Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-fscjk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T03:55:13.190Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

12 - Interdisciplinary and Integrative Research

from Part II - Important Methodological Considerations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 December 2024

By
Rick Szostak
Edited by
John E. Edlund  and
Austin Lee Nichols
John E. Edlund
Affiliation:
Rochester Institute of Technology, New York
Austin Lee Nichols
Affiliation:
Central European University, Vienna
Get access

Summary

This chapter describes a common set of challenges faced in interdisciplinary research and strategies for addressing each of these challenges. These strategies are shown to be quite distinct from the disciplinary methods addressed in other chapters in this Handbook. Importantly, strategies are outlined for several distinct steps in the interdisciplinary research process. A set of challenges associated with team research is also identified, and a set of strategies for addressing these is presented. Having described how interdisciplinary research is performed, we are then able to clarify our definition of interdisciplinarity. The chapter closes with discussions of the relationship between interdisciplinarity and creativity, appropriate standards for evaluating interdisciplinary research, important concerns regarding the impact of interdisciplinary research on career progress, and the value of employing integrative strategies within disciplines. In all, the chapter urges a symbiotic relationship between specialized and interdisciplinary research.

Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge Handbook of Research Methods and Statistics for the Social and Behavioral Sciences
Volume 2: Performing Research
 , pp. 261 - 282
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2024

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bergmann, M., Jahn, T., Knobloch, T., Krohn, W., Pohl, C., & Schramm, E. (2012). Methods for Transdisciplinary Research: A Primer for Practice. Campus.Google Scholar
British Academy. (2021). Knowledge Exchange in the SHAPE Disciplines. www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/publications/knowledge-exchange-in-the-shape-disciplinesGoogle Scholar
Bromme, R. (2000). Beyond one’s own perspective: The psychology of cognitive interdisciplinarity. In Weingart, P. and Stehr, N. (eds.), Practicing Interdisciplinarity (pp. 115–133). University of Toronto Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Buzan, T. (2010). The Mindmap Book. BBC Books.Google Scholar
Fam, D., & O’Rourke, M. (eds.). (2021). Interdisciplinary and Transdisciplinary Failures: Lessons Learned from Cautionary Tales. Routledge.Google Scholar
Frickel, S., et al. (eds.). (2016). Investigating Interdisciplinary Collaboration: Theory and Practice across Disciplines. Rutgers University Press.Google Scholar
Galison, P. (1997). Image and Logic: A Material Culture of Microphysics. University of Chicago PressGoogle Scholar
Hall, K. L., Vogel, A. L., & Croyle, R. T. (eds.). (2019). Strategies for Team Science Success: Handbook of Evidence-Based Principles for Cross-Disciplinary Science and Practical Lessons Learned from Health Researchers. Springer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hesse-Bulber, S., & Johnson, R. B. (eds.). (2015). Oxford Handbook of Multimethod and Mixed Methods Research Inquiry. Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hirsch Hadorn, G., Hoffmann-Riem, H., Biber-Klemm, S., Grossenbacher-Mansuy, W., Joye, D., Pohl, C., et al. (eds.). (2008). Handbook of Transdisciplinary Research. Springer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Holley, K., & Szostak, R. (2022). Interdisciplinary education and research in North America. In Klein, J. T. and Baptista, B. V. (eds.), Interdisciplinarity and Transdisciplinarity: Institutionalizing Collaboration across Cultures and Communities. Routledge.Google Scholar
Jacobs, Jerry A. (2013). In Defense of Disciplines: Interdisciplinarity and Specialization in the Research University. University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Laursen, B. K., Motzer, N., & Anderson, K. J. (2022). Pathway profiles: Learning from five main approaches to assessing interdisciplinarity. Research Evaluation, 32(2), 213–227. https://doi.org/10.1093/reseval/rvac036CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lumsden, K. (2019). Introduction: The reflexive turn and the social sciences. In Lumsden, K., Bradford, J., & Goode, J. (eds.), Reflexivity: Theory, Method, and Practice (pp. 1–36). Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lyall, C. (2019). Being an Interdisciplinary Academic: How Institutions Shape Careers. Palgrave Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lyall, C., Bruce, A., Tait, J., & Meagher, L. (2011). Interdisciplinary Research Journeys. Bloomsbury Academic.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McLeish, T., and Strang, V. (2016). Evaluating interdisciplinary research: The elephant in the peer-reviewers’ room. Palgrave Communications, 2, 16055.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Newell, W. H. (2001). A theory of interdisciplinary studies. Issues in Integrative Studies, 19, 1–25.Google Scholar
Okamura, K. (2019). Interdisciplinarity revisited: Evidence for research impact and dynamism. Palgrave Communications, 5, 141.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
O’Rourke, M., Crowley, S., Eigenbrode, S. D., & Wulfhorst, J. D. (eds.). (2014). Enhancing Communication and Collaboration in Interdisciplinary Research. SAGE Publications.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Repko, A. F., Newell, W. H., & Szostak, R. (eds.). (2012). Case Studies in Interdisciplinary Research. SAGE Publications.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Repko, A., & Szostak, R. (2020). Interdisciplinary Research: Process and Theory, 4th ed. SAGE Publications.Google Scholar
Repko, A., Szostak, R., & Buchberger, R. (2020). Introduction to Interdisciplinary Studies. SAGE Publications.Google Scholar
Sternberg, R. J. (2006). The nature of creativity. Creativity Research Journal, 18(1), 87–98.Google Scholar
Szostak, R. (2004). Classifying Science: Phenomena, Data, Theory, Method, Practice. Springer.Google Scholar
Szostak, R. (2012). The interdisciplinary research process. In Repko, A. F., Newell, W. H., & Szostak, R. (eds.), Case Studies in Interdisciplinary Research (pp. 3–19). SAGE Publications.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Szostak, R. (2017a). Interdisciplinary research as a creative design process. In Darbellay, F., Moody, Z., & Lubart, T. (eds.), Creative Design Thinking from an Interdisciplinary Perspective (pp. 17–33). Springer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Szostak, R. (2017b). Stability, instability, and interdisciplinarity. Issues in Interdisciplinary Studies, 35, 65–87.Google Scholar
Szostak, R. (2022). Integrating the Human Sciences: Enhancing Cohesion and Progress across the Social Sciences and Humanities. Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Szostak, R, Gnoli, C., & López-Huertas, M. (2016). Interdisciplinary Knowledge Organization. Springer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ulibarri, N., Cravens, A. E., Nabergoj, A. S., Kernbach, S., & Royalty, A. (2019). Creativity in Research: Cultivate Clarity, Be Innovative, and Make Progress in your Research Journey. Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×