METHODOLOGY
11
2.2 Action Research as a Theoretical
Methodology
The LEED O+M rating system may facilitate the POE process but
the aspect of multi-party interaction and participatory activities
important to LEED Lab can be evaluated through action. These
demand specic attention to how researchers (i.e., staff, consult-
ants) engage with participants.
4
In LEED Lab, research occurs
within the context of an occupied building through the cumula-
tive information gained from students’ diagnoses (Figure 2.1).
However, it is critically dependent on communication with other
parties, consultants, and facility personnel. These stakeholders
are involved in the decisions which affect the operations and
stability of their facilities beyond the LEED Lab course.
Originally coined in 1944 by Kurt Lewin as “comparative
research on the conditions and effects of various forms of social
action and research leading to social action,”
5
the purpose of the
action research strategy has evolved to that of solving a particu-
lar problem and producing guidelines for best practice.
6
Leading
scientists distinguish action research from basic research by
asserting that the intention of the former is to solve an important
problem for a client, and not simply to test features of a theory.
7
Researchers Jon Barton, John Stephens and Tim Haslett have
created a normative set of criteria for use in the designing and
assessing of action research and in so doing represent action
research as a scientically rigorous methodology.
8
LEED Lab
identies and utilizes four of their criteria:
1. Team processes that adopt multiple perspectives and plu-
ralist values both as a hedge against fallible behavior and
as a platform for ethical practice;
2. Logical processes that can be easily identified with abduc-
tive, deductive and inductive modes of inference;
Fig 2.1 LEED Lab students
design and build a rainwater
cistern as a part of pursuing
water reduction credits, after
it was discovered that there
were many opportunities
for creative stormwater
management
Source: Photo by Patricia
Andrasik, 2017
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