◄Previous: Introduction

# Learning outcomes

After studying this course, you should be able to:

- appreciate why theory is relevant to and important for research
- recognise how research perspectives offer ways of linking theory to the practice of research
- understand what a research paradigm is and how paradigms can be distinguished from each other
- recognise how the choice of a research paradigm and its associated research methodology relates to how a research problem or enquiry is conceptualised
- understand how different research positions have led to different views about what counts as evidence and, as a consequence, what is judged to be valuable or reliable evidence in research
- appreciate how having a clear view of the theories and concepts informing a study offers a useful framework for research.
◄Contents►Next: 1 The meaning of theory

OpenLearn - Engaging with postgraduate research: education, childhood & youth
Except for third party materials and otherwise, this content is made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 Licence, full copyright detail can be found in the acknowledgements section. Please see full copyright statement for details.