UGC NET Study Notes on Research Aptitude

By Mohit Choudhary|Updated : August 8th, 2022

UGC NET EXAM consists of Paper 1 and Paper 2. Research aptitude forms the most important and difficult section of Paper 1. It comprises steps of research, research methods, research ethics, thesis writing and other research work. In today’s post, we will discuss some important terminologies related to research. Read them slowly and carefully.

What is Research?

  • The term research comprises of two words, namely ‘re’ means again and ‘search’ means to find out.
  • Research is a process of enquiry and investigation.
  • It is systematic and methodical.
  • It increases knowledge.
  • It is a structured enquiry that utilises the acceptable scientific methodology to solve the problem and create new knowledge that is generally applicable.
  • It is a way of thinking, it examines critically the various aspects of any professional work.
  • Any higher learning institute worth its name thrives on research.

Objectives of research

  • Create new knowledge
  • Create solutions to a problem.
  • Investigate existing problem.
  • Review the existing knowledge.
  • Explore and analyse more general issues.
  • Develop new insight into a phenomenon.

Research related important terms

Metaphysics

  • It is derived from Greek work that means ‘after or behind or among the natural
  • It is a branch of philosophy that deals with abstract concepts such as being, knowledge, identity, time and space.
  • It studies questions related to existence, what it is for something to exist and what types of existence there are.
  • It asks questions like- 1. What is there? 2. What is it like?

Epistemology

  • It is the branch of philosophy concerned with the study of knowledge.
  • It deals with origin, nature, scope, and methods to acquire new knowledge.
  • It is considered one of the main branches of philosophy, along with ethics, logic, and metaphysics.
  • The term was first used by Frederick Ferrier.

Rationalism

  • It regards reason as the chief source and test of knowledge.
  • It tends to believe that logic and reason as the means of acquiring knowledge.
  • Mind is given the authority over senses.
  • In this logic and reason come first to conclude something before experience.
  • It is associated with deduction.
  • Rationalism is opposed to empiricism because it believes that certain truth exists and that the intellect can directly grasp these truths.

Empiricists

  • It claims that sense experience is the ultimate starting point for all our knowledge.
  • The senses give us raw data about the world, and without this raw material, there would be no knowledge at all.
  • It emphasises the role of empirical evidences in the formation of ideas, rather than innate ideas or traditions.
  • It is a fundamental part of the scientific method that all hypothesis and theories must be tested against observation of natural world.
  • It is related to induction.

Research paradigms

  • It is an approach to conducting research that has been verified by the research community for long and that has been in practice for hundreds of years.
  • There is a difference between natural sciences and social sciences and so is the difference between research approaches relating to them.
  • Thus, there are two competing paradigms to acquire knowledge. These are positivist paradigm and interpretive paradigms.

Positivist paradigm

  • It is associated with quantitative research strategies.
  • Most of the Scientific or Quantitative research use Positivism as a conceptual framework of research.
  • Positivist believes in empirical hypothesis testing.
  • In pure sciences, this approach is preferred because of its empirical nature to study facts.
  • Positivists believe that the findings of one study can be generalised to another study of a similar kind regardless of it is conducted in a different environment and situations.

Interpretive paradigm

  • It is associated with qualitative research strategies.
  • It is applicable in Social sciences such as history, sociology, political sciences etc.
  • In interpretive approach , the research design should be flexible and unstructured.
  • The method should be valid and the research design should generate small-scale and intensive data, using insiders accounts and based on descriptions of what is seen and what is heard.

Verstehen

  • The term is closely associated with the work of the German sociologist, Max Weber.
  • It means a systematic interpretive process in which an outside observer of culture attempts to relate to it and understand others.
  • Verstehen translates to ‘meaningful understanding; or ‘putting yourself in the shoes of others to see things from their perspective.’

Theory

  • A theory is a set of systematically related statements, including some law-like generalisations that can be tested empirically.
  • A plausible or scientifically acceptable general principle or body of principles offered to explain phenomena.
  • These generalisations provide hypotheses, and those hypotheses determine what must be measured.

We hope these Terminologies related to Research Aptitude will help you to prepare for UGC NET 2022 Exam.

Thank you

Team BYJU'S Exam Prep

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