Causality and Causal Explanation: The Constitution of Sufficient Reasoning in Social Research

Abstract

As Social Researchers, we have for the last one and half decades witnessed a disturbing lag in the existing body of literature for causal explanations. The majority seem to contradict and provide no clear-cut explanations about the relevancy of applying causal techniques to understand social patterns. Much as it is true that understanding social processes and patterns is in many ways more challenging than understanding the physical world, social researchers need to provide a justification to these complexities through scientific inquiry using causal techniques and interpretations. Many times social researchers concentrate on the simple linearity between cause and effect and yet its ability to explain reality is doubtable. This sounds to reason that, our focus as social experts should be on what form of social interactions extend over time in the social world to establish the links between cause and effect. Again, how relevant is the available evidence to claim that social factor X causes a change in social factor Y? In other words, is social factor Y a function of social factor X? To establish a scientific conclusion and perhaps shed light on why things in the social world are the way they are, one must logically identify a competent X that can independently predict a change in Y through covariates. In light of this, social researchers can vividly offer logical explanations to various social processes which often seem to be beyond human description.   In this paper, the researchers offer a scientific explanation concerning the various errors in reasoning within the social world and provide a distinction between various types of social explanations, articulate causal reasoning behind social processes, events and patterns in order to draw conclusions that are based on evidence.