Empirical studies 1899654 197338315 2008-03-10T21:58:58Z SmackBot 433328 Date the maintenance tags or general fixes {{Unreferenced|date=January 2008}} '''Empirical studies''' in [[social sciences]] are when the research ends are based on evidence and not just theory. This is done to comply with the [[scientific method]] that asserts the objective discovery of knowledge based on verifiable facts of evidence. The concept of an empirical study is divided into both [[quantitative]] and [[qualitative research]] [[epistemology]]. The statistical, data bound, analysis belongs to the [[quantitative]] and shares many research methodologies with the discipline [[economics]], while the qualitative works with data that are not easily analyzed numerically. Some interpret the lack of a statistical breakdown in qualitative works as what prevents an empirical analysis. Researcher’s empiricism is also criticized on the usage of secondary as opposed to primary sources. Primary evidence is the original form of data and by its very nature cannot be surpassed in authenticity. Thus, researcher’s empiricism has been tested on these grounds. Although sometimes primary documents are not available in a researcher’s subject area.{{Clarifyme|date=March 2008}} [[Category:Research]]