Research philosophy is a vast topic and here we will not be discussing this topic in great details. Research philosophy is associated with assumption, knowledge and nature of the study. It deals with the specific way of developing knowledge. This matter needs to be addressed because researchers may have different assumptions about the nature of truth and knowledge and philosophy helps us to understand their assumptions. In business and economics dissertations at Bachelor’s level, you are not expected to discuss research philosophy in a great level of depth, and about one page in methodology chapter devoted to research philosophy usually suffices. For a business dissertation at Master’s level, on the other hand, you may need to provide more discussion of the philosophy of your study. But even there, about two pages of discussions are usually accepted as sufficient by supervisors. Discussion of research philosophy in your dissertation should include the following: You need to specify the research philosophy of your study. Your research philosophy can be pragmatism, positivism, realism or interpretivism as discussed below in more details. The reasons behind philosophical classifications of the study need to be provided. You need to discuss the implications of your research philosophy on the research strategy in general and the choice of primary data collection methods in particular.   The Essence of Research Philosophy Research philosophy deals with the source, nature and development of knowledge[1]. In simple terms, research philosophy is belief about the ways in which data about a phenomenon should be collected, analysed and used. Although the idea of knowledge creation may appear to be profound, you are engaged in knowledge creation as part of completing your dissertation. You will collect secondary and primary data and engage in data analysis to answer the research question and this answer marks the creation of … Continue reading Research Philosophy