Introducing Research Methodology

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In the Second Edition of this textbook designed for new researchers, Uwe Flick takes readers through the process of producing a research project. The book gives readers the fundamental data collection and analysis skills that they need for their first project, as well as a good understanding of the research process as a whole. It covers both quantitative and qualitative methods, and contains plenty of real-life examples from the author′s own research.

The book will help readers to answer questions such as:

• why do social research in the first place?
• how do I develop a researchable question?
• what is a literature review and how do I conduct one?
• how could I collect and analyze data?
• what if I want to do my research online?

Uwe Flick is Senior Professor of Qualitative Research in Social Science and Education at the Freie Universität Berlin, Germany. He is a trained psychologist and sociologist and received his PhD from the Freie Universität Berlin in 1988 and his Habilitation from the Technical University of Berlin in 1994. He has been Professor of Qualitative Research at Alice Salomon University of Applied Sciences in Berlin, Germany and at the University of Vienna, Austria. Previously, he was Adjunct Professor at the Memorial University of Newfoundland in St. John’s, Canada; a Lecturer in research methodology at the Freie Universität Berlin; a Reader and Assistant Professor in qualitative methods and evaluation at the Technical University of Berlin; and Associate Professor and Head of the Department of Medical Sociology at the Hannover Medical School. He has held visiting appointments at the London School of Economics, the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales in Paris, at Cambridge University (UK), University of Lisbon (Portugal), Institute of Higher Studies in Vienna, in Italy and Sweden, and at the School of Psychology at Massey University, Auckland (New Zealand). His main research interests are qualitative methods, social representations in the fields of individual and public health, chronical illness and vulnerability in fields like youth homelessness, peer relations or migration, and technological change in everyday life. He is the author of Introducing Research Methodology: A Beginner’s Guide to Doing a Research Project (4th edn, London: Sage: 2025) and editor of A Companion to Qualitative Research (London: Sage, 2004) and The Psychology of the Social (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998). As his most recent publications, he has written Designing Qualitative Research (2nd edn, London: Sage, 2018), Doing Grounded Theory (London: Sage, 2018), Doing Triangulation and Mixed Methods (London: Sage, 2018), and Managing Quality in Qualitative Research (2nd edn, London: Sage, 2018) and Doing Interview Research – The Essential How To Guide (London: Sage, 2022). He edited The SAGE Handbook of Qualitative Data Analysis (London: Sage, 2014), The SAGE Qualitative Research Kit (2nd edn, London: Sage, 2018), The SAGE Handbook of Qualitative Data Collection (London: Sage, 2018) and The SAGE Handbook of Qualitative Research Design (London: Sage, 2022) and The SAGE Handbook of Qualitative Research Quality (London: Sage, 2025).