Exploratory research
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Exploratory research is a type of research conducted because a problem has not been clearly defined. Exploratory research helps determine the best research design, data collection method and selection of subjects. Given its fundamental nature, exploratory research often concludes that a perceived problem does not actually exist.
Exploratory research often relies on secondary research such as reviewing available literature and/or data, or qualitative approaches such as informal discussions with consumers, employees, management or competitors, and more formal approaches through in-depth interviews, focus groups, projective methods, case studies or pilot studies.
The results of exploratory research are not usually useful for decision-making by themselves, but they can provide significant insight into a given situation. Although the results of qualitative research can give some indication as to the "why", "how" and "when" something occurs, it cannot tell us "how often" or "how many."
Exploratory research is not typically generalizable to the population at large.
[edit] Social Science
In many social science circles, exploratory research "seeks to find out how people get along in the setting under question, what meanings they give to their actions, and what issues concern them. The goal is to learn 'what is going on here?' and to investigate social phenomena without explicit exceptions." (Russell K. Schutt, Investigating the Social World, 5th ed.. This methodology can is also at times referred to as a 'grounded theory' approach to 'qualitative research' or 'interpretive research', and is an attempt to 'unearth' a theory from the data itself rather than from a a pre-disposed hypothesis.
