Typology of scientific reflections needed for sustainability science development

Sustainability science is at an early stage of development. Among many other obstacles, there are two prominent issues hindering its advance. There is both a lack of a set of principles for knowledge construction, and a need to implement research to solve real problems. This paper proposes a typology of scientific reflections for meeting these two challenges and contributing to sustainability science development. This typology is made up of four kinds of reflection: practical, instrumental-methodological, theoretical-conceptual, and onto-epistemological. Each kind of reflection is based on a different type of question and gives shape to its respective type of research.