The Discovery of Grounded Theory: Strategies for Qualitative Research (Observations)

his volume is directed toward closing the gap between theory and empirical research and improving social scientists capacities for generating theory that is relevant and useful to their research. "Most writing on sociological method has been concerned with how accurate facts can be obtained and how theory can thereby be more rigorously tested. In this book we address ourselves to the equally important enterprise of how the discovery of theory from data-systematically obtained and analyzed in social research--can be furthered. We believe that the discovery of theory from data--which we call grounded theory--is a major task confronting sociology today for as we shall show such a theory fits empirical situations and is understandable to sociologist and layman alike. Most important it works--provides us with relevant predictions explanations interpretations and applications.... And so we offer this book which we conceive as a beginning venture in the development of improved methods for discovering grounded theory." From the introduction to The Discovery of Grounded Theory Authors: Barney G. Glaser Anselm L. Strauss