Research ! Flashcards
Positivists
Prefer scientific, quantifiable data, high in reliability and validity.
Interpretivist
Qualitative data, small scale, high validity.
Practical Issues
Cost
Time
Access
Ethical issues
Informed consent
Confidentiality
Physiological harm
Theoretical issues
Reliability
Representativeness
Validity
Lab Experiments
Highly reliable = Controlled environment
Can establish cause and effect relationships
However, artificiality = Not a natural environment = Hawthorne Effect
Required consent
Unrepresentative
Milgrams Obidence Test
Harvey + Slatin = Teacher Labelling
Field Experiments
+
Less Artificial
Lower Hawthorne Effect
High Validity
- No consent
Less control over variables
Limited application to real life situations.
Access to area (Gatekeepers)
R+J = self fuffiling prophecy
Questionnaire
+
Cheap quick
Quantifiable data
Represtative
Low ethical issues
-
Low response rate
Low validity
Unrepresentative, only a certain group answer as others are busy.
No further questions can be asked.
Census
Reay + Higher Education
Structured Interviews
+
Training is easy and cheap
Cheap and easy to administer
Represtative
Reliable “Recipe” for reproducibility
-
Low Validity - closed ended questions
Low validity - lie\exaggerate
Oakley - Housework Studies
Rollock -“Colour of the class”
Unstructured Interviews
+
Rapport - allows for relationship to develop through informality
Flexibility - not fixed questions
Valid - Open ended questions
-
Time consuming
Training interviewer
Unrepresentative due to small sample size
Not reliable due to open questions.
Examples
Willis - the lads research
Dobash + Dobash
Semi-structured
+
Flexible
Easier to angles than unstructured
-
Can guartee honestly
Low reliability
Participant observations
+
High validity natural setting
Low ethical isssues
Low cost
-
Unreliable
Unreprestative small scale
Gatekeepers
Hawthorne effect
More risk of researcher going native
Examples
Khan
Max and Ghail experiences of racism
Non participant observations
+
Cheap
High validity no risk of going native
Low effect of Hawthorne effect
-
Each observation is subjective and up to interpretation
Small scale not Represtative
No informed consent
Gatekeepers
Examples
Ofsted
Francis
Overt Observations
+
Low ethical issues
High reliability
Researcher can openly take notes
Allows researcher to use other methods aswell
-
time consuming
Low reliability due to diffuculty to repeat
Lacks validity Hawthorne effect
Not always representative
Examples
Ofsted
Covert observations
+
Valid no lower risk of Hawthorne effect
More valid due to first hand experience
More chance of establishing cause and effect relationships.
-
Deception
Researcher has to “get in”
Hard to gain trust
Time consuming
Could be less representative due to investigating specific group
Examples
Winlow - bad fellas investigation on new masulinities
Official statistics
+
Cheap
Easy access
Low ethical issues
Reliable due to being done every 10 years
Representative due to collecting data from wide demographics.
-
May not fit with what the sociologist wants to study
Definitions may differ from government to sociologist E.g poverty
Some data may be classified
The census, birth rate death rate
Documents
+
Valid written by person of study
Cheap and save time
-
Issues about confidentiality
Sensitive topics
Personal bias in the documents
Access ?
Examples
Aries - changing childhood
Historical documents
+
Allow to create comparisons over time
-
Unreprestative - some docs may be lost or destroyed
Low validity due to bias in writing
Authenticity in question
Access low
Examples
Thomas and Znaniecki study of letters from polish migrants
Anne franks diary
