Steinbeck 's second major legacy was the method of research that he developed in order to create his novels. Steinbeck was the first author of the twentieth century to focus on “the complexity of all life”, rather than the actions of a small group (Shillinglaw). Steinbeck 's “strong biological base for all his metaphysical conclusions” introduced the idea of scientific reasoning as a basis for philosophies, rather than the purely qualitative observations most writers of his time used (Ariki et al. 175). By doing so, Steinbeck set a precedent for humanities research that many writers of the post-World War era would follow. After Steinbeck, writers who used their work to propose various ideas concerning society, culture and life in general