Chapter 3 Flashcards
What is Research methodology?
The system of methods a researcher uses to gather data about a particular research question.
What is a quaLITATIVE research method used for?
Used to study social data that CANNOT BE MEASURED; these methods often incorporate an INSIDER PERSPECTIVE and may be MORE SUBJECTIVE than quantitative research methods. They STUDY CASES that DO NOT FIT into LARGER MODELS.
Accused of being too soft, literary, subjective.
What is a quaNTITATIVE research method used for?
Methods used to gather MEASURABLE DATA on social issues; they are more likely than qualitative methods to FAVOR OUTSIDER PERSPECTIVE and OBJECTIVITY so can be counted and measured and used to GENERATE STATS.
Explicitly RECOGNIZES the SOCIAL LOCATION, including biases, OF the RESEARCHER within the research.
OFTEN USES QUESTIONNAIRES and POLLS, soulless number crunching maniacs.
State how quaLITATIVE research methods can be used on CASE STUDIES.
Qualitative research usually focuses on a SMALL NUMBER of individual cases. This type of research is often concerned with the SUBJECTIVE MEANINGS of people’s EXPERIENCES and their personal INTERPRETATIONS of the social world.
State some common quaLITATIVE research methods.
Ethnographies Institutional Ethnographies Case Studies Narratives ALTERNATE QUALITATIVE RESEARCH Content analysis Discourse analysis Genealogy
Describe ETHNOGRAPHIES
Ethnographies are QUALITATIVE method typically carried out with the RESEARCH LIVES IN FIELD with STUDIED TEST SUBJECTS for an extended period of time in order to understand how people go about their DAILY LIVES and WORLDVIEW INTERPRETATIONS. Aims for a BROADER view by studying an entire culture.
eg. William Whyte and studying “Cornerville” through semi-structured (informal 1 on 1) interviews and participant observation (outsider view wrt insider view) with the help of informants (intemediataries with power who help sociologists get accepted into a culture).
Describe INSTITUTIONAL ETHNOGRAPHIES
Dorothy Smith
App: Feminist
Institutional ethnographies are QUALITATIVE method recognize that there are AT LEAST 2 TRUTH SETS operating within any given institution. One set of truths represents the RULING INTERESTS (e.g. those of the organization and its administrators) while the other set represents the INSIDER, EXPERIENTIAL perspectives of those who work within the institution, tasked with UPHOLDING RULING INTERESTS. There is OFTEN DISJUNCTURE (separation between knowledge held) between these sets of truths or interests.
It involves explicitly TAKING SIDES so is more scientific.
Ruling interests have participants activate RULING RELATIONS (help serve needs of the organization at everyone’s personal expense).
Government to school to teacher to parents to student doing homework!
Describe CASE STUDIES
Case studies are QUALITATIVE method typically involve the STUDY of SINGLE or a FEW selected CASES that MAKE UP ONE SOCIAL ENTITY.
Case studies are often used to IDENTIFY BEST PRACTISES (strategies with proven history of getting wanted results easier compared to alternatives) ie. reviewing a practise.
Used often in POLICY sociology.
Describe NARRATIVE
Narratives are literally the STORIES PEOPLE TELL, so QUALITATIVE method.
While this type of research played a minor role in sociology because of the prominence of positivism until the last two decades, it
represents an important contribution to sociological knowledge.
Narratives GIVE PEOPLE, especially marginalized people, A VOICE—the EXPRESSION of VIEWPOINT that comes from people occupying a SPECIFIC SOCIAL LOCATION.
TRIANGULATION is using at least 3 PERSPECTIVES to EXAMINE a social issue.
VERSTEHEN is Max Weber’s tool for an EMPATHETIC desire to LEARN the impacts of ISSUES from a DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE of the world.
Describe CONTENT ANALYSIS
Content analysis is QUALITATIVE method involves SYSTEMATICALLY COUNTING and INTERPRETING the THEMES encountered in CULTURAL ARTIFACTS, such as articles, advertisements, artwork, clothing, children’s books, and institutional records to determine the dominant ones. These artifacts have 2 properties:
- NATURAL/FOUND quality: they are NOT CREATED TO BE STUDIED.
- NON-INTERACTIVE: NO INTERVIEWS used to gather the interpretation data ie. its all up to the OUTSIDER VIEW.
Look at pg. 62 for more details.
Describe DISCOURSE ANALYSIS
Discourse analysis is QUALITATIVE method carried out in one of two ways:
- Analysis of “TEXTS” such as conversations, texts, court transcripts or news stories,
ie. Foucault and Totalitarian Discourse or - Broad analysis of LARGE FIELDS of INFO/IDEAS over a PERIOD OF TIME, such as an analysis of the changes in the discourse of masculinity over the past hundred years.
Describe GENEALOGY
Genealogy is a QUALITATIVE method type of discourse analysis that EXAMINE the HISTORY of the BROAD FIELDS OF DISCLOSURE of discourse discussed above.
An example of genealogical research is EDWARD SAID’s study of ORENTALISM: the corporate institution for managing (ruling, describing, teaching) the Orient (something foreign wrt current location) ie. the way the Western world depicts the Middle East.
Describe quaNTITATIVE RESEARCH
Quantitative research focuses on social elements that can be MEASURED and used to GENERATE STATS. Must use operational definition.
Describe STATISTICS
Statistics, in sociology, is the SCIENCE of USE NUMBERS to MAP SOCIAL BEHAVIOR and BELIEFS. They are quite shoddy because they can prove virtually anything using objectivism and people have subjective objections to methods used.
Two common terms are used:
variables
correlations
Describe OPERATIONAL DEFINITION
Operationalizing a definition entails taking an ABSTRACT OR THEORTEICAL concept (e.g. “poverty,” “abuse”, working class) and TURN IT into a concrete and MEASURABLE ENTITY.
This is very difficult because there is little consistency between sociologists and you have very many variables to address to make a valid objective conclusion.
eg. to measure poverty you must establish poverty line and for that you need to take in some considerations, assumptions and exceptions for variables.
