I really found the theme of this week a lot more graspable and it felt pleasant to finally leave two weeks of more philosophical elements behind (even though some earlier terms and concepts were mentioned during the seminar). I prepared myself for the “research and theory” week by reading the papers which we were assigned and answered the questions according to them. Unfortunately i missed the lecture with Leif on monday since I had a mandatory lesson in another course but the seminar itself was really instructive and i learnt a lot during it.
During the seminar we were divided into groups and talked about our papers and what different kind of theories we have discovered but also about how we define theory. I actually thought I had grasped the definition of theory correctly but when Leif started to describe for us what theory really is, almost the entire room looked surprised. How we should see the difference between theory, knowledge, hypotheses and statements is something that came up during the entire seminar and was hard to completely understand. As i understand the word theory and its meaning now afterwards is that it is propositions we create ourselves that tries to explain and describe different phenomenon and it can be either strong or weak depending on different circumstances. Furthermore, to build a strong theory it has to be supported by a set of proven hypotheses and if the hypotheses are reformulated as a result of a strong theory, it can end up with new theories. Therefore, even if it’s hard to convince people about a new theory and why it should be accepted, it’s still possible and basically could be changed interminably.
When i read my text “The benefits of Facebook “Friends”: Social Capital And College Students” which was about the relationship between Facebook and social capital i never realized that social capital was a theory itself until Leif explained it for us. There are so many different theories we’re witnessing in our daily lives without noticing. It’s fascinating with this course how our perceptions of different concepts that we’re examine could change radically in a second and I will carry with me the knowledge of theory into the coming up weeks.
Hi,
SvaraRaderaIt is an interesting reflection.
During the seminar I also realize that many theories is hidden around us or maybe we are too busy to take notice on that. On the paper I choose (Laptop multitasking hinders classroom learning for both users and nearby peers), the writer only mentions 2 theories to support his hypothesis. However, in the seminar, Leif shows me that there are many theories that not mention by the writer, for the example, “every student want to get higher grade”, “noise when using a laptop is loud enough to distract people”, etc.
Furthermore, I agree that to support the hypothesis, we need a strong theory to support it. If I can correlate with the paper above, maybe this is the reason why the writer only mentions the main theory to support his hypothesis. Nice reflection