DEBATES THAT CHARACTERIZE A PARADIGM OR WORLD VIEW AS EITHER QUANTITATIVE OR QUALITATIVE REST ON TWO ASSUMPTIONS: THAT A METHOD TYPE MUST BE LINKED TO A PARADIGM AND THAT THE CHOICE BETWEEN QUANTITATIVE AND QUALITATIVE PARADIGMS IS THE ONLY CHOICE AVAILABLE. EXAMPLES DRAWN FROM ETHNOGRAPHY, GEOLOGY, AND STATISTICS SUGGEST THAT THE LINKAGE BETWEEN PARADIGM AND METHOD SHOULD BE RECONSIDERED, THAT THE LINKAGES THAT EXIST MIGHT WELL BE THE RESULT OF AN ADAPTIVE EVALUATION, AND THAT THE MOST FUNDAMENTAL DISTINCTION BETWEEN THE PARADIGMS MAY EXIST ON THE DIMENSION OF VERIFICATION VERSUS DISCOVERY. SINCE ATTRIBUTES OF PARADIGMS ARE LOGICALLY INDEPENDENT, RESEARCHERS CAN MIX AND MATCH THE ATTRIBUTES FROM BOTH PARADIGMS TO ACHIEVE THE COMBINATION MOST APPROPRIATE FOR THE RESEARCH PROBLEM AND SETTING UNDER STUDY. SIMILARLY, SINCE THE CHOICE OF METHODS IS NOT DETERMINED BY ALLEGIANCE TO AN ARBITRARY PARADIGM, AND SINCE THIS CHOICE DEPENDS AS MUCH ON CHARACTERISTICS OF THE SPECIFIC RESEARCH SETTING AS ON PARADIGM ATTRIBUTES, RESEARCHERS SHOULD BE ABLE TO CHOOSE BETWEEN BOTH QUANTITATIVE AND QUALITATIVE METHODOLOGIES. SUCH A COMBINATION COULD HELP RESEARCHERS DEAL WITH THE MULTIPLE PURPOSES OF EVALUATION RESEARCH, COMPENSATE FOR BIAS, AND OFFER POSSIBLE INSIGHTS NOT AVAILABLE FROM THE EXCLUSIVE USE OF ONE OR THE OTHER METHODOLOGY. CONSTRAINTS OF TIME, BUDGET, TRAINING, AND CURRENT TRENDS SHOULD, HOWEVER, BE TAKEN INTO ACCOUNT. REFERENCES ARE GIVEN. (AOP)