Ontology

Research

Philosophical stance on the nature of reality — realist (social structures exist independently) vs constructionist (reality is constituted through interpretation and interaction).

Sources

1. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy — “Social Ontology”, Brian Epstein (first published 21 March 2018; substantive revision 4 March 2024) plato.stanford.edu accessed 22 September 2026

In research-methods usage the relevant philosophy is social ontology, which Brian Epstein’s Stanford Encyclopedia entry describes as “the study of the nature and properties of the social world”. The entry surveys the realist and constructionist positions this lexicon entry contrasts, and notes a view that complicates the tidy opposition: social entities can be “both real and mind-dependent”. The realist-versus-constructionist choice presented in methods textbooks is therefore a simplification of a live philosophical debate, not a settled binary.

The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy is cited because it carries a named author and a dated revision for each entry, so the claim is attributable to a person on a date — which is the test this lexicon applies to reference sources, and the reason an open-edit encyclopedia is not used. The application to research practice above is this lexicon’s reading.

Related terms

• Abbreviation
• Abstract
• Abstraction
• Academic Database
• Analysis
• Annotation

From the AJG lexicon archive (July 2026).