The research paradigm is a broad framework telling researchers how the research is based and the nature of the research (questions, aims, and objectives). Collis and Hussey (2013) argued that a philosophical approach includes a coordination of understanding the world and reflects the research understanding of the knowledge and reality.
Saunders et al., (2009) argued that the research paradigm includes natural science or social science, where the former believes the reality to be based on positivism, and the latter believes in social impacts on understanding the world and leads to interpretivism. Collis et al., (2013) argued that the phenomenon positivism focuses on measuring social phenomena, while interpretivists focus on exploring the complexity of social phenomena. In both cases, it is about understanding the world through important assumptions which will be adapted by the research strategy, methodology and methods. It is the main idea that the relation between knowledge and processes conducted develops the knowledge. Ontology and epistemology are two assumptions that have great differences and researchers adapt depending on their foundations and the research questions. The ontological assumption is about the nature of reality and the epistemological assumption is the way of accepting the world (Cohen, Manion & Morrison, 2011). Pragmatism adopts one position of ontology, epistemology and axiology that depends on the research questions. However, researchers do not always conduct one position and sometimes apply the research questions in opposing positions, where the research must be flexible in terms of a continuum position (Saunders et al., 2009; Collis et al., 2013).
The research philosophy paradigm includes three aspects of philosophical stance of a study: ontology, epistemology and axiology. Each concept explains the understanding of the phenomena from different directions. Collis et al., (2013) explained that the approaches within a positivism paradigm include descriptors such as: quantitative, objective, scientific, and traditionalist; while an interpretivist paradigm includes: qualitative, subjective, humanist, and phenomenological. Before developing a research design it is essential to decide upon the assumption of the research, the ontological and epistemological assumptions.
Ontology is the assumption about the nature of reality, whether the world is viewed as idealism or realism. It is a way of seeing oneself inside the world and it represents the meaning of reality, it is about the assumption of the way that the world operates from the point of view of the researcher’s understanding; the two consequent approaches are subjectivism and objectivism, depending on how the world operates from either the point of view of the researcher’s perspective, or as stand-alone phenomena.
Bryman (2012) noted that objectivism is a position of ontological philosophy which leads to assess social phenomena separately from social actors, while constructivism leads to social phenomena being accomplished by social activities and actors, or people, as an intrinsic part of the research context.
Epistemology is the “theory of knowledge” and is another stance of research philosophy. Cohen et al., (2011) discussed it as referring to how researchers accept the nature of knowledge represented by two opposite points of view - positivism and interpretivism, which refer to two different types of research; one leads to more tangible resources and the second leads to more intangible feelings, beliefs and actions to grasp meaning of the world.
Positivism is an epistemological position that is adopted by tradition of natural science. Producing the research most probably will be about generalizations or laws of natural and physical scientists. Myers (1997) argues that the positivist looks at the reality of objective events and this reality is used to measure the independent properties of what the researcher observes. Social phenomenon is used in this position to test the theory.
On the other hand, interpretivism leads to subjectivism, it respects the difference between people and the objects of natural science and grasps the different subjects’ meaning. As Saunders et al., discussed, interpretivism goes well with subjectivism, as a way to research social phenomena that are about perceptions and understanding of actions by social actors. As these phenomena are about people, it is the perceptions that individuals attach to it which the researchers need to search into, and details of why reasons such phenomena happened and the reality behind it, that guides towards constructivism or social constructivism, which means the researcher tries to understand the social reality
that is created by social actors, and thus must follow the interpretivist perspective to explore the subjective meaning that motivates or creates their actions in social reality. The Axiology assumption in philosophical approaches investigates judgments about value. Axiological stance can therefore be viewed as a continuum with the extreme ends being either value-free or value-biased. Collis et al., (2013) discussed axiological assumptions by positivists that believe the research is value free, positivists trust that objects that are studied in the research are not affected by studying, while social science studies are far away from the positivist view due to the behaviour and peoples’ beliefs being affected by the study. This research rests on interpretivism assumption and is socially constructed as shown in Figure (3.2). Saunders et al., (2009) argued interpretivist researchers’ emphasis is to understand different people in their role and how people play the role of a social actor. In this regard, values are part of the study and the researchers believe that values support understanding and interpreting the research object.