Using theory – To predict outcomes, describe, analyse or interpret? A framework for analysing the use of theories

This article directs attention to theory in academic writing. The empirical material analysed consists of 52 Swedish doctoral dissertations on social work in healthcare, published between 2008 and 2019. The aim of the study is to describe and suggest a framework for analysing the use of theories in research work. The results suggest that the field is characterised by an intersection of sciences, mirrored by two overarching ways of understanding theory. One approach, less frequently drawn upon, is analysed as influenced by the health sciences, understanding theory as a means of predicting outcomes by using different variables, without defining them within a broader theoretical framework. Theorising is here analysed as the enabling of predicting outcomes, by generalisations. The more common approach to theory is analysed as influenced by the social sciences, understanding theory as a way of understanding society and social relations, explicitly defining and referencing the concepts used. Within this second approach, theorising is done differently and, drawing on Wolcott´s descriptions of ways of doing analysis in ethnography, we propose three ways of understanding this theorising, conceptualised as Description, Analyses and Interpretation. In the article we outline how different understandings of theory and theorising allow for different kinds of knowledge to be gained. The framework presented can be useful for students and researchers when planning research and writing academic texts, clarifying different ways of understanding theory and the potential use of variables and theoretical concepts: from aim, to analysis and implications.