objects) and ‘mechanisms’ (dynamics that affect these interactions) (Alvesson and Sköldberg, 2009), and because of its rejection of not just the collective, holistic level of analysis but also the reductionist, individual level, (Bhaskar, 2008), it too was not considered appropriate as the philosophical underpinning. A relativist perspective was congruent with the focus of the research because it holds that reality is vested within the individual person (Easterby-Smith et al., 2002). This is not to deny the actual independent external existence of objective things (Bryman, 2008), which is accepted as entirely possible, and it is not to suggest that reality consists only of ideas in the mind, which is the ‘Philosophical Idealists’ perspective (Crotty, 1998). The perspective adopted holds, however, that external things are sensed and internalised through perceptual filtering, which creates (only) a representation of reality (Hamlyn, 2005), and it is this subjective reality created experientially in the mind (Alvesson and Deetz, 2000) that is the key focus for the research. This is consistent with the positioning of the self adopted for the research and discussed in section 2.4. Relativism maintains that a person’s sense, or perspective, of reality is vested in their individual, psychological experience, that is, it is ‘relative’ to their knowledge and meanings (Crotty, 1998), forming internal conceptions or ‘constructs’ (Kelly, 1955; 1963). As this relates to how people know about reality, I explore it further in the discussions on epistemology (section 3.2.2), and on Personal Construct Psychology (section 3.3.4) where individual views on reality due to variation in construct systems are discussed. In summary, I adopted a relativist perspective for the research because it is congruent with the research question and nature of the phenomena being explored. This ontological perspective is also congruent with my own convictions about the nature of reality. In the next section I consider the nature of knowledge and build a coherent paradigm for the current research by arguing an epistemological stance which is consistent with the ontological position, recognising that epistemological assumptions fundamentally underpin research strategy and methodology (Remenyi et al., 1998). 3.2.2
Perspective on Knowledge
A person’s epistemological perspective, how they know about reality, will be intimately related to their ontology to form their philosophical paradigm (Easterby-Smith et al., 2002) and can vary
110