Research methods based on primary data - observations Flashcards
Participant
The researcher gets involved
Non-participant
The researcher quietly watches
Covert
Participant doesn’t know researcher
Overt
Participant knows researcher
Overt advantages and disadvantages
✓ No ethical issues
X People change their behaviour knowing their being watched
Covert advantages and disadvantages
✓ People act naturally
X Unethical, participants are deceiving
Verstehen
To understand/empathy
- Weber’s term for studying human beheaviour
- German word for “to understand”
- “Someone who has been there”
Ethnography
Studying way of life of people
If people know they are being watched they change their behaviour, therefore reducing….
Validity
Mayo - The Hawthorne effect and “Observer effects”
- Carried out in the Hawthorne factory
- Conducted various experiments
E.g. Levels of lighting, heating and rest breaks
Mayo concluded
- No matter the environmental conditions, worker productivity increased
- As they were being observed
Laud Humphrey’s and the tearoom sex study - participant observation
- Detailed understanding of men who have impersonal sex with one another in public restrooms
- Stationed as “watchqueen”
- Those willing to talk were among better educated
- Avoid bias: followed other men and
- 1 year later disguised (unethical) appeared at their homes and interviewed about marital status, race and job (putting himself in danger)
Laud Humphrey’s and the tearoom sex study - findings
- 54% were married living with wives
- Sex had to be quick, inexpensive and impersonal
- 24% bisexual
- 24% covert homosexuals
- 14% members of gay community
Laud Humphrey’s and the tearoom sex study - unethical
An argument arose when members of the department argued Humphreys has unethically invaded the privacy and threatened the social standing on the subjects
Strengths of Humphrey’s study
✓ Covert - natural behaviour
✓ High in validity- true picture
✓ Gain verstehen
