Empirical communication research

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The Empirical communication research strives human communication to make by means of data collection in the field categorized. The categories or forms of communication accepted must be able to be substantiated by data obtained in the field. Empirical communication research is used in cultural and humanities disciplines such as socio- or ethnology , where it can be part of network analysis, for example , but it is also attracting increasing interest in the field of corporate research .

Empirical means to collect experience about reality, to systematize it and to apply this systematics to the subject area of ​​communication science. There are various methods of data collection within the empirical procedures:

  • survey
  • Content analysis
  • observation
  • Physiological measurement

The survey (written questionnaire, telephone interview, ...) is primarily used to collect attitudes and opinions on a certain topic. With the content analysis one tries to analyze the content of the communication. When making observations, the focus is on natural, real behavior. Survey and content analysis are the most frequently used methods of data collection. Both methods can be applied experimentally or non-experimentally .

Considered empirical communication research as a process, it follows a fixed scheme. You develop a general hypothesis, a theory, translate it into an empirical procedure, for example a survey, develop indicators that are converted into a question and try to draw conclusions about the original consideration from the results of the investigation.

The aim of empirical communication research is to describe and explain communication science phenomena. Here again a distinction can be made between descriptive and explanatory research. While the former is aimed at the systematic description of certain phenomena, such as the concrete use of media in the population, explanatory research deals with if-then relationships between two or more facts.

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ H.-B. BROSIUS, F. KOSCHEL: Methods of empirical communication research . West German Publishing House, Wiesbaden 2001

literature

  • H.-B. BROSIUS, F. KOSCHEL: Methods of empirical communication research . Westdeutscher Verlag, Wiesbaden 2001, ISBN 3-531-13365-9 .