Business research methods: systematic literature review

This academic research endeavours to progress by way of successive paradigm shifts. The current paper looks into four distinct typologies of research into the management field. It draws from a careful systematisation of research papers, through the use of the PRISMA software, which allows for an algorithm of scientific impact to be inferred. Four typologies of business research were identified and subsequently analysed with a view to identifying potential scientific impact. In doing so we aim to establish the relative importance of theoretical soundness vis-à-vis methodological approach as well as statistical and methods sophistication. The empirical superiority of quantitative empirical studies is strong in the current environment, whilst qualitative research in international business recurrently leads to a neo-positivist separation of theory and method, limiting discussions of the important ontological, epistemological and political issues involved in the research process.