Lecture One: Research and Epistemology

The goal of today's lecture was to gain a common understanding of what is meant by the term 'research', and how we could then refer to this term in our future CoP lectures, seminars and studio sessions.

Lecture Notes

It's often thought that research is the process of finding out new facts and knowledge, which it is, but it isn't just limited to this. In a creative practice sense it can also refer to learning new processes, experimentation to find out what things work and what doesn't and problem solving. So research doesn't always have to be right and it is okay to embrace failure, as this will strengthen our knowledge for what will work in the future. It will promote success.

There are many different ways in which you can research, whether this be reading books at the library or conducting experiments/surveys, but all methods are going to produce different types of data. The main for types of data being; Primary, Secondary, Quantitative and Qualitative.

Primary and Secondary data refers to the source in which the data was received. If it is Primary this means that the data was developed or collected/generated and does not yet exist, where as if it is secondary the data has already been collected. For example you could take statitisics from an online source, or read up on past experiments.
Quantitative and Qualitative refers to the type of data that is being collected/used. Quantitative refers to data that can be measured, whether this be numbers, facts, figures or statistics, where as Qualitative is more subjective and can involve a person's beliefs or opinions. Qualitative isn't always measured.

This data will mean nothing to us if we don't process it. By processing data we can take information from the results to add to our existing knowledge of the person receiving it. This can involve simply taking in information we have researched in a way that we can understand, or it can be taking it that step further by investigating for solutions to questions that may have been generated. It could also involve applying this knowledge to our practice to see HOW this will work, or even WHERE this information can apply. This is what we mean by the term Epistemology. Epistemology distinguishes between HOW we can KNOW something, and whether it is knowing that, how or where.

Research is always going to be subjective to the individual, as when we research we set out to find out things we don't know making us the centre of our own research. The most important thing to remember is to START ANYWHERE and to make it relevant to our own practice in a way that we are going to understand it, and gain experience/knowledge.

"Research is what I'm doing when I don't know what I'm doing" 

- Wernher von Braun.