42. Developmental Research

Rita C. Richey

Wayne State University

Wayne A. Nelson

Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville

The field of instructional technology has traditionally involved a unique blend of theory and practice. This blend is most obvious in developmental research, which involves the production of knowledge with the ultimate aim of improving the processes of instructional design, development, and evaluation. It is based on either situation-specific problem solving or generalized inquiry procedures. Developmental research, as opposed to simple instructional development, has been defined as "the systematic study of designing, developing and evaluating instructional programs, processes, and products that must meet the criteria of internal consistency and effectiveness" (Seels & Richey, 1994, p. 127). In its simplest form, developmental research could be either:

• A situation in which someone is performing instructional design, development, or evaluation activities and studying the process at the same time
  
• The study of the impact of someone else's instructional design and development efforts
  
• The study of the instructional design, development, and evaluation process as a whole, or of particular process components

In each case, the distinction is made between performing a process and studying that process. Reports of developmental research may take the form of a case study with retrospective analysis, an evaluation report, or even that of a typical experimental research report.

The purposes of this chapter(see footnote) are to:

• Explore the nature and background of developmental research
  
• Describe the major types of developmental research by examining a range of representative projects
• Analyze the methodological approaches used in the various types of developmental research
  
• Describe the issues, findings, and trends in recent developmental research
  
• Discuss the future of this type of research in our field