Chapter 1 Flashcards
3 Major Aspects of the Scientific Enterprise
- Theory: deals with the logical aspect
- Data Collection: observational aspect
- Data Analysis: Brings logical and observational together to find patterns
Empirical Data
Observed, rather than speculations or personal values
Social Regularites
probabilistic patterns, doesn’t need to be correct 100% of the time “women self disclose more than men” usually correct but not always
Aggregates
The whole behavior, not individual behaviors (empirical data and social regularities are aggregated behavior)
Communication Studies
Field of research on the production and uses of symbols, in concrete social and cultural contexts to enable the dynamics of systems, society, and culture. (key terms production, uses, and dynamics make it clear that communication is a process.
3 main interests of comm. researchers
- message production, transmission, and meaning making.
- systematically examine the content or form of communicative messages. ex. how/what a family talks about at the dinner table influences the kids political beliefs
- functions and effets of messages ex. persuasive effects on anti smoking posters on kids
Method vs. Methodology
Method: Tools of data collection
Methodology: Paradigms of knowing
Epistimology
Science of knowing
Ordinary Human Inquiry
Attempts to explore patterns and relationships to make sense of information and and to predict future experiences. A few types are traditional knowledge and authoritative knowledge.
What is a lit. review
A comprehensive survey of what other experts have done in your topic area. It furthers and uses sources to improve your argument,
Replication vs. triangulation
Replication: you do the same study again to make sure the results are consistent
Triangulation: The process of comparing data gathered one way to data gathered using another method, using another researcher or from different participants.
Reference vs. Bibliography
Bibliography is a broader list where you write everything you researched, where references are limited to what you cited in your paper
Components of a Research Report
Title, byline, abstract, introduction, method, results, discussion, references
Cross sectional vs. longitudinal
Cross sectional: studies a cross section of a phenomenon at one time and analyzes it. For example, a single public opinion poll is a study aimed at describing the U.S. population at a given time.
Longitudinal: designed to permit observations over an extended period. A researcher can observe the comm activity of a radical political group from its inception to its demise.
4 Main purposes of Comm research
Exploration: to provide a beginning familiarity with the topic, typical when a researcher examines a new interest or when the study is new. For example, you could disagree with the graduation requirements for comm. Studies and want to change them. You would need to explore and find the history of the requirements, other schools stance.
Description: the researcher observes and then describes what was observed. For example, a researcher who depicts the communication among management team members.
Casual/Functional: to explain things. For example, why some television shows have higher viewer ratings than others. Causal explanation addresses why questions, and functional explanation addresses how questions.
Understanding: “It is description to observe that people usually greet someone they know. It is understanding when the researcher knows the social group’s rules that produce this pattern of action and when the researcher can claim, say, that the greeting means the participants had a prior relationship of some sort and were signaling their recognition of their familiarity with another.
