Yvonna S. Lincoln is Professor Emerita at Texas A&M University, where she held the Ruth Harrington Chair of Educational Leadership and was Distinguished Professor of Higher Education. She is the coeditor of the journal Qualitative Inquiry, coeditor of the first through six editions of The SAGE Handbook of Qualitative Research, and coeditor of The SAGE Handbook of Critical and Indigenous Methodologies. As well, she is the coauthor, editor, or coeditor of more than a half dozen other books and volumes. She has served as the President of the Association for the Study of Higher Education and the American Evaluation Research Association, and as the Vice President for Division J (Postsecondary Education) for the American Educational Research Association. She is the author of coauthor of more than 100 chapters and journal articles on aspects of higher education or qualitative research methods and methodologies.

Post-Positivism and the Naturalistic ParadigmIs the Naturalistic Paradigm the Genuine Article?Constructed RealitiesThe Disturbing and Disturbed ObserverThe Only Generalization is There is no GeneralizationIs Causality a Viable Concept?Is Being Value-Free Valuable?Doing What Comes NaturallyDesigning a Naturalistic InquiryImplementing the Naturalistic InquiryEstablishing TrustworthinessProcessing Naturalistically-Obtained DataCase Reporting, Member Checking, and Auditing

Naturalistic Inquiry provides social scientists with a basic but comprehensive rationale for non-positivistic approaches to research. It confronts the basic premise underlying the scientific tradition that all questions can be answered by employing empirical, testable, replicable research techniques. The authors maintain that there are scientific facts that existing paradigms cannot explain, and argue against traditional positivistic inquiry. They suggest an alternative approach supporting the use of the naturalistic paradigm.