Real World Research: A Resource for Social Scientists and Practitioner-Researchers

by Colin Robson

Real world research is a common responsibility of professionals and practitioners in a wide range of both public and private settings. These include teachers, social workers and health service professionals, managers and specialists in business, architects, designers, criminologists and accountants among many others.

Real World Research provides a clear route-map of the various steps needed to carry out a piece of applied research to a high professional standard. It is accessible to those without a social science background while providing rigorous and fully up-to-date coverage of contemporary issues and debates. It brings together materials and approaches from different social science disciplines, seeing value in both quantitative and qualitative approaches, as well as their combination in mixed-method designs.

Genres: Research, Nonfiction, Reference, Psychology, Social Science, Philosophy, Design

624 pages, Paperback

First published June 14, 1993

Reviews

[Lucy Smith]

Jolly useful, well worth it if doing research in teaching or similar field.

[Nina Miller]

This is a rough read, but if you can scan it and use it as refernce, it is really useful.

[Andy Horton]

Re-reading this fifteen years after my last postgraduate study, as I begin researching for the mini-dissertation on my PGCPHE.
A clear, practical guide.

[Will]

You might think this looks like a textbook. You would be wrong. Robson's book is a fantastic practical guide for working researchers--it's organized in a very accessible format, and contains straightforward, easily implemented guides to various types of research designs. This book works as a field guide, which makes its theoretical content all the more valuable.

[Anujin Zor]

I'm alive but im dead

[Tom White]

Read and referenced as part of my MSc dissertation. A quintessential guide but some chapters felt a bit dated - probably because I read the fourth edition

[Elizabeth]

Reading this for SLIS 705. So far, surprisingly readable for a textbook.

[Martyn Perry]

A very useful and practical guide to cutting through the academic jargon and translating it into practical application.