方法对比

	描述性研究	趋势研究
领域	研究设计	研究设计
方法族	Process / pipeline	Process / pipeline
起源年份	Late 19th century; formalized in social/behavioral sciences ~1960s–1980s	Mid-20th century (formalised in social science methodology ~1950s–1960s)
提出者	Francis Galton, Karl Pearson (early empirical tradition); formalized in social science by Fred Kerlinger	Earl Babbie and survey research tradition
类型	Non-experimental quantitative research design	Quantitative longitudinal research design
开创性文献	Creswell, J. W. (2014). Research Design: Qualitative, Quantitative, and Mixed Methods Approaches (4th ed.). Sage. ISBN: 978-1452226101	Creswell, J. W. (2014). Research Design: Qualitative, Quantitative, and Mixed Methods Approaches (4th ed.). Sage. ISBN: 978-1452226101
别名	descriptive study, descriptive survey design, observational descriptive research, non-experimental descriptive research	trend study, trend survey, longitudinal trend study, time-series survey
相关	3	4
摘要	Descriptive research is a non-experimental quantitative design that systematically documents the characteristics, frequencies, or distributions of variables in a defined population at a given point in time. It answers 'what is' questions — who, what, when, where, and how much — without manipulating variables or drawing causal conclusions. It is one of the most widely used research designs across the social, behavioral, health, and education sciences.	Trend research is a longitudinal quantitative design that tracks changes in a characteristic of a general population over time by surveying different, independently drawn samples at two or more time points. Unlike panel studies, the same individuals are not followed; rather, each wave draws a fresh sample from the same population, allowing researchers to detect population-level shifts in attitudes, behaviours, or conditions while avoiding the attrition and panel conditioning problems of repeated-measures designs.