Main trends of research in the social and human ... - unesdoc - Unesco

634 Pierre de Bie
ence of information and communication media common to a field of problem-
focused research - all these are factors which toward coherent and continuous
progress in problem-focused research.
Strong points and weak points in problem-focused research
The fact of being concerned with a specific social problem and of being invited
to associate with other disciplines is a source of both advantages and disad-
vantages.
There is no doubt that a sense of the help they could give in solving specific
social problems and their dedication to important social values have spurred
specialists in the human sciences and given them a dynamism which they would
not otherwise have had. Society and its problems are the laboratory of the
specialist in the human sciences: the idea that he must work first in an ivory
tower to build up a purely theoretical core of research and only then approach
field work in problem-focused research is mistaken, in that problem-focused
research also increases basic theoretical knowledge. And this has proved to be
a very fruitful aspect of it, often the source of innovations. As a result, research
workers have been led along many different paths to which mere theoretical
reflection apriori would doubtless not have brought them: e.g. it seems possible
to credit problem-focused research with the preparation of research techniques
to evaluate action undertaken.gzIt has stimulated and encouraged many forms of
multidisciplinary association, the multidisciplinary nature of the research being
determined to a certain extent by the action.
But before considering the advantages and disadvantages of interdisciplinary
association it is necessary to mention the weak points resulting from demands
for action.
In many fields writers refer to the heterogeneous nature of the work, its lack
of coherent theories and of scientific maturity.93 Are these characteristics com-
mon to many fields of problem-focused research, or is this simply a phase in
their development, an early phase which has its advantages by enabling iso-
lated, independent research workers to give free rein to their inventive and crea-
tive abilities ? It is not for nothing that Paillat refrains from critizing isolated
research workers - alone or in groups - whose efforts ‘provide a means of guard-
ing against the risk of conformism that may be involved in planned research‘,
adding that ‘it is in the light of the findings of such work that oriented geronto-
logical research has been able to dehe its field of activity and its priorities’.94
The concern with action implies an awareness of the need for what is urgent
and immediately useful, and the slant towards specific practical problems can
have an adverse effect on the care given to methodology. Rather than spend
time on a detailed and exact analysis, which would cause the research worker
to exceed greatly the time allotted to him by those requiring practical action,
those engaged in research will prefer to use methods and procedures which
guarantee results in the least possible time, constituting an approximation
which, though it might appear somewhat crude to the scientist, is sufficient as a
guide for action. It is the same with public opinion polls where the ‘quota’