Applications of Case Study Research (Applied Social Research Methods)

Author of one of the most successful books in case study research, Yin provides students and research investigators with extensive applications of actual case study research, as well as discussions of how case study research can be applied to broad areas of inquiry. Each of the applications (which are excerpts from complete case studies) is designed to help readers identify solutions to problems encountered when doing case study research. The book is organized into three parts: Part I shows how to integrate theoretical concerns into exploratory case studies, descriptive case studies, or causal case studies, as well as showing how theory can shape the case selection process. Part II provides examples from education and management information systems of important steps in case study research, such as how to select the units of analysis, how to define data collection needs, and how to establish rival hypotheses. Lastly, Part III examines the use of case studies as an evaluative tool, including distinctions among different qualitative research strategies and for evaluating highly complex interventions, such as community-based interventions. For those who desire increased methodological guidance on how to carry out case study research, Yin′s new book provides the help they′ve been seeking.

Robert K. Yin is President of COSMOS Corporation, an applied research and social science firm.  Over the years, COSMOS has successfully completed hundreds of projects for federal agencies, state and local agencies, and private foundations.

Outside of COSMOS, Dr. Yin has assisted numerous other research groups, helping to train their field teams or to design research studies. The most recent such engagements have been with The World Bank, the Division of Special Education and disAbility Research at George Mason University, the Department of Nursing Research and Quality Outcomes at the Children’s National Health System (Washington, DC), and the School of Education, Southern New Hampshire University.

Dr. Yin has authored over 100 publications, including authoring or editing 11 books (not counting the multiple editions of any given book). Earlier editions of the present book have been translated into eight languages (Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Swedish, Romanian, Italian, Polish, and Portuguese), and a second book on Qualitative Research from Start to Finish (2016) is in its 2nd edition and has been translated into four languages (Chinese, Korean, Swedish, and Portuguese).  Dr. Yin received his B.A. in history from Harvard College (magna cum laude) and his Ph.D. in brain and cognitive sciences from MIT.