1. This lecture examines the difference between qualitative vs. quantitative approaches to research
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2. As you can probably see, the quantitative research approach is pretty numbers driven. When you hear
statistics such as 20% potential customers are female, 50% of auditors feel pressured by managers to lie, etc,
they are most likely results of quantitative studies.
Key points to remember are:
1. The quantitative approach can be used to answer many different kinds of research questions – reporting,
descriptive, explanatory, or predictive
2. Statistics is at the heart of quantitative research
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3. As you can probably see, the qualitative approach can address a descriptive question (how did something
happen?) or an explanatory question (why did something happen?)
Qualitative research is probably more pervasive in the corporate world than you realize. When Dr. Chung
worked at Kodak in their human factors department, she worked with a bunch of anthropologists who
specialized in ethnography.
Key points to remember are:
1. Qualitative research is about interpreting and understanding a complex phenomenon. The deliverables
are usually meaning or deeper understanding, rather than numbers, frequencies, or other quantitative
counts
2. Meaning or deeper understanding are usually the foundation of a theory. That’s why we often say
qualitative research is for the goal of theory building, rather than theory testing
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4. The quantitative approach strives to stay close to the core values of the scientific approach – objectivity,
numbers, and large‐scale consistency are emphasized.
The easiest way to understand qualitative research is to contrast it with quantitative research. In general,
qualitative research is used to understand a phenomenon and build a theory, while quantitative research is
used to verify, confirm, or test a theory that has been previously established
Searches for meanings in specific contexts‐for example in a study of why managers accept the use of
unethical practices our interest could be in understanding how this acceptance evolves and what it means for
the managers involved in the unethical practices
Quantitative research uses scientific laws to search for general causal patterns and regularities to be tested in
the field with large samples (from theory to data, also called deduction‐theory driven). On the other hand,
qualitative research collects data in the field with small samples to understand the phenomenon and –based
on this‐ proposed a theory (from data to theory, also called induction‐data driven).
Qualitative research is very useful particularly in studying poorly understood phenomena
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5. This chart illustrates how research questions can be re‐phrased depending on your research approach
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