Studies of decision-making in a renal dialysis unit and a special education establishment using talk as a resource

Abstract

This thesis comprises of studies of decision-making in two organizational settings: namely a renal dialysis unit and schools for maladjusted children. More specifically, the orientation to decision-making is one which deals with decision-making "glosses" and the accounts of those involved in doing the deciding. Because the concern is with glosses and accounts, a major resource in the following analysis consists of tape-recorded discussions in both types of organizations alluded to.
Although a general interest in decision-making corresponds to the interests of "conventional" sociology I have drawn upon the work of Garfinkel, Sacks, Schegloff (and othersusually described as ethnomethodologists). I have adopted somewhat of a "revisionist" stance in my analysis by drawing upon the work of conversational analysts in order to undertake, in an exploratory fashion, the use of a form of conversational analysis in the pursuit of more conventional sociological interests.
At a second, but emphatically not subordinate level, the following also refers to the continuing debate between proponents of the normative and interpretive paradigms in sociology.