ABSTRACT
Depending on their research objectives, researchers select from three types of quantitative research designs: exploratory, descriptive or causal. A research project may involve the use of just one or two designs, or it may involve all three. Typically, a project begins with an exploratory study for preliminary identification of possible factors or variables, then moves to a descriptive study to define the salient or key variables and concludes with a causal study, such as an experiment, to test the variables for strength of association or cause-and-effect relationships. Exploratory research is often not discussed in any great detail in political science research textbooks. This chapter looks at some of the ways that exploratory designs can be used in all the subfields of political science.
