Powerpoint #2 - Studying Social Life Flashcards

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1
Q

What are the 5 Standards of Scientific Knowledge?

A
  1. Empirically Testable
  2. Falsifiable
  3. Reproducible
  4. Valid
  5. Generalizable
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2
Q

How does sociology differ from natural sciences?

A
  1. Subjective Experience
  2. Reactivity
  3. Ethics
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3
Q

What is Subjective Experience?

A

-understanding one’s actions comes with understanding what the actions mean to them

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4
Q

What is Reactivity?

A

-how someone responds to research by changing their behavior (intentionally/unintentionally)

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5
Q

What is the Hawthorne Effect?

A

unintended effects on behavior produced when people are aware they are being studied

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6
Q

What is the Research Process?

A

THEORY–(deductions)–>
HYPOTHESIS–(sampling measurements)–>
DATA–(statistics)–>
EMPIRICAL GENERALIZATIONS–(conceptualization)

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7
Q

What is reliability?

A

whether or not a variable/results are consistent over time

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8
Q

What is validity?

A

whether or not the variable measures what we think it measures

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9
Q

When is reliability/validity increased?

A
  • when you ask things people are reasonable expected to know
  • when you ask things people want to answer correctly (avoid social desirability bias)
  • when you ask things that are quick and easy to answer
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10
Q

What is a convenience sample?

A

sampling people who are easy to find

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11
Q

What is a quota sample?

A

a sample including specific numbers of cases falling into various subcategories

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12
Q

What is a probability sample?

A

*random sample

a sample in which each case has a chance to be in the sample

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13
Q

What are 3 common types of statistics?

A
  1. Descriptive Statistics
  2. Measures of Association
  3. Tests of Significance
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14
Q

What are Descriptive Statistics?

A

summarizing the distribution of a sample (ex. mean, median, average)

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15
Q

What are Measures of Association?

A

examining the relationship between variables

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16
Q

What are Tests of Significance?

A

whether or not a result could occur by chance

17
Q

Association vs. Causality

A

just because one variable is associated with another doesn’t mean that they caused each other

18
Q

What are the two types of research?

A
  1. Quantitative

2. Qualitative

19
Q

What is Quantitative research?

A
  • emphasizes numbers, countable things, and statistical analysis
  • deduces theories/tests hypotheses
  • may use social surveys, experiments, and systemic observation
20
Q

What is Qualitative research?

A
  • emphasizes more verbal/descriptive information
  • exploratory rather than confirmatory, developing new theories rather than testing hypotheses
  • use participant observation and historical/comparative methods
21
Q

What are Observational Studies?

A

watching subjects to see how they behave

Systemic vs. Participant

22
Q

What are Systemic Observations?

A

formal/quantitative method of observation, may use set of codes, code event, and statistically analyze results
-reactivity must be considered

23
Q

What are Participant Observations?

A

researcher participates in/is directly involved in lives of those he/she is studying
-often used for the interactionist perspective

24
Q

What is an ethnography?

A

detailed descriptive account of summarizing/interpreting culture/subjects studied

25
Q

What are the researcher roles in a participant observation?

A
  1. A true insider
  2. A researcher acting as an insider
  3. An outsider
26
Q

What are Social Surveys?

A

gathering information by asking people questions

-may be objective or subjective

27
Q

What is social desirability bias?

A

when respondents answer questions in ways that make them appear to have socially desirable traits

28
Q

What is a spurious relationship?

A

two variables are related and appear to have a direct causal connection, but actually both of the variables are affected by a third variable

29
Q

What is an operational definition?

A

a description of procedures used to measure a concept n sufficient details that someone else could perform the same procedure and get a similar result

30
Q

What does being empirically testable mean?

A

it should be possible to gather data that will show the assertion/theory to be true or false

31
Q

What does being falsifiable mean?

A

it should be possible to specify predictions/assertions which, if found to be untrue in an empirical test, would cause us to reject the theory/proposition

32
Q

What does it mean to be reproducible?

A

others should be able to perform similar studies and obtain similar results

33
Q

What does it mean to be valid?

A

the knowledge should accurately reflect reality

34
Q

What does it mean to be generalizable?

A

the ability to draw conclusions about a larger group or about other groups