Third approach in research method with emphasis on information retrieval research: composing quantitative and qualitative methods

Abstract

Purpose: The purpose is to review various views about the composed research method, and to obtain a relatively comprehensive cognitive knowledge. Method: This is a conceptual paper in which, using related literature and concepts of chemistry, the intention of composing the two quantitative and qualitative research methods is identified so that it leads to a better understanding of the composed research method. Results: Findings show that different researchers of the composed method disagree with each other over the kind of mixing the two quantitative and qualitative research methods. Some scholars find it blended into data, methods, and findings, on the contrary, some consider a composition of theoretical and philosophical foundations and some other know a mixture by combining each of these items. Mixing the two substances together is one of the basic subjects of chemistry. In chemical science, when mixing the two substances changes the physical nature of the material, it is mixed up, but if, in addition to change their physical nature, the chemical structure of the material is changed, and a new material is produced with a new chemical structure (the new chemical nature), it is called a composition. Accordingly, a change in the type of data, methods, and findings can be regarded as a change in the physical nature in chemistry and a change in the theoretical and philosophical foundations can be considered as a change in the chemical nature in chemistry. using the dialectical approach as a composed approach in the information retrieval studies is suggested.

Keywords

• research method
• information retrieval
• hybrid method
• combination and mixture