Ontological and epistemological foundations of research: The analysis of three educational studies

Abstract

Ontological and epistemological perspectives constitute the philosophical scaffold of a research study. The main problem of most studies is the inconsistency in the rationale of the studies, in other words, the discrepancy between theory and practice. Identifying the study’s perspective to the truth (ontology) and the knowledge (epistemology) contributes much to the coherence in the rationale of the study. In this respect, this study aims to analyse three selected educational studies from ontological and epistemological perspectives to reveal how the consistency can be achieved relying on the philosophical underpinnings.