Academic Writing and its Importance for Social Enquiry

Types of Academic Writing

What Am I Required To Do In This Assignment?

What Are The Key Academic Writing Styles And Why Are They Important

How Do  I Produce High Quality Work That Merits a Good Grade?

The field of social science is dynamic in nature in the sense that every new occurrence in the human society leads to a change in the way the community is perceived. As a consequence of this, social science requires constant research and social enquiry which would help us to understand the human lives in a better manner. Such social enquiry can take various forms such as that of a positivist research or an interpretivist research (Panhwar, Ansari and Shah 2017). There are different kinds of collection of data also such as that of qualitative data collection and quantitative data collection. The data once collected is analyzed in the context of the research philosophy as mentioned before. This is turn, helps the researcher to get a holistic understanding of the topic which is being researched upon (Ang, Tan and He 2017). The purpose of this paper is to explore the field of academic writing and determine the different kinds of academic writing which are used for university purposes. Furthermore, the paper also makes reference to a research topic and tries to understand how this topic would be explored in the context of the research philosophical underpinnings.

Academic writing is different from a normal essay writing on the grounds that academic writing tries to discuss on an important issue (Ang, Tan and He 2017). Educational institutions have the main objective of ensuring the impartation of knowledge to the students which can be used for improving their standard of living (Dirgeyasa and Hum 2017). In this context, four kinds of academic writings can be determined.

The first is that of descriptive writing. The purpose of such kind of writing is to provide factual knowledge to the people who would be reading the paper (Davidson 2019).

The second kind of writing is that of analytical writing. This refers to the organization of the descriptive writing in to facts, groups and categories so that the relationship amongst the information provided can be understood (Ang, Tan and He 2017).

Persuasive writing refers to the provision of one’s own opinion within the writing (Ang, Tan and He 2017). This enables the readers to understand the point of view of the scholar who has written the assignment.

Importance of Academic Writing Styles for University Purposes

Critical writing is the most favored kind of academic writing within the field of social science (Ang, Tan and He 2017). Critical writing includes the rationalization of the information which is being accumulated in the assignment. Such information is then analyzed with the aid of various theoretical frameworks which helps to make practical sense of the information provided.

Academic writing is essential for the universities and various educational institutions because of the way they are organized and presented. Every piece of writing contains certain information (Panhwar, Ansari and Shah 2017). However, the unique characterizing feature of academic writing is that it presents the information in a logical flow and there is considerable usage of theoretical frame work. The use of established theories helps to impart validity to the writing. Furthermore, such academic writings use empirical evidences to substantiate their assignment which, in turn, ensures reliability to the paper.

In this regard, it can be seen that academic writing has the purpose to impart educational information to the readers. They are written with a resolution to contribute to the growth of the available literature in the concerned field of study.

In order to understand the importance of academic writing, a research topic in being proposed in this paper. The research topic selected is that of understanding the gender pay gap which is noticed in the private employment sector within the United Kingdom. This research topic would be analyzed with the aid of various methodologies which would help the readers to understand the significance of social enquiry and how it is done.

Research refers to the situation whereby an individual focuses on a particular field of interest (Siponen and Tsohou 2018). He or she then tries to collect information related to that field of study by looking in to the different sources of available literature which have already talked about the particular issue. The collected information is then analyzed with a help of the different research philosophies and theoretical lenses. In this regard, there are two kinds of research analysis technique which enables the researcher to either take on a subjective understanding or a objective point of view to the research study (Panhwar, Ansari and Shah 2017).

The importance of enquiry in the field of social science lies in the fact that it helps to impart a degree of rationality to a subjective field. Social science deals with many aspects of the human society which are difficult to rationalize or be observed through a practical lens. In this respect, the use of the various methods and methodologies would help the researcher to organize the information which has been collected and analyze it with the aid of various lenses and philosophies (Saltman 2019). This helps to standardize the field of social science and give it an objective character.

Research Topic

Positivism refers to a philosophical understanding of any research work. The term positivism was first coined by Auguste Comte in the nineteenth century (Berkovich 2018). In the field of social science, the research philosophy of positivism signifies a scientific approach to the research study under focus. In other words, the research topic makes considerable use of statistics and empirical evidences in order to collect the necessary data for research execution. Comte was of the idea that the different established theories in the human realm would be utilized and improved upon in order to provide solutions to the different problems faced by the human society (Shapiro 2017).  

In the context of the research topic, the positivist philosophy can be used to understand the gender pay gap as observed in the society. The purpose of the research is to analyze the meaning of gender discrimination by reflecting upon the pay gap which exists between the two genders in the region of the United Kingdom.

While talking about the philosophical underpinnings of positivism, it is important to note the concept of Verstehen. According to Martin (2018), Verstehen signifies reconstructing the experience of the individual who has talked about a particular incident, in order to understand how that individual reached the particular conclusion. Verstehen is therefore considered to be a measure of verification.

However, as argued by Bonell et al. (2018), it can be seen that the positivist research philosophy lays emphasis on the objectivity of the research study. The researcher tries to isolate the facts and the statistics which is used in the course of the research work. It is such information which is used for understanding the research work.

As stated by Kankam (2019), one of the main objectives of the positivist research philosophy is to analyze the research study under consideration in a rational and practical manner. In the proposed research study, the researcher would attempt to understand the issue of existing gender pay gap as stemming from the problem of gender discrimination. In this regard, the individuals who would be surveyed would be required to provide objective answers to the questions posed to them. As a result, there is no scope of subjective analysis within the research work.

Another important research philosophy which is used in the execution of any social science research work is that of interpretivism (Pulla and Carter 2018). The interpretivist research philosophy signifies the use of the opinions and the views provided by the scholars who have already worked in the concerned field of study. In other words, a subjective understanding of the opinions of the scholars are taken and they are sought to be applied in the given research work so as to reach a plausible conclusion (O'Donoghue 2018).

How Research is Used for Social Enquiry

The research topic which has been selected for the understanding of social enquiry and how it is done is that of understanding the pay gap. Gender discrimination has been present in the society since times immemorial. In the contemporary societal structure, one significant aspect of gender discrimination has manifested itself in the form of gender pay gap. In this respect, it can be seen that the male working members are provided with a higher salary structure as opposed to their female counter parts. The proposed research seeks to understand this gender pay gap on the context of the United Kingdom by undertaking an interpretivist form of research study.

In this respect, as stated by Hasan (2016), it can be seen that the employment of wither a qualitative study or a quantitative study is dependent on the kind of research paradigm or research philosophy which is being used in the research work. In this respect, the relation of the work to that of epistemology, ontology and methodology is sought to be analyzed. Hasan (2016) opines that qualitative research tries to understand that there are multiple realities which exists in the society. The changing nature of the realities are subjective in nature and open to interpretation by the scholars who are involved in this field. In the event that participants are used for collecting the data, the researcher needs to be competent enough to distance himself from all objectivities associated with the research and enter in to the realm of subjective understanding. In this regard, the use of interpretivist research philosophy assumes significance as the view points and the theories of the earlier scholars are taken in to consideration for the effective execution of the paper (Panhwar, Ansari and Shah 2017).

However, as argued by Dean (2018), it can be seen that the philosophical underpinnings of the interpretivist approach is dependent on the analysis of available historical arguments. () has opined that the new social science researches ignore the philosophical paradigms which are present within the field of research. As a result of this, there is no emphasis on the subjective nature of the paper whereby the various sources of literature are utilized for understanding the research topic under focus.

As opined by Ryan (2018), it can be seen that interpretivist research philosophy allows the researcher to take a comprehensive and subjective analysis of the research topic which is under consideration. In the proposed research topic of gender gaps, the employment of the interpretivist research philosophy would mean that the issue of gender discrimination would be examined. The historical trend of employment services and the manner in which the women of the society have always been discriminated against would also be taken in to consideration. Furthermore, the various sociological underpinnings which lead to the rise of gender pay gap would also be mentioned in the paper. In other words, a subjective lens would be applied for the execution of the research topic.

Philosophical Underpinnings of Positivism

Conclusion

In conclusion, it can be observed that the field of social science is concerned with the investigation of the society and the prevailing relationships observed amongst the individuals living in such societies. The field is an umbrella term which includes the study of social relationships, anthropology, political science, psychology, demographics and even that of commerce. In this regard, it needs to be noted that the social science researchers try to understand the field of cyber security and how they impact the human society, the cultures and their influence in the activities of the people and also how the politics of the nations have an impact on the working of the people. The researches which are carried out in this field have the primary aim of providing authentic information to the readers. The use of scientific and logical data assures that the people can rely on the information which is being provided in such social science research work. One of the most significant feature of such social science researches is that it provides the readers with plausible recommendations and solutions which would aid them to resolve the noted problem in the society.

References

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