QUANTITATIVE RESEARCH: NATURE AND SIGNIFICANCE

Quantitative research is empirical in nature; it is also known as the scientific research paradigm. The paradigm ensures validity by the process of rigorous clarification, definition or use of pilot experiments. That is trying out the instruments before hand, and checking their relevance with experts and assessing their reliability by use of statistical tests. This approach can be further sub-classified into inferential, experimental and simulation approaches to research. Quantitative research involves significant issues where a study seeks to create an understanding of the various assumptions that have been developed in a given study. In general, a lot of quantitative research tends to be confirmatory and deductive. But there are many quantitative researches that can be classified as exploratory as well. The data collected in quantitative research are, as mentioned, hard. The strength of producing numbers as data is that this demonstrates an ordered system Such an approach could be viewed as being necessary in an organization as big as the NHS, for as Spencer (1983) suggests, preparing an off-duty rota for 5000 employees needs quantitative methods and a computer This argument is also supported by Kileen's (1981) study regarding new mothers where there was a need to use numerical data to identify the nursing resources needed, number of nurses involved, and what difference they made to patient outcome, length of stay, cost-effectiveness of discharge planning and the length of the tune patients stayed out of hospital before any re-admission.