Means and methods of family law scientific cognition

Introduction: the article is devoted to the problem of determining the tools and techniques that a researcher can (and should) be guided by when conducting scientific research in the field of family law. It was revealed that there is currently no comprehensive study on the overall methodology of the independent branch under consideration. Purpose: the purpose of the paper is to examine the means and methods in order to determine their repertoire, identify its possible differences from conventional means and methods traditionally used by researchers in studies on civil law and also present tools and techniques of scientific research in their interdependence. Methods: particular methods of formal logic, such as analysis and synthesis, induction and deduction in connection with extrapolation, argumentation, generalization, analogy are used. Results: using these methods, it has been possible to identify most of the tools and techniques applicable for research on family law. Avoiding traditional division of methods into general scientific and specific scientific ones, the author emphasizes the relationship of means and methods in cognition of family law. It is proposed to actively apply extrapolation and idealization methods. Among the tools of scientific cognition, the author finds language tools the most difficult to apply. Besides, the terms “familiarnoe issledovanie” (can be translated as "familiaristic research") and uchenye-familiaristy (can be translated as "scientists-familiarists"), which are rather rare for family law science terminology, were used. According to the author, one should positively estimate these terms, which are generally accepted in foreign scientific studies and mean a "study on family law (in the field of family law)" and "scientists studying family law». Conclusions: family law is so universal that it cannot be confined by individual methods, whether they are general scientific or specific scientific ones. The number of them can be even bigger than in civil law. As far as there is no any comprehensive research on these in family law science, the problem of carrying out such an investigation has been stated.