Research in Education

RESEARCH IN EDUCATION PETER SANDIFORD T HE phrase "research in education," when mentioned in the company of a group of professors of chemistry and physics, is apt to provoke sceptical smiles. Research to them means conclusions derived from the data obtained in controlled experiments. These experiments can be repeated by other workers and the truth or falsity of the conclusions established. But research cannot be so narrowly limited. There is research in history, in literature, in mathematics, even in philosophy and education. Any critical investigation in which the evidence is carefully weighed and evaluated is entitled to the name research. The main feature of research is care and accuracy-in fact scholarliness, and scholarliness is not confined to experimental :findings, although it must be confessed that a reputation for scholarliness is easier to establish in physical and chemical laboratories than in most other places. But any investigation which brings into play those twin marks of the educated man, the weighing of evidence and knowing when a thing is proved, is research. When is a thing proved? Obviously enough, proof in mathematics is more easily demonstrated than in any other branch of learning. It may be secured for all time by one man, providing his premises be granted. When Lindemann, in r882, published a proof that the squaring of the circle was an impossibility, this one solution established the case forever. Similarly, it has been proved that the trisection of an angle is an impossibility using, of course, only compass and ruler. If, therefore, some crank now writes to an editor to say that he has 308 RESEARCH IN EDUCATION succeeded in squaring the circle or trisecting an angle, his manuscript may be deposited gently in the waste-paper basket without a single qualm or misgiving. But a single person's ipse dixit in physics or chemistry is insufficient to establish a case. Rather must he give an account of his experimental set-up, his findings, and his conclusions. If his findings and conclusions are confirmed by a number of other skilled workers in the field, ·then, and not till then, are they regarded as authentic. Such repetition in physics and chemistry is comparatively easy; the material dealt with is inorganic and easily controlled. It should, however, be noted that both physics and chemistry are based on measurement and on mathematics, the science of pure number. As we pass to the biological sciences, for example to zoology and botany, we get further removed from mathematics ; we get into a realm where the variables are more difficult to control. We have reached the field of organisms , and truths about organisms are more difficult to establish than truths about inorganic matter. Still the ideal of research is essentially the same as in physics or chemistry since it is that of investigating the single variable. Psychology, including many aspects of research in education, may be regarded as the next step further removed from the foundational mathematics. Here we are dealing with human beings, and these, even to a greater extent than plants and sub-human animals, simply refuse to "stay put." This·is the basis of the claim that research in education is so much more difficult than research in chemistry, in physics, or in the biological sciences. It is, in fact, the most difficult kind of research of the single-variable type that we have to-day. But · research of the single-variable type, which commonly is designated as scientifi.c research, does not 309 THE UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO QUARTERLY exhaust the field. We may classify research into philosophical research and scientific research, into pure research and applied research, and in .many other ways, but the fact remains that the claim, frequently made, that experimental research is the ·only kind possible, is quite untenable . Turning now to our main topic, research in education, we find the field conveniently divided into four main branches, namely, history of education, philosophy of education, educational administration, and educational psychology. In the field of the history of education the researchers, though not so numerous as in the spheres of politics and economics, employ exactly the same techniques that all historians employ. They meet with the same difficulties, and...