Dr.Hab., Professor A.F. Zakirova^1
1Tyumen State University, Tyumen

Keywords: research methodology, conceptual basics, natural-scientific paradigm, humanitarian paradigm, hermeneutical approach.

Background. The Research Methodology and Tools in Physical Education and Sports discipline is included in the Professional Cycle (optional) module for Master education course of 49.04.01 Physical Education discipline. This education course is designed to build students’ competences in the modern research process design methods applicable in the physical culture and sports sector and customisable to the relevant specialties. The course includes materials on the modern theoretical grounds of educational and psychological research; new methods and toolkits; research methods harmonising and combining aspects; special research methods and procedures; educational experiments and their design; research data reporting and analysing basics; and training studies.

Modern research methodology mastering course with its systemic content, procedures and education technologies is traditionally designed based on the following:

• Social order for modern professional education and its interpretation by the process actors;
• Contexts of the modern socio-cultural and educational strategies and world-outlook-related challenges faced by teachers, trainers and instructors;
• New research data and most efficient research technologies; and
• Considerations for the multilevel structure of the necessary competences and the valid requirements to the specialist training process.

On the whole the above research methodology mastering course design strategy with the relevant physical education and sports master training models, tools and methods meets the modern requirements to the individualised culture- and competencyy-building specialist training process. It should be noted, however, that special theoretical studies supported by practical positive experience of the new master training course application at Tyumen State University were found beneficial for the research competences of masters being further advanced based on the theoretically grounded and systemic combination of classical and new educational vectors applying hermeneutic technologies for practical research in the modern physical culture and sports sector.

Objective of the study was to demonstrate benefits of hermeneutic technologies being applied to build conceptual basics for the Research Methodology and Tools in Physical Education and Sports curriculum for the master education course.

Methods and structure of the study. The conceptual basics for the Research Methodology and Tools in Physical Education and Sports curriculum imply the relevant world-outlook-, resource- and process-related education components that need to be duly harmonised.

The world-outlook-related component determines the cognitive foundation for the physical culture and sports sector problems and issues being addressed by the researcher. We believe that most productive in this context is the research activity modelling approach offered by V.S. Stepin that implies the following constituents being used to build a research process: research ideals and standards; theoretical worldview; and valid philosophical grounds of science. Internal structure of every such constituent, as provided by V.S. Stepin, may be classified in few elements in its turn. The research ideals and standards include the cognitive settings as such (including description/ explanation/ evidence/ substantiations/ knowledge system governing standards) plus the relevant social standards regulating the role of science as dictated by the national social development stage [6].

It should be emphasised that a research methodology as an education subject may be conceptually well grounded only when the world-outlook-, resource- and process-related education components are duly harmonised i.e. the key aspects of the research activity are consistent and correlated to specify its objective, goals, subject, guiding research hypothesis, theoretical and practical research and test methods and tools. When the above research toolkit is disharmonised (for instance, the guiding hypothesis is inconsistent with the research goals and/or the test methods are irrelevant to the research subject etc.), the research will come to a system failure and degrade to theoretical declarations, simulacrums and valueless experimental results irrelevant to the purposes of the study.

Such inconsistencies and disharmonies are often due to the researching masters having vague understanding of the meanings of ‘natural-scientific paradigm’ and humanitarian paradigm’, heuristic potential of the inter-paradigm interaction in research of human nature with its biological aspect on the one hand and socio-cultural aspect on the other hand.

Students of a physical culture university on the whole acquire some knowledge at the bachelor training stage on the basics of humanitarian sciences that are generally driven by the idea of integral human nature composed of the biological and socio-cultural elements, with the physical and spiritual education evolving in the relevant universe, time and culture as well as the life process on the whole and professional sport educational process in particular. Monitoring of the students’ academic research practices has shown that the classical research models (with their requirements to accuracy, objectiveness, accountability and repeatability of research findings) once generated by natural sciences and now traditional for modern biology, medicine, environmental science etc. – still need to be balanced by the humanitarian approach with its natural focus on individual, unique and genuine aspects.

Our study has shown that the modern research mastering education in the physical culture and sports sector applies the idea of natural-scientific and humanitarian approaches integration mostly in the general world-outlook-related education component (i.e. in setting the educational process goals and didactic concepts); and to a much lesser degree in the claimed-resource-related education component (i.e. in the research material mining domain with the relevant interdisciplinary links being employed). Practical attempts to apply the humanitarian research methods and procedures with due efforts to secure a good combination/ synergy of humanitarian and natural-scientific approaches in a physical education and sports research – are even more seldom. Therefore, understanding of the integrated structure of the human nature is more often than not limited to vain declarations and, hence, practical research is fraught with paradigm-related inconsistencies and disharmonies.

Our practical experience shows that it is the hermeneutic approach with its idea of perception and interpretation driven by both rational logics and values of research mechanisms that actually helps the masters learn the creative thinking mechanisms with understanding of the relevant world-outlook- and technology-related aspects of human life activity; with a human being considered in its natural (homo naturalis), religious (homo religiosus), intelligent (homo sapiens, homo faber) aspects, and at the same time in its playing and reading (homo ludens, homo legens), meanings creating (homo significans) and perceiving (homo intellegens) aspects. The hermeneutic approach to interpretation of the human nature and reality applies the toolkits provided both in the modern humanitarian and natural sciences, plus other sources of educational material and process interpretations, with all resource of the humanitarian knowledge being applied for the interpretations. The hermeneutic-approach-driven research methods and tools help actively employ not only the traditional notions of anthropological knowledge like human, soul, individual, personality, individuality etc. but also the notions provided by the hermeneutical doctrine like understanding, interpretation, sense, sign, meaning, symbol, metaphor, dialogue, reflexion etc. In the cultural and physical education domain, the humanitarian paradigm is based on the recognition of every individual human value and uniqueness of every individual life event, with material for the humanitarian studies provided by any cultural manifestations generated by science, religion, arts, language, common sense and ethnic education. Knowledge of humanity and educational reality provided by arts studies, aesthetics, cultural studies, semiotics and psycholinguistics, is always personality-centred.

The hermeneutic approach as the humanitarian research aspect employing and strengthening tool is highly productive at every stage and level of research, including theoretical/ empirical/ practical research data mining stage; operational hypothesis shaping and development stage; outcome data assessment and interpretation stage; study report production stage; and defence of the research findings and ideas in scientific debates [2].  The humanitarian theoretical and empirical research methods may be listed as follows: biographical method; intelligent dialogue with an author of theoretical/ journalistic/ religious/ artistic text; provoking a conflict of interpretations; mereologic (as an alternative to inductive-deductive) conclusion; etymological analysis of terms and definitions followed by studies of scientific knowledge geneses; metaphoric modelling in hypothesising process; terminology production and reproduction method; reflexion focused on research errors; comparisons and combinations of paradigm-related and narrative descriptions of the research subject etc.

The classical and hermeneutic approaches in their combination facilitate the research subject being fully conceptualised and addressed by the relevant productive and diverse hypotheses to generate, in compliance with the general logics and principles of the modern physical education and training process, individualised humanitarian knowledge with due focus on human development in the socio-cultural and physical aspects.

Conclusion. Conceptual basics for the Research Methodology and Tools in Physical Education and Sports curriculum for the master education course were designed based on a harmonic unity of the world-outlook-, resource- and process-related education components with the natural-scientific and humanitarian approaches being duly balanced and synergised. It is the hermeneutic approach that provides an efficient toolkit for the humanitarian approach in the research process learning under the master training course that gives the means to develop necessary knowledge of the integral human nature; development and cultural processes evolving in certain universe, time and culture; and the most productive modern general and physical education strategies and technologies sensitive to the complex human nature.

References

1. Gurevich P.S. Filosofskoe tolkovanie cheloveka [Philosophical interpretation of man]. Moscow: Center for Humanitarian Initiatives publ., 2012, 472 p.
2. Zakirova A.F. O gumanitarnoy spetsifike nauchno-pedagogicheskogo issledovaniya [Humanitarian specifics of scientific pedagogical research]. Vestnik Tyumenskogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta. Gumanitarnye issledovaniya. Humanitates, 2012, no. 9, pp. 12-19.
3. Zakirova A.F., Manzheley I.V. Vydvizhenie gipotezy v nauchno-pedagogicheskom issledovanii po problemam fizicheskoy kultury i sporta [Hypothesizing process in research education studies of physical culture and sports]. Teoriya i praktika fiz. kultury, 2016, no. 12, pp. 90 – 92.
4. Kuznetsov V.G. Germenevtika i gumanitarnoe poznanie [Hermeneutics and humanitarian cognition]. Moscow: MSU publ., 1991,192 p.
5. Slobodchikov V.I., Isaev E.I. Osnovy psikhologicheskoy antropologii. Psikhologiya cheloveka: Vvedenie v psikhologiyu subjektivnosti. Ucheb. posobie dlya vuzov [Fundamentals of psychological anthropology. Human psychology: Introduction to psychology of subjectivity. Academic textbook]. Moscow: Shkola – Press publ., 1995, 384 p.
6. Stepin V.S., Rozov M.A. Filosofiya nauki i tekhniki [Philosophy of Science and Technology]. Moscow: Gardarika publ., 1996, 400 p.

Corresponding author: a.fagalovna@mail.ru

Abstract

The study offers conceptual basics for the Research Methodology and Tools in Physical Education and Sports curriculum for a master education course, with a special emphasis on the challenges of the research methodology learning in the master education course. We considered the paradigm-related disharmonies and contradictions in the process of natural-scientific and humanitarian components of the research technology being integrated. Of special interest were the theoretical knowledge integration related limitations in the general world outlook aspect – when the didactic principles and educational process goals are set and, to a lesser degree – in the theoretical material selection process driven by the interdisciplinary connections; and it is also noted that the modern research methods applied in humanitarian sciences are still underemployed in actual practices. The study overviews benefits of the humanitarian research paradigm driven by every personality value and meaning of every individual life event being highly appreciated. The study data and analyses were used to outline the potential ways to improve the academic progress in the research domain by theoretically grounded and systemic synergies in the research process with the classical and new research approaches being combined; and demonstrated potential benefits of hermeneutical technologies for the problem-solving in the physical culture and sports sector.