On theory-driven methods

Rodney Stark

pp. 175-196

in: Jon R. Stone (ed), The craft of religious studies, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2000

Abstract

Social scientists typically are trained to prefer a single methodology, hence they commonly identify themselves as experimentalists, survey researchers, participant observers, or demographers and they predicate their research on the basis of their methodological commitments. It is common to hear them wonder what they should do a survey on next, what experiment they could do, or what social scene they might observe.