文档介绍：Some Questions about Evidence-based Practice in Education
Martyn Hammersley
Faculty of Education and Language Studies
The Open University
Walton Hall
Milton Keynes
MK6 7AA
email: m.******@
Paper presented at the symposium on "Evidence-based practice in education" at the Annual Conference of the British Educational Research Association, University of Leeds, England, September 13-15, 2001
The movement for evidence-based practice, for enhanced use of research evidence in the work of the professions, started in medicine in the early 1990s. It has grown in influence there, and spread across a number of other fields, including education (see Trinder 2000a and Davies et al 2000). Not surprisingly, it has taken a somewhat different form in each area; and has generated diverse reactions. So, while much can be learned from what has happened in medicine, we must also attend to the particular way evidence-based practice has recently been promoted and responded to in education, if we are to make a reasonable appraisal of it.
There is an initial, and generic, problem with the notion of evidence-based practice which needs to be dealt with. This is that its name is a slogan whose rhetorical effect is to discredit opposition. After all, who would argue that practice should not be based on evidence (Shahar 1997:110)? So there is an implication built into the phrase 'evidence-based practice' that opposition to it can only be irrational. Interestingly, critics managed to counter this by denying that practice can be based on evidence; in the sense that research evidence can provide its exclusive foundation. The response to this on the part of advocates has been to change "evidence-based" to "evidence-informed" practice(1). At face value, this suggests a more reasonable view of the relationship between research and practice. However, it is at odds with the radical role that is ascribed to research by the evidence-based practice movement. As a result, even more th