Practitioners know more than they can say. They think in action, and learn by reflecting on it afterwards.
- +Fits Pragmatism, Interpretivism, Phenomenology
- –Tension with Positivism
The longer story
Donald Schön's The Reflective Practitioner (1983) argued that professionals such as architects, designers, musicians and therapists do not simply apply theory to problems. They work in messy situations where the problem itself has to be framed, and they know more than they can put into words. He called this knowing-in-action.
His terms reflection-in-action and reflection-on-action gave practice research a way of describing how making generates knowledge. He also named the opposing view "technical rationality", the belief that real knowledge is scientific and practice merely applies it. If your thesis includes a body of practice, Schön is very likely in the bibliography.