The Social Construction of Data: Methodological Problems of Investigating Learning in the Zone of Proximal Development

Abstract

Educational researchers have traditionally drawn on procedures and metaphors from the hard sciences to guide their thinking about methodological issues. One frequently invoked metaphor is that of the purity of data, which a researcher can contaminate through the process of investigation. This article questions the appropriateness of the purity metaphor, using a perspective provided by Vygotsky 's notion of the zone of proximal development (ZPD) and its emphasis on a genetic method in which development is mediated by cultural tools and signs. Methodological problems emerging from this conception of the ZPD-including problems of defining research, identifying an appropriate unit of analysis, considering the relationship between evidence and telos (an optimal sense of development), and accounting for the mediational role of assessment-are reviewed. Finally, the work of Luria (1976) is examined from the neo-Vygotskian perspective developed in this article.

How Korean Language Arts Teachers Adopt and Adapt Open Educational Resources: A Study of Teachers’ and Students’ Perspectives

“…The data from field notes, recordings, and interviews were analyzed by drawing on Vygotsky's (1978Vygotsky's ( , 1934Vygotsky's ( /1987 views on the social nature of human activity. From a Vygotskian perspective, data are "social constructs" established through the relationship of research context, participants, and researcher (Smagorinsky, 1995;Newell et al, 2014).…”

Child development within the framework of cultural-historical theory

“…Vygotsky (akt. Wertsch, 1997 : 68) Böylelikle bir yordayıcı olarak değerlendirildiğinde yakınsak gelişim alanı, çocuğun psikolojik gelişiminin analizinde iki farklı amaç için kullanılmaktadır (Brown ve Ferrara, 1989;Smagorinsky, 1995). Bunlardan ilki yakınsak gelişim alanının, bir gelişim evresinden diğerine geçiş için gerekli olan ve olgunlaşmaya devam eden psikolojik işlev (ve onlarla ilgili toplumsal etkileşim) türlerini tanımlamada yani bir evreden diğerine geçiş sürecinde söz konusu olan değişimin kaynağının belirlenmesinde kullanılmasını içermektedir.…”

“…Değişimin odağında da örneğin kavramlarla düşünme gibi bir psikolojik işlev vardır. Yakınsak gelişim alanının diğer işlevi ise, psikolojik gelişim için gerekli bu işlevlerin içselleştirilmesi ile bağlantılı olarak çocuğun varolan gelişimsel durumunu betimlemeyi ya da değerlendirmeyi mümkün kılmasıdır (Brown ve Ferrara, 1989;Smagorinsky, 1995). Chaiklin (2003) bu özelliği, "yakınsak gelişimin öznel alanı" (subjective zone of proximal development) olarak kavramsallaştırmaktadır.…”

Criteria for the Quality of Inquiry

“…Such research does not, to paraphrase Lewin (as cited by Cole, 1996, p. 225), take its point of departure in the subject's life space; instead, it changes that life space to fit the requirements of a predefined set of research conditions: it makes an experiment happen in a non-laboratory situation. The distinction is essential to good research in the nomological tradition, for if teachers were to begin to alter their practice in the course of the research on the basis of its results, or even of the fact that research is being done, this would "contaminate" the data, which would then become useless (Smagorinsky, 1995). Data should describe the world as it is; they should be objective in the sense that they are the product of the state of the world and of nothing else.…”

“…In that sense, no objectivity is possible, and all research constitutes an intervention in a practice. As Smagorinsky (1995Smagorinsky ( , 1998 showed, an idea about the desired direction of change is always already implicit in measurement instruments. This does not mean, however, that this idea is the only one possible.…”