ABSTRACT
This chapter describes qualitative research that is originated as a systematic approach to scholarly inquiry in disciplines typically characterized as social sciences and humanities, such as sociology and anthropology. The chapter expresses the attempt that untangles the circular argument that underscores much of the evidence dialogue within qualitative research circles, and proposes an alternative approach to understanding the appropriate role of qualitative research processes and products in addressing the problems that the evidence based practice (EBP) movement was meant to solve. It considers the evidential knowledge, which takes the form of justified true beliefs in the form of propositions that can be articulated and confirmed using systematic processes capable of substantiating the warrants for that truth value. The qualitative research is unlikely to offer much by way of competition to its quantitative counterparts by way of such measures as prediction, control, population generalizability, correlation, and causality.
