The document discusses the philosophy of positivism in social science research. Positivism traces its roots back to philosophers like Bacon and Descartes in the 17th century. It developed into a philosophy championed by Auguste Comte in the 19th century, which believes that scientific observation and experiment are the only ways to arrive at true knowledge. Positivism applies the scientific method to social sciences by focusing on quantifiable data that can be statistically analyzed to discover objective social truths and laws. The researcher takes an independent, objective role in this process.

2. • Roots of research, as we know it, can be traced back to Bacon
(1561) and Descartes (1596).
• Natural word is different from social word
• These roots founded research that is known as Positivistic research
or Positivism
• Positivism is known as the natural scientist approach to research.
• In 19th century French philosopher Auguste Comte use the term
positivism in his book “The course in positive philosophy” and “A
general view of positivism”.
• He believed that all knowledge is based on experience and can be
advance only by means of observations and experiment.

3. • positivism is based on the idea that science is the
only way to learn about the truth.
.
• It is an approach to study society that relies
specifically on scientifically evidences, experiment
and statistics to reveal a true nature
of society works or operates.
• positivist thinker adopt scientific method as a
means of knowledge generation.

4. PRINCIPLES OF POSITIVISM
 No differences in the logic of inquiry
 Research should aim to explain and predict
 Research should be empirically observable
via human senses
 Inductive reasoning should be used to
develop hypotheses
 Common sense should not be allowed to bias
the research findings
 Science must be value-free and it should be
judged only by logic

5. POSITIVISM AS A PHILOSOPHY
•The positivism research philosophy is difficult to explain in a precise
manner
•In its essence, positivism is based on the idea that science is the
only way to learn about the truth.
•
• It adheres to the view that only ‘factual’ knowledge gain through
observation including measurement is trustworthy.
•
•Positivist studies the role of data collection and interpretation in
objective way. Positivism depends on quantifiable observation that
lead to statistical analysis.
•
• As a philosophy positivism is in accordance with empiricist view (
that knowledge stems from human experience).
•

6. POSITIVISM AS A PHILOSOPHY
•Positivism
•Role of researcher objective analyst
•Working with an observable social reality the end
product can be law-like generalizations similar
to those produced by the physical and natural
scientist ( Remenyi et al., 1998)
•The researcher is independent and neither affects
nor is affected by the subject of the research
•Highly structured methodology
•Quantifiable observations that lend themselves to
statistical analysis..
•Complexity is reduced to a series of law-like
generalizations this leads to interpretivism
•

7. POSITIVISM AS A PHILOSOPHY
•Positivistic research, whether natural or social
science oriented, seeks facts
•Results of positivistic research should be laws
•factual
•exact
•precise
•Absolute
•Objectivity is required as far as possible