Official statistics Flashcards
What are official statistics?
A secondary source of data. Quantitative data produced by an official body, such as a government organisation, research group, or company
KEY STUDY: Durkheim (1897)
Compared suicide rates across European countries, finding patterns and trends which suggested suicide has some social factors. For example, marital status, children/childlessness, and religion all affects a country’s suicide rate. He used these results to argue that Sociology is a science
KEY STUDY: Ofsted (yearly)
Frequently provide statistics on things such as exam results to monitor the effectiveness of schools and colleges
KEY STUDY: Crime Survey for England & Wales (yearly)
Every year, provides data on the experiences of crime in the general public. In 2011, found that only 38% of crimes were actually reported to the police, and the police did not record all of these
What are some practical strengths of official statistics?
- Allows comparisons between different groups, e.g. the educational achievement of different genders or ethnicities
- Collected regularly, so can be used to show patterns and trends, or ‘before and after’ comparisons to show cause and effect, e.g. of new legislation
- Easily accessible. Usually published online, saving time and money
What are some practical weaknesses of official statistics?
- Government collects statistics for their own purposes, so sociologists may not find the information they want
- Definitions used by the government may be different to those used by sociologists, e.g. poverty
- Definitions can change over time, making comparisons difficult
- Marxists would argue the government can manipulate statistics in order to serve the needs of capitalism, e.g. the definition of unemployment has changed multiple times over the years to make it seem that numbers are going down
What are some ethical strengths of official statistics?
- No participants so no risk of causing them harm
What are some ethical weaknesses of official statistics?
- Inappropriate to study suicide or domestic violence as it is dehumanising
What are some theoretical strengths of official statistics?
- Positivists like them as they are highly reliable (being collected in a standardised way) and scientific. This can make it easy to spot patterns and trends
- Covers very large numbers, making them representative
- Objective; no researcher bias as the researcher has no connection with the subjects of the research
- Usually much bigger than sociologists could carry out themselves. E.g. the Crime Survey for England & Wales 2014 had a sample size of 50,000 people
- Hard statistics have higher validity as they generally contain all the information they claim to
What are some theoretical weaknesses of official statistics?
- Interpretivists dislike them as the data is usually gathered by someone else, so they cannot be sure there weren’t leading questions, reducing validity
- No verstehen
- Soft statistics have lower validity as they generally don’t contain all the information
- Some statistics may be less representative as they are only based on a sample, not the whole population
What are hard statistics?
Data sets where it is likely that all the data has been collected. E.g. marriage rates published by the government must be accurate, as a marriage is not valid unless it is verified by the government
What are soft statistics?
Data sets where it is likely that not all the data has been collected. E.g. crime rates, as there is a “hidden figure of crime” that is not included because it is not reported, not recorded properly etc
