Morality in Scientific Practice: The Relevance and Risks of Situated Scientific Knowledge in Application-Oriented Social Research

After decades of epistemological inquiry on the social construction of science, we have observed a renewed consensus on empiricism in application-oriented social sciences and a growing trust in evidence-based practice and decision-making. Drawing on the long-standing debate on value-ladenness, evidence and normativity in sciences, this article theoretically discusses and empirically illustrates the Life-World origins of methods in a domain of inquiry strongly characterized by an empiricist epistemic culture and a normative stance: Children and Media Studies. Adopting a reflexive approach to their own research in such an epistemologically underexplored field, the authors analyze a standard research instrument (the codebook for content analysis) and two procedures (operational definitions and intercoder agreement). The analysis illustrates how background assumptions (e.g., moral suitability) shape the research method and how the procedures routinely conceal this work of shaping. In the discussion the authors cast light on the role scientific procedures play in the naturalization of a given moral order, and put forward the question of whether and how this "morality-building" feature of methods should be taken into account in the assessment of their appropriateness. In the conclusion the authors advance that the situated nature of scientific knowledge, rather than discrediting its relevance, is what makes it relevant, here and now, for the larger community the research may impact on. The authors discuss the risks of such a pragmatic outcome and propose the adoption of an oscillating epistemic stance as a way to cope with them.