Sociology as a Science - Theories

Question 1

What does science aim to do?

Answer 1

• Discover cause and effect relationships

- Aims to be objective and value free

Question 2

How does positivism suggest that sociology can be a science and that this is desirable?

Answer 2

Objective knowledge gained in a scientific way provides the basis for solving social problems and achieving progress

Question 3

What is the inductive approach taken by early positivists?

Answer 3

Whereby theories develop from observations and then further observations are used to verify theories

Question 4

What methods do positivists use?

Answer 4

Those allowing for maximum objectivity and detachment such as quantitative methods

Question 5

What are they key assumptions behind positivism?

Answer 5

• Individuals are constrained by social forces
• Durkheim: social facts
• Sociology should aim to discover cause + effect relationships

Question 6

How do interpretivists suggest that sociology CANNOT be a science?

Answer 6

The subject matter is fundamentally different, people have free will and can exercise choice
- Job of sociology is to uncover the meanings people give to the social world + focus on how individuals interact with one another

Question 7

How do interpretivists suggest people are not ‘puppets on a string’?

Answer 7

They are not manipulated by external ‘social facts’ but are autonomous beings who construct their social world thought the meanings they give to it

Question 8

What are they key assumptions of interpretivism?

Answer 8

• Humans have consciousness
• Humans interpret meanings to make sense of the world
• Society is the product of human interaction

Question 9

Why is the objectivity demanded by scientific methods hard to achieve?

Answer 9

• Scientists are human so will have values and make assumptions
• Funding impacts research
• Have their status and social standing to consider

Question 10

How does Popper suggest that sociology could be a science?

Answer 10

If it follows the deductive method rather than the inductive method
= researcher starts with a hypothesis or theory and tests its
- scientists should look for evidence to support a theory but should try to falsify it

Question 11

What is a paradigm?

Answer 11

A framework which sets out appropriate methods for study and specifies what questions a scientist should ask

Question 12

What does Kuhn suggest that paradigms cause? (Cannot)

Answer 12

Suggest scientists are ‘blinkered’, they don’t see alternative views and reject evidence that does not fit the paradigm

Question 13

What does Kaplan suggest? (Shouldn’t)

Answer 13

Makes the distinction between the methods scientists claim to use and the methods they actually use
- illustrated by scientists who dismiss evidence from experiments which contradict their hypothesis e.g the Thalidomide scandal

Question 14

What does Gomm argue? (Cannot)

Answer 14

Science itself is relative:
- Darwins theory was only accepted in England because it fitted ideas at the time - survival of the fittest and natural selection helped to explain why Britain ruled the world

Question 15

What do Realists argue?

Answer 15

That while there are differences between the social and natural world a social science is possible

Question 16

What does Bhaskar suggest? (Should)

Answer 16

That in the social and natural world there are underlying structure and mechanisms = the aim of realism is to under and explain these

Question 17

What does Sayer suggest? (Can)

Answer 17

There are open and closed systems:

• Open - where all variables cannot be controlled and therefore precise predictions cannot be made
• Closed - where all variables can be controlled and measured

Question 18

What do Postmodernists regard science as?

Answer 18

A ‘meta-narrative’ calming to have the monopoly of the truth

- knowledge is socially constructed as relative = there are only ‘truths’

Question 19

Why are feminists critical of science? (Shouldn’t)

Answer 19

Argue that it is patriarchal upholding male stream values

- quantitative methods are oppressive and cannot capture the reality of women’s experiences

Question 20

What does Beck argue? (Shouldn’t)

Answer 20

Science hasn’t always led to the progress that positivists believed it would
- ‘risk society’ = witnessed scientifically created dangers

Question 21

What does McNeil suggest? (Can)

Answer 21

The debate to whether sociology should be a science depends on the definition of science
- if we accept the realist definition then a lot of sociology is in fact scientific