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PURPOSE OF THE STUDY 119

It is therefore relevant to ask oneself at every choice point whether the benefits
that result from a more sophisticated design to ensure accuracy, confidence, gen-
eralizability, and so on, are commensurate with the larger investment of
resources.
In this chapter we will examine the six basic aspects of research design. Specif-
ically, we will discuss the purpose of the study, the types of investigation, the
extent of researcher interference, the study setting, the unit of analysis, and the
time horizon of the study (the shaded parts in Figure 6.2). The other aspects of
measurement, data collection methods, sampling design, and data analysis will
be elaborated in later chapters.

PURPOSE OF THE STUDY: EXPLORATORY, DESCRIPTIVE,
HYPOTHESIS TESTING (ANALYTICAL AND PREDICTIVE),
CASE STUDY ANALYSIS

Studies may be either exploratory in nature or descriptive, or may be conducted
to test hypotheses. The case study, which is an examination of studies done in
other similar organizational situations, is also a method of solving problems, or
for understanding phenomena of interest and generating further knowledge in
that area. The nature of the study—whether it is exploratory, descriptive, or
hypothesis testing—depends on the stage to which knowledge about the
research topic has advanced. The design decisions become more rigorous as we
proceed from the exploratory stage, where we attempt to explore new areas of
organizational research, to the descriptive stage, where we try to describe certain
characteristics of the phenomena on which interest centers, to the hypotheses
testing stage, where we examine whether or not the conjectured relationships
have been substantiated and an answer to the research question has been
obtained. We will now look at each of these in some detail.

Exploratory Study
An exploratory study is undertaken when not much is known about the situation
at hand, or no information is available on how similar problems or research
issues have been solved in the past. In such cases, extensive preliminary work
needs to be done to gain familiarity with the phenomena in the situation, and
understand what is occurring, before we develop a model and set up a rigorous
design for comprehensive investigation.
In essence, exploratory studies are undertaken to better comprehend the
nature of the problem since very few studies might have been conducted in that
area. Extensive interviews with many people might have to be undertaken to get
a handle on the situation and understand the phenomena. More rigorous
research could then proceed.
Some qualitative studies (as opposed to quantitative data gathered through
questionnaires, etc.) where data are collected through observation or inter-
views, are exploratory in nature. When the data reveal some pattern regarding
the phenomena of interest, theories are developed and hypotheses formulated