Participant Observation

Question 1

What is non-participant observation?

Answer 1

When the research simply observes the group without taking part in it

Question 2

What is participant observation?

Answer 2

When the research takes part in an event while observing

Question 3

What is overt observation?

Answer 3

The researches makes their true identity and purpose known to those being studied

Question 4

What is covert observation?

Answer 4

The study is carried out ‘under cover’. The researcher takes on a false identity and role, usually posing as a genuine member of the group

Question 5

Why is getting into the group to study a danger of participant observation? (making contact)

Answer 5

Initial contact with the group make depend on personal skills, having the right connections or even pure chance

Question 6

Why is getting into the group to study a danger of participant observation? (acceptance)

Answer 6

• To gain entry, the researcher will have to win their trust and acceptation
• It may be helpful to make friends with key individuals but the researchers age, gender, class or ethnicity may prove an obstacle

Question 7

Why is getting into the group to study a danger of participant observation? (observer’s role)

Answer 7

• Once in, the researcher should adopt a role that doesn’t disrupt normal patterns and offers a good vantage from which to make observation
• However it might not be possible to take on a role like this, as some roles may involve taking sides in conflict, which may mean the researcher becomes estranged from one faction, making observation difficult

Question 8

Why is staying in the group to study a danger of participant observation?

Answer 8

• To complete the study, the researcher has to be both involved in the group to understand fully nut also detached from the group to remain objective and unbiased
• A danger of staying is ‘going native’. By over-identifying with the group, the researcher becomes biased.
• Also, if they stay a while, the researcher may cease to notice things that would’ve struck them as unusual earlier, as behaviour becomes normal.

Question 9

Why is getting out of the group to study a danger of participant observation?

Answer 9

• Re-entering one’s normal world can be difficult. e.g. Whyte found that when he returned to Harvard after his research, he wasn’t tongue-tied and couldn’t communicate with fellow academics
• The researcher may find that loyalty prevents them fully disclosing everything they learnt, for fear of harm by the members of the group

Question 10

Describe a case of participant observation (Griffin)

Answer 10

Griffin, a white man, in 1959 used medication and sun lamp treatments to change his skin colour and pass as black. He then travelled around the deep South USA, experiencing first-hand the impact of racism (example of verstehen)

Question 11

Describe a case of participant observation (Patrick)

Answer 11

• Patrick went undercover to study the violent behaviour of the teenagers in a gang in Glasgow
• He concealed his identity and motives during the 4 month study, while he observed closely the gang members

Question 12

Give advantages of overt observations

Answer 12

• It avoids ethical problems of obtaining info by deceit, and when studying deviant groups, being expected to join their activities
• It allows naïve but important questions that only an outsider could ask
• The observer can take notes openly
• It allows the researcher to use interview methods to check thoughts from observations

Question 13

Give disadvantages of overt observations

Answer 13

• A group may refuse give permission for observations, or may prevent them from seeing everything.
• It risks creating the Hawthorne effect, as they know they’re being observed so may act different, creating invalid research

Question 14

What are practical disadvantages of covert observations?

Answer 14

• It requires the researcher to keep up an act, call for detailed knowledge of the group’s way of life before joining. There’s always a risk of being discovered
• Sociologists can’t take notes openly, must rely on memory and opportunity to write in secret. e.g. Ditton has to use toilets to record observations, which aroused suspicion.
• Hawthorne effect, addition of a new member (researcher) can change the group’s behaviour

Question 15

What are ethical disadvantages of covert observations?

Answer 15

• It’s immoral to deceive people e.g. Milgram, pretending to be their friends. Informed consent can’t be obtained as they don’t know the aim of the study
• They may have to participant in immoral or illegal activities as part of their ‘cover’, or as a witness a moral or legal duty to intervene, e.g. Patrick observing a gang.

Question 16

Describe insight as a validity advantage of participant observations

Answer 16

• Allows the researcher to gain empathy through personal experience, verstehen. By living as a member of the group, we gain insight into their way of life and their meanings.
• This closeness to people’s lived reality means that PO can give uniquely valid and rich data0

Question 17

Describe flexibility as an advantage of participant observation

Answer 17

• Doesn’t start with fixed hypothesis, it allows the sociologist to enter with a open mind about what they’ll find,
• New explanations can be formulated and sociologists can change direction to follow them up.
• Open-mindedness allows researcher to discover things that other methods may miss, e.g. Whyte noted by observing ‘I learned answers to question that I would not have had the sense to ask if I had been using interviews.’

Question 18

Describe a practical advantage of participant observation

Answer 18

• PO may be the only viable method for studying certain groups, particularly deviant groups. Such groups may be suspicious of outsiders asking questions
• e.g. Yablonsky points out a teen gang is likely to see researcher who come with questionnaires as unwelcome representatives of authority
• But, PO allows for a rapport to be built and trust gained.

Question 19

Describe why structural theorists would be against participant observation

Answer 19

• Structural sociologists, Marxists argue that as PO focuses on the micro levels of actors’ meanings. It ignores the structural forces that shape out behaviour, such as class inequality.
• e.g. Marxists argue that actors may suffer from false consciousness and misunderstand their true positions. If so, their own account of their lives in PO, will give us a distorted view

Question 20

Describe a validity disadvantage of participant observation

Answer 20

• Positivist argue the findings from PO are subjective and biased impressions from the observer, and as the researcher selects what they think is noteworthy, and this is likely to fit in with the researcher’s pre-existing views
• Furthermore, the Hawthorne effect, the presence of the observer defeats the main aim of PO, to produce a ‘naturalistic’ account of human behaviour. However interpretivists argue the group will get used to the researcher and act normally

Question 21

Describe a lack of objectivity as a disadvantage of participant observation

Answer 21

Positivists argue the researchers involved with the groups results in a lack of objectivity
- The risk of ‘going native’ makes it difficult to remain objective, which will produce a biased and over-sympathetic view of the group
- PO attracts sociologists whose sympathies lie with the underdog. As PO is seen as a method for ‘telling it like it is’ from the actors’ point of view, some views may be biased in favour of their subjects viewpoint, e.g. Willis was accused of presenting a romanticised account of the lad