Feminist research is not a form of empiricism since feminist scholars
often need greater conceptual clarity than is necessary for theoretical
critique in order to conduct empirical research. For instance, to make
abstract concepts and relationships amenable to empirical exploration
the feminist researcher must identify those which can be seen to exist
and are the most important for closer study, while also developing a
research methodology for translating and analysing them empirically
(see Caprioli 2004; Ackerly, Stern and True forthcoming).