The methodology of building economics research

Academic research into building economics is comparatively new, if by academic research we mean the kind of research we have in well-established academic disciplines. It seems that a new discipline, like building economics, goes through a set of stages before it reaches scientific maturity. Initially, there is no research and the writing is prescriptive. When the research begins, it's essentially descriptive. This stage is followed by a stage of explanatory or analytical research where the aim is to build and test theories. The final step is the problem-solving stage where the theories and analytical techniques developed in the previous stage are used for forecasting and predictions or to solve practical problems.