Methodology
Past empirical research on the relationship between corporate social and financial performance shows that most of them have been deductive. The deductive approach assumed a hypothesis about the said relationship – either positive or negative, and sought to verify the hypothesis through testing of a sample of corporations. The inductive approach tested a sample of companies to find out specific patterns of association between social and financial performance, to come up with a suggested theory based on the finding – i.e., negative, positive or no relationship. Thus, deductive approaches tested theory, and inductive approaches developed theory.