Transferability

Brief History

In the second half of the twentieth century, a shift occurred in discussions of research quality. An earlier tradition of quantitative research persisted, characterized by experimental design and statistical analysis of increasing sophistication. At the same time, discussion of qualitative research rigour increased. Reflecting the growth, The SAGE Handbook of Qualitative Research passed through four editions between 1993 and 2011. However, in much of the literature, experimental [Page 786]designs (i.e. research designs involving careful control of predetermined variables), and especially randomized control trials, were regarded as the research approach to be encouraged. Many governments held similar views: In the USA, the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 was explicit that only experimental designs counted as quality research and deserved government support.

Initial discussions of qualitative research often used the same terms and concepts as quantitative research, modifying them only as necessary to accommodate the different characteristics of qualitative research. Generalizability was the term used to describe the application, in one study or situation, of research findings from a different research study. Yvonna Lincoln was a prominent champion of qualitative methods during the period under discussion. To counter the dominance of quantitative research, she proposed replacing the methodological concepts of quantitative research with different terms. Transferability was substituted for generalizability and became a term in common use in the qualitative literature and the action research literature.

Later still, there was a move to choose terms that were devised independently rather than being based upon quantitative research concepts. In these later formulations, transferability as a label was less in evidence, though still in use by some authors. By the time of the appearance of the 2011 SAGE Handbook of Qualitative Research, the concept for Lincoln had become cumulation—the cumulative addition to knowledge by each of a number of studies.

Transferability of Action Research

Action research and case study research—all or most action research can be regarded as intervention case study—have both been criticized for a lack of transferability. It has been argued that generalization is not possible from a single case, though that has been disputed. In some current qualitative research, the issue is not regarded as important or relevant. Many qualitative researchers take the constructivist view that reality is not directly knowable. All theory is therefore a construction of unknown relevance to an unknowable reality. On this view, there is no definitive means of distinguishing one construction from another. A much quoted chapter in Guba and Lincoln's 1979 book Naturalistic Inquiry is titled ‘The Only Generalization Is: There Is No Generalization’. Some action researchers hold a similar constructivist position, and of them, some have accepted that transferability is not possible. An alternative view is more pragmatic: The main aim of action research is to bring about improvement in some social situation. What is important is what works.

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