How Technology Is Used to Help Children with Disabilities in Saudi Arabia - Research Paper Example

The paper "How Technology Is Used to Help Children with Disabilities in Saudi Arabia" is a wonderful example of a research paper on technology. The aim of the study was to investigate how technology is used to help children with hearing impairment, visual impairment, and intellectual disability in Saudi Arabia. The study sought to find answers to the following research questions:

• What challenges do educators face while using different assistive technologies while teaching children living with any of the three types of disabilities (hearing impairment, visual impairment, and intellectual disability) in Saudi Arabia?
  • What types of technological tools are used in schools for children with disabilities (hearing impairment, visual impairment, and intellectual disability) in Saudi Arabia?
  • How does variable such as age and gender affect the educators’ perceptions about the use of technology to support the learning of students with disabilities?
  • What experiences do educators have about the use of technology to support the learning of students with disabilities?
  • What can be done to improve the use of technology to support the education of students with these disabilities in Saudi Arabia?

This chapter presents information about the methodology that was used in the research. The chapter is divided into various sections as follows. First is the research paradigm within which the research was located, including the justification for the use of the pragmatic paradigm that was selected. This is followed by the research design, whereby the sequential exploratory design and the mixed methods approach were used. The next section discusses the population within which the study was located, the sample of the study, and the sampling procedure that was used. This is followed by information about data collection, which includes the ethical procedures that were followed, the data collection tools and how they were piloted, the process of collecting the data, and how the quantitative and qualitative data that were collected were analyzed. At the end of the chapter, a brief summary of the chapter’s details is provided.

3.2 Research Paradigm

A research paradigm refers to “a perspective about research held by a community of researchers that is based on a set of shared assumptions, concepts, values, and practices” (Johnson & Christensen, 2012, p. 31). A research paradigm can also be defined as a way of studying a social phenomenon from which a particular understanding of the phenomenon can be obtained and explanations made (Hua, 2016). A paradigm can also be understood as a set of ideas regarding the manner in which a particular problem exists and a set of agreements about how such a problem can be investigated (Mukherji & Albon, 2010). Based on these definitions, it is clear that the selection of a paradigm for any research is important since the paradigm influences the methodology to be used and also shapes the researcher’s perceptions of the issue being investigated (Mukherji & Albon, 2010). There are different types of research paradigms, and they include positivism, interpretivism, the critical paradigm, and pragmatic paradigm (Cryer, 2006; Mertens, 2010; Rubin & Babbie, 2009; Schoen, 2011). Each of the aforementioned research paradigms has its own perspectives regarding the nature of reality (referred to as ontology), the theory of knowledge or what the researcher can know about the subject (referred to as epistemology), and how the researcher can get information about the perceived reality (i.e. the methodology to be used) (Riazi, 2016). The different research paradigms are explained below.

3.2.1 Positivist research paradigm The positivist research paradigm asserts that the things that exist can be described factually (Denicolo, Long & Bradley-Cole, 2016). The positivist ontology (the nature of reality) is also built in the belief that the world is external and that there exist one objective truth to any research situation or phenomenon regardless of the belief or perspective of the researcher (Edirisingha, 2012). Positivism follows natural principles and encompasses a researcher who makes an attempt to take a neutral and disinterested role.

As such, observations of phenomena based on the positivist research paradigm must be carried out objectively. Values and biases must be eliminated as much as possible, and there has to be a clear distinction between the subject and the researcher (Marlow, 2011), meaning that the researcher has to remain detached from the participants in the research or the subject being studied. Positivists take a structural and controlled approach in carrying out research by identifying an understandable research area, coming up with a suitable hypothesis or hypotheses, and by making use of an appropriate research methodology (Edirisingha, 2012).

Along the same line, positivism holds that scientific methods are the only way to establish the truth as well objective reality about a given phenomenon (Chilisa & Preece, 2005). Scientific methods encompass a cycle of research that includes observation, discovery of underlying patterns and coming up with a theory, formulating a hypothesis, carrying out research to subject the hypothesis to test, and rejecting or accepting the hypothesis that was used (Mukherji & Albon, 2010). The use of quantitative methodology is applied, which involves collection of data scientifically in a precise way that is determined by measurement and then subjected to scientific analysis with the objective of making the results generalisable (Mukherji & Albon, 2010).

This involves testing and observing the “cause and effect” relationships that exist between different types of variables (Walsh & Wigens, 2003, p. 22). 3.2.2 Interpretive research paradigm Research located in the interpretive paradigm involves not seeing people as things that can be researched like phenomena, but seeing them as individuals with the capacity to think, interpret and attach meanings to various occurrences (Magnusson & Marecek 2015). Researchers doing research based on the interpretive research paradigm argue that instead of people simply perceiving their particular material and social circumstance, each individual makes sense of his or her environment or context within which they exist based on a cultural framework of “socially constructed and shared meanings”, and that people’s interpretation of the world influences their position in the world (Mukherji & Albon, 2010, p. 23). In particular, interpretive researchers “are interested in people’s ways of making sense of their activities, experiences, and relationships” and how they intend to act in accordance with these ways of making sense (Magnusson & Marecek 2015, p. 2). In regard to ontology and epistemology (the association between the person doing the research and the reality), interpretivism holds the position that reality is relative and can be understood in many ways rather than one (Edirisingha, 2012).

In addition, according to interpretivists, the multiple realities are also dependent on other systems in regard to meanings, which implies that it is even more difficult to interpret the meanings by relying on fixed realities (Williamson, 2002). As well, the knowledge that is gathered in through interpretivism is not objectively determined or perceived but is socially constructed (Edirisingha, 2012). This means that as opposed to positivism, in which researchers have to be objective in their analysis and detached from the subject being studied or the participants, interpretivism requires an active connection between the researcher and the subject, and the meaning of what is being investigated has to be “socially and individually constructed” (Williamson, 2002, p. 30).