Introduction to Communication Research (2nd Edition)

Citation

Reinard, J. (1999), "Introduction to Communication Research (2nd Edition)", Corporate Communications: An International Journal, Vol. 4 No. 4, pp. 208-209. https://doi.org/10.1108/ccij.1999.4.4.208.3

There is an obvious vacuum in provision of a suitable handbook on research methodology for students and managers of communicative action. Frustratingly, this is another text that fails to rise to the job.

The author seems intent on ensuring that his reader is corrected on any feeling that communication belongs to sociology, psychology, literature, etc. He wants us to believe that communication research (communication studies?) is a distinct field. Thus we are (mis)treated to three opening chapters that seek to justify the search for theory via hypotheses and subsequent application in measurement. That is all very well, but this still does not provide us with a way forward unless, as the author urges, we stick with scientific method.

For those who are satisfied with a scientific perspective on the world we live in, this book is as relevant as any other, and more so than many. It is well laid out and readable, and does emphasise doing research beyond talking about it. In many respects it is an updated account of the scientific orthodoxy, but that only goes so far.

Inevitably, such a book cannot say everything about the field. But this is perhaps its greatest weakness. The reader receives no clue that communication research can be treated in any other way. This is a worthwhile addition to the researcher’s knowledge base and will provide some valuable support – but it is over‐priced, in my opinion, and may find more space in libraries than in personal collections. Serious scholars are advised to seek inspiration and guidance in other texts. Recommended is Wendy Lees‐Hurwitz’s edited volume on social approaches to communication (Guilford Press, 1995).