Research is conducted to culminate their results into a product which can fetch some commercial value and it is useful in giving welfare and comfort to the society.
It is immaterial whether qualitative research or the quality research gives beauty Beauty lies in the fact that the research has been able to bring the desired results.
Hello,
This is an interesting perspective. It reminds me of my own thoughts from years earlier, when I likened, (thinking to myself), writing up qualitative research as painting a picture, and going back to improve on small sections, as an artist might, when in the finishing stages.
Yes, I agree - particularly when completed and written up - that qualitative research can be a thing of beauty, in a way that quantitative research wouldn't be. Perhaps that would be more like a complex, technical diagram; stunning, but from another perspective than a painting.
Very best wishes,
Mary
I think beauty is in the eye of the beholder. A qualitative research who found a good fit to an elaborate Structural Equation Model might well consider that a thing of beauty.
Every research method has its own beauty. But own narrow experience with several methods is a condition to discover this.
Philadelphia, PA
Dear Rahman,
My first thought is simply that you owe the readers some account of what you mean by "beauty" in this question. I suppose that there are many forms of beauty, all involving, perhaps, some concept of unification of diverse elements.
But beauty of quantitative treatments or works, as in the mathematician's conception of beauty as simplicity or elegance seems quite different from the qualitative unity of a painting or or a work of music. However, your question seems to suppose some single concept of beauty applicable everywhere.
Living in different countries or on different continents, one comes to see something of the variety of concepts of beauty, as with the beauty of the human form. These varieties require some considerable experience if they are to be comprehended or appreciated. In a similar way, the beauty of qualitative or quantitative works may require something like "insider's" levels of relevant experience. That would make comparisons very difficult.
This is not to say, though, that "beauty is in the eye of the beholder." On the other hand, something or other must be there if beauty is to be perceived or appreciated. Its a kind of work, as it were, that we come to think of as simply intuitive, effortless and unreflective--from long habit.
H.G. Callaway
I think you need a qualitative interpretation of quantitative research to provide academic and popular audiences with explanatory loveliness.
Both qualitative and quantitative analyses bring about reduction of and structure into vast amounts of data. For me, both can reveal 'things of beauty'.
I strongly oppose the notion that one research approach, in this case, a qualitative research represents the actual beauty than a quantitative research. I am in favor of David and Hein stance regarding the beauty of research.
Beauty is a disputed concept. Following Wolff (Kant's tutor), German philosophy holds that beauty is an objective quality existing in the object of perception, not the person's mind. This beauty is an alternative form of truth to correspondence truth's statements about the world. Hence the famous line "truth is beauty and beauty truth". This is how Nietsche can argue that aethetics is more valuable than philosophy or art is superior to science - he's contrasting correspondence truth with truth-as-beauty. German philosophy then argues about what the objective characteristics of beauty are, but tends to go for symmetry and regularity. Hence, under this system you can be wrong if you find something beautiful. Anglo-saxon traditions, mainly following Hume, hold that beauty is an internal and subjective reaction to something, reflecting an inner state, not the external object. Hence the line "beauty is in the eye of the beholder." French philosophy tends towards the Anglo-saxon view.
For this question to make sense, it has to use the German concept of beauty, otherwise beauty cannot be "represented" as it would not exist in the research subject. The anglo-saxon version of beauty can only be applied here if the question was "which do you find more beautiful?"
Besides what have been told about the relativity of beauty (David), its shared qualities like the elegance (Hein), and how it relates to objects such as the analysis (Irena and Brandt) I would also mention historical contingency or "poisedness" of particular conceptions of what beauty strives to be.
When reading "History of Beauty" by Umberto Eco, one might notice how the ideals of what shall be called “beautiful” have been interchangeable. Starting from the ideal of perfect proportion and representation in ancient Greece, there were as many various efforts to break out of the fantasy of definite unity as there were to bring it back again - each of which has been overwritten with the regard for idiosyncrasies brought by the former. (Hopefully someone else can stretch this argument further in the time and space than the culture of ancient Europe)
When looking for similarities with science it resembles a little bit Thomas Kuhn ideas of changing paradigms where/when legitimate conceptualizations of what reality is, do convey what kind of truth and meaning we choose to seek as researchers. If one doesn't disapprove with this argument then it doesn't seem too far-fetched to think that paradigms can also entail some aesthetic standards which render the lenses through which we feel pleasure or disgust while relating scientific objects (databases, reports, papers, and so forth) to the shared ideals of simplicity, generality, accuracy or some other academic virtue.
From what I know (although I don’t know much) there were wars fought over epistemology, accompanying the rise of qualitative movement in the 60's, following the efforts to legitimize its methods and the knowledge they produce. Years later, although we still peck at each other a little bit, some sort of consensus kind of grew on us that plurality is a norm and we don’t actually need one dominant way of rendering what reality is as long as it serves its respective purpose of understanding social issues, identifying trends or verifying majorities of social life.
To finally answer the question I believe that the beauty actually rests in the eye of the beholder, but the eye itself belongs to some broader community, holding on to some epistemic and aesthetic standards. More importantly tough I think we came to the point in history when there is no need for one idea of what the reality is to dominate the others as long as each of them understands the beauty, that follows the purpose it means to serve. To me It is the passionate dedication for rigour, valitidty, detachment, breaking complexities or describing them without reduction, attachment, reflexivity, or interpretation that makes the research beautiful. To me there is no fundamental difference between passions of mathematician or that of anthropologist to their respective subjects. There is "the beautiful contrast" though between the passion and indifference.
The beauty of research is in the search for truth and in what is achieved at the end. The choice between qualitative and quantitative is just about the means to an end and cannot substitute the whole.
For me the research results represent the actual beauty. I like every method which brings reliable and valid research findings.
For me the qualitative research or the quality research is important to get a good results which help people in life and give more benefits.
best regard
"Beauty" is in the eye of the beholder. A quantitative researcher will find beauty in their work and likewise for the qualitative researcher. So, please explain what you are referring to by "beauty".
As David says, above, beauty is in the eye of the beholder; neither qualitative or quantitative has a monopoly; indeed, a classic example of this might possibly be Alan Turing's 1952 paper on the chemical basis of morphogenesis (attached) which could be interpreted as a very quantitative explication of phenomena thought to be beautiful.
The qualitative research explores the better picture and scenario of the research. In terms of the beauty, qualitative research represents the real explanations and sense of a phenomena rather than the justifications or relationships.
Research is conducted to culminate their results into a product which can fetch some commercial value and it is useful in giving welfare and comfort to the society.
It is immaterial whether qualitative research or the quality research gives beauty Beauty lies in the fact that the research has been able to bring the desired results.
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