Traditionally, research has been classified as two types: pure- and applied-research.
Pure research deals with theories while applied research deals with testing of theories
in the real world. However, according to (Phillips & Pugh, 2005) this twofold
classification is too restrictive, i.e. it does not very well reflect the research applied in
academia. Therefore, they have proposed a classification of research in three types:
exploratory, testing-out, and problem solving. These classifications cover both
qualitative and quantitative research methods: