Primer in Theory Construction

An A&B Classics Edition

Paul Davidson Reynolds

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2015
• ISBN:
  9781317345138
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Sociology
• Index: Social Sciences

A Primer in Theory Construction is for those who have already studied one or more of the social, behavioral, or natural sciences, but have no formal introduction to the way theories are constructed, stated, tested, and connected together to form a scientific body of knowledge. The author discusses scientific theories in general terms, but also addresses the special challenges of developing scientific knowledge about social and human phenomena.

This Allyn and Bacon Classics Edition contains the complete text of the original copyright 1971 version, with new typography and page design.

1

Introduction

A scientific body of knowledge consists of those concepts and statements that scientists consider useful for achieving the purposes of science.¹

The purpose of this book is to describe the different types of concepts and statements that compose a scientific body of knowledge and to indicate what form they should have to facilitate their adoption by a scientific community. However, the ultimate test of any idea is its utility in achieving the goals of science, and good ideas in clumsy form generally gain wider acceptance than poor ideas in correct form, although it may take longer. There is no substitute for a good idea.

The purpose of this chapter is to describe the characteristics of scientific knowledge. In order to explain and justify these characteristics, two issues will have to be discussed first: the purposes science ought to serve and the procedure scientists use in evaluating the usefulness of concepts and statements.

For What Should Scientific Knowledge Be Useful?

While scientific knowledge is basically a system for description and explanation, not everything can be explained by science. Such questions as “How does the moon affect the oceans of the earth?”, “What changes a person’s status in a social system?”, or “Under what conditions does ‘life’ (an organism capable of reproduction) exist?” can be approached with scientific knowledge–and frequently answered. All of these questions are related to how or why certain events occur. Such questions as “Why is there a moon?” or “Why are there societies?” or “Why is there life?” are beyond the capacity of science. These “Why does it exist?” questions are more of a religious or philosophical nature and cannot be resolved with an empirically based science. For this reason, the remainder of this book will not treat “why things exist” but will emphasize “why things happen,” the major focus of science.

Assuming that scientists have completed the task of building a scientific body of knowledge designed to describe “things” and explain why “events” occur, which is obviously not going to happen very soon, what should such a body of knowledge be useful for? Most people would probably want scientific knowledge to provide:

1. A method of organizing and categorizing “things,” a typology;

2. Predictions of future events;

3. Explanations of past events;

4. A sense of understanding about what causes events.

And occasionally mentioned as well is:

5. The potential for control of events.

Each of these will be discussed in turn.

Typologies

Of all these purposes, the first is the easiest to achieve, because any set of concepts can be used to organize and classify. For example, rocks can be classified by color, size, weight, strength, crystalline structure, or any number of other characteristics; individuals can be classified by color, size, weight, strength (physical condition), the nature of their cognitive structure, and so on; and social systems can be classified by size, strength (commitment of members to the system), the form of the internal organization, and so on.

Since there is such a large number of ways to organize and classify phenomena or “things,” the problem becomes one of determining which typologies (methods of classifying) are the most useful. This leads to a major issue: What criteria should be used to evaluate the usefulness of typologies? Two of the more obvious criteria are that the application of a typology to phenomena should result in, first, its exhaustiveness–of all the “things” being classified, there is no item that cannot be placed in the scheme– and, second, its mutual exclusiveness–that there is no ambiguity about where each “thing” is to be placed in the scheme. A third and perhaps more important criterion is that typologies should be consistent with the concepts used in the statements that express the other purposes of science.

Prediction and Explanation

Predicting events that will occur in the future and explaining events that have occurred in the past are, except for a difference in temporal perspective, essentially the same activity as long as scientific statements are abstract. Consider, for example, the following statements:

i. If the volume of a gas is constant, then an increase in temperature will be followed by an increase in pressure.

ii. If the rate of succession (changes in membership) in an organization is constant, then an increase in organizational size will be followed by an increase in formalization (of the structure and procedures).

Both of these statements have the same form:

Under certain conditions (constant volume, rate of succession) a change in one variable (temperature of a gas, organizational size) is followed by a change in another variable (pressure of the gas, formalization of the organization).

Statements of this form compose a scientific body of knowledge and can be used for prediction and explanation of scientific events, using a form of explanation adopted from symbolic logic (other concepts of explanation will be described on the following page).

For example:

If	the volume of a gas is constant,	and the temperature increases,	pressure then the increases.
In situation Z	the volume of gas R is constant,	and the temperature increased.
Therefore,	the pressure of gas R increased.

This is a form of explanation adopted from symbolic logic (Hempel and Oppenheim, 1948). Notice that no mention of time (in a historical sense, a particular time in history) enters into the first statement in the explanation. Abstract statements of this sort and, therefore, explanations based on them, are independent of historical time. In other words, these statements can be used to explain past events and to predict future events.

Using an identical logical form, statement ii can be used to explain a change in organizational characteristics.

If	the rate of succession is constant,	and organizational size increases,	then organizational formalization increases.
In situation Y	the rate of succession in organization Q is constant,	and organizational size increased.
Therefore,	the formalization of organization Q increased.

Again, this logical deduction is independent of historical time because statement ii is independent of historical time and applies to past and future situations alike.

When a statement is useful for explanation and prediction, the concepts contained in the statement can be used to organize and classify. Gases can be classified according to their volume, temperature, and pressure, and organizations can be classified according to their rate of succession, size, and degree of formalization. Therefore, it seems reasonable to expect that, if a statement can be used to explain or to predict, the concepts contained in that statement can be used to organize and to classify (provide a typology).

Sense of Understanding

A further purpose of scientific knowledge, providing a sense of understanding, is both the most difficult to achieve and the most controversial. It is the assumption of this author, to be followed throughout this book, that a sense of understanding is provided only when the causal mechanisms that link changes in one or more concepts (the independent variables) with changes in other concepts (the dependent variables) have been fully described.² If a person feels ambiguous or uncertain about an explanation, it is because some part of the causal linkage has been omitted from the description.

In the previous examples predictions and explanations about gases and organizations were logically derived from statements that are best described as empirical generalizations. Under certain conditions, when scientists have a great deal of confidence in the truth of such statements, they are called laws. However, despite the fact that these examples meet all the requirements of logical explanations, it is difficult to consider them complete, for they do not provide a sense of understanding. A complete explanation would require several such statements that together provide a description of the causal process.

In relation to the example of the gas at a constant volume subjected to an increase in temperature, the following causal process, based on the conception of a gas as a collection of molecules in constant motion, might be proposed to explain this relationship.

An increase of temperature increases the kinetic energy of the gas molecules.

The increase of kinetic energy causes an increase in the velocity of the motion of the molecules.

Since the molecules are prevented from traveling further by the vessel of constant volume, they strike the inside surface of the vessel more often. (Since they travel faster, they cover more distance and bounce off the vessel more often.)

As the molecules strike the sides of the vessel more frequently, the pressure on the walls of the vessel increases.

The results of this process are summarized in the empirical relationship: as the temperature increases, the pressure increases. There may be other processes that will “explain” the relationship between a change in temperature and a change in pressure and perhaps this one process could be made more explicit, but nevertheless such descriptions seem to provide a sense of understanding.

In a similar fashion the process that relates an increase in organizational size to an increase in formalization might be described as follows:

An increase in organizational size is considered to be an increase in the number of organization members.

An increase in the number of members will cause an increase in the variation of training and experience of the members.

As the members vary more in terms of their training and experience, their interpretation of rules and procedures will vary more.

An increase in the variance in interpretation of organizational rules and procedures will cause a decrease of coordination in organizational activities.

A decrease in coordination of organizational activities causes a decrease in organizational performance.

A decrease in performance disturbs organizational administrators.

Organizational administrators attribute poor performance to a decrease of coordination.

Organizational administrators attribute a decrease of coordination to ambiguous rules and procedures.

To reduce the ambiguity of organizational rules, the organizational administrators increase the number of rules and make the rules more detailed and specific.

An increase in the number of rules and their specificity is generally considered an indicator of an increase in formalization.

Again, the results of this process are summarized by the statement: as size increases, formalization increases. Again, it is likely that other processes may link changes in size and the degree of formalization.

Two ways of explaining events, derivation from a scientific statement (or law) and description of a causal mechanism, have been presented. Both succeed in explaining, but it is clear that the second procedure, the description of the causal mechanism...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• 1. Introduction
• 2. The Idea
• 3. Concepts
• 4. Statements
• 5. Forms of Theories
• 6. Testing Theories
• 7. Strategies for Developing a Scientific Body of Knowledge
• 8. Conclusion
• Appendix: Student Exercises
• References
• Author Index
• Subject Index