Documents

Question 1

What are documents?

Answer 1

A secondary source of data. Can include written articles, diaries, videos, images, and (more recently) social media posts

Question 2

KEY STUDY: Anne Frank (1947)

Answer 2

Anne Frank was a young Jewish girl kept hidden from the Nazis by her neighbours during WW2 Germany. She kept a diary of her experiences. She later died in a concentration camp, but her diary has become a published and famous piece of work

Question 3

KEY STUDY: Hey (1998)

Answer 3

Carried out a study into the formation of schoolgirl friendships. Collected notes that girls had passed to eachother in lessons. Also asked to see their diaries; in order to gain their trust in this, Hey gave the girls her diary to read as well

Question 4

What is a personal document?

Answer 4

Something that was never intended to be seen by others, e.g. a diary, a personal note, a private piece of art

Question 5

What is a public document?

Answer 5

Something that was intended to be seen by the public, e.g. Ofsted reports, newspapers, TV, and (arguably) public social media posts

Question 6

What is a historical document?

Answer 6

A public OR personal document that was produced in the past, e.g. Anne Frank’s diary. There is no set amount of time that has to pass before a document is considered documents

Question 7

What are some practical strengths of documents?

Answer 7

• Historical documents may be the only source of information for studying parts of the past
• Can be used along with primary methods to check findings
• Quick and cheap because someone else has gathered the information

Question 8

What are some practical weaknesses of documents?

Answer 8

• Authenticity; is the document what it claims to be? Could it be a hoax? E.g. the so-called ‘Hitler Diaries’ were later proven to be fake
• There may not be documents available for the topic sociologists want to research
• Access; could be difficult to access some documents, e.g. personal
• Some public documents can be kept classified for up to 30 years, making research time consuming
• Analysis of large scale government documents could be time consuming

Question 9

What are some ethical strengths of documents?

Answer 9

• Produced by someone else, so few ethical concerns for the researcher using them
• When using historical documents, researchers do not need to gain informed consent

Question 10

What are some ethical weaknesses of documents?

Answer 10

• Unique challenges; e.g. Anne Frank is dead and never intended her work to be published. Is it still appropriate to use it?
• This could impact the author’s family and friends
• Informed consent must be specifically gained when using personal documents

Question 11

What are some theoretical strengths of documents?

Answer 11

• Interpretivists like them because they have high validity can gain verstehen, giving a real insight into how individuals think
• Personal documents are especially high in validity as the author had no reason to alter the truth if they only ever intended it to be for their own use

Question 12

What are some theoretical weaknesses of documents?

Answer 12

• Positivists dislike them as they only use small sample sizes, making them unrepresentative
• Unstandardised and unreliable; based on subjective interpretations of events. Makes it hard to generalise results
• Researcher bias; researchers could misinterpret documents, or apply their own meanings to them
• Hoax documents are, by definition, very low in validity
• Certain groups may be unrepresented, such as the illiterate (who can’t read or write) or historical working classes who didn’t have the leisure time to keep diaries