The relationship between theory and methods Flashcards
what do positivists and interpretivists have differing conceptions of?
The nature of society
How do positivists see society?
As a reality external to individuals - social structures and social facts exist independent of the individual which exercise constraint over them and mould their behaviour.
How do interpretivists see society?
as a socially constructed set of meanings shared by a social group
What is there a conflicting view of and a basic agreement of between positivists and interpretivists?
About what counts as proposer sociological research evidence and different explanations and understandings of human behaviour.
how do positivists believe social behaviour can be measured and explained?
objectively - can and should be researched according to the same/ similar principles and methods used in natural sciences which includes the hypthetico-deductive model
What is positivists research more likely to involve?
large scale/ macro research on large numbers of people and is generally associated with structural theories of society e.g. marxism and functionalism
What are the quantitative statistical techniques which positivists tend to use?
- official statistics
- experiment
- comparative method
- social surveys
- structural questionnaires
- formal/ structured interviews
- non participant observation
