Causal reasoning about education: What is it and what should it be?

Abstract

Education is about promoting particular change and development. Educational research should reflect the special ontology of education, which we characterize in terms of meaningful movement in motion, where different interest holders have positions, purposes, and potential. Methodologically, this implies a focus on actuality and generativity rather than on generalizable laws. This would mean that there is no replication crisis in education because there is no stable, universal system of relations within which results can be replicated. We call for collaboration with philosophers in enabling educational researchers to deliberate on the conception(s) of causality appropriate to their specific work and argue that more generally, to contribute to the flourishing of education, educational research needs to shift attention from mechanistic to intentional (teleological) conceptions of causation.