Inductive and Deductive Research

Saunders et. al., (2009) divided the research logic into two approaches, deductive and inductive. The difference between the two research approaches is that deductive is intended to test theory and inductive to build theory.

The inductive Approach

The inductive approach builds a theory from particular facts to a general conclusion. Theory building aims at new perceptions and is process oriented for rich contextual understanding and developing the meaning through data analysis.

Theories mean- is a concept that is not yet verified.  In technical language, ‘theories’ is often synonymous with ‘hypotheses’.

Hypothesis means- a proposed intention to explain certain facts or observations or an opinion based on incomplete evidence.

The deductive approach

The deductive approach tests a theory through logical and analytical judgement by evidence and prior conclusions. The theory testing aims to test the pre-developed (pre-build) theory through data analysis to support the theory through logical and analytical judgement. However, it does not mean that all theories tested would be true. Theory testing is to establish, the theory is true or not.

Many types of research consider a qualitative method for theory building and a quantitative for theory testing. However, many types of research use both Qualitative and Quantitative Methods for theory building and theory testing. Moreover, research can typically have a mixed approach incorporating deductive and inductive. A mixed approach is when a researcher uses deductive and inductive approaches. A researcher often adopts an Inductive Approach to generate theories during qualitative analysis. Some scholar claims that a literature review is a theory-building approach and data analysis (qualitative or quantitative) is a theory-testing approach.

For instance- a theory can be built through the literature while reviewing the views of different authors since that theory is based on general conclusions drawn from the literature review that will need testing through logical and analytical evidence. To test the theory, both Qualitative and Quantitative data can be used.