‘Knowledge must be contextual’: Some possible implications of complexity and dynamic systems theories for educational research

It is now widely accepted that qualitative and quantitative research traditions, rather than being seen as opposed or in competition with each other (Hammersley & Atkinson, 1995; Furlong, 2004) should be used, where appropriate, in some kind of combination (Bryman & Cramer, 1999; Moore et. al. 2003). How this combining is to be understood ontologically, and therefore epistemologically, however, is not always clear. After looking briefly at the wide variety of different practices and epistemologies which are conflated in the use of qualitative/quantitative as a binary concept, the paper will explore this area of ‘critical connections’ in relation to the analysis of data. Complexity/dynamic systems theory will be explored as offering the basis of a different kind of ontology which might open up possibilities for creating different types of knowledge (see Byrne, 1997).