinary perspective. The implication of this is that there is no cross-fertilisation of knowledge in conjunction with other disciplines because knowledge is mostly produced within the boundary of the field. This, however, does not mean that there is no multi, inter or transdisciplinary research in the field, their occurrence is just low.
In the field of computing, hierarchical knowledge structure is mostly adopted as in most physical sciences. Equally with the nature of computing most research is application oriented and interdisciplinary research is employed depending on the usecase.
In humanities and social sciences where i belong leans more towards horizontal structures than hierarchical. The world views mostly are determined by the candidates philosophical assumptions underpinning the research context. However due to the unexplored and widely used qualitative research, constructionism is slowly being accepted. In fact in the recent past, we have seen more students using more mixed methods as they now appreciate the contribution of the combination of the approaches to the outcome.
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