Theory Building

Robert starts his book ( theory building) illustrating the source of a hypothesis to test a theory, theory correlation to hypothesis testing, the operation of the theory units, laws they interact with, boundaries of a theory, and the system state they all interact in. He emphasizes the use of logic theories in building a model, procedure to match a model in the real world, how to construct a theory to through modeling observations, as well as proving the theory by empirical tests.

In further detail he focuses on the first purpose of his book, making the distinction between asking questions and a theory. As research is based on a research question, he presents the two distinction differences of the benefit of research for theory and how theory serves research. Major parts of the book are centered around theory building in social science and minor areas on construction of math and chemistry models and theories. In social science behavior, the role of precision paradox and power paradox are examined and tested, defining the vital relationship of power paradox and prediction process in one of the book chapters.

Robert expands in his detail analysis to articulate the notion of transforming the understanding of a concept and turning it to a unit, how theories are built on properties of an object rather than the object. In this context units may be a variable or an attribute, unit types are primitive or sophisticated. In defining all the theory construction process in detail; this theory components are subject to laws of interaction and every theory is affected by different types of interactions. Laws of interactions have a direct correlation to the level of efficiency in theory operations. These laws and interactions introduce a problem in theory building the problem of independency from other science and the required level of analysis as many theories interact with other types of sciences in operations. He describes and analysis the shared boundary criteria by units and law models, and the types of boundaries theoretical and empirical.

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