Theory and Methods

Question 1

What is primary data?

Answer 1

Collected directly by the researchers themselves- interviews, questionnaires and surveys

Question 2

What is secondary data?

Answer 2

Used by sociologists but have collected by other people - books journals census

Question 3

What is quantitative data?

Answer 3

information that can be expressed in statistical or number form

Question 4

What is qualitative data?

Answer 4

information concerned with the meaning and interpretation people have about some issue or event

Question 5

What is reliability?

Answer 5

The extent to which the outcomes are consistent when the experiment is repeated more than once

Question 6

What is validity?

Answer 6

The extent to which the instruments taht are used in the experiment measure exactly what is needed

Question 7

Positivity theory and methods

Answer 7

Human behaviour is repetitious - possible to repeat the study and get same results (reliability)
Causality must be established to predict behaviour - measure directly so no other confound variables are found (validity)
Human behaviour is subject to external forces - ability to generalise findings to a wider population (representativeness)

Question 8

Interpretivists theory and methods

Answer 8

Action and behaviour is unique - invisible internal influences (subjectivity)
Meanings and motives are essence - described using words and pictures (qualitative)
People make own social reality through interactions - details accounts (validity)

Question 9

What is the difference between objective and subjective?

Answer 9

O- Dependent on factual truths while S is on personal opinion

Question 10

What are some practical factors in choosing a research method?

Answer 10

Cost - large surveys can be time consuming and expensive to complete
Appropriate methods - using written questionnaires is difficult if group studies maybe be illiterate

Question 11

What are other factors in choosing a research method?

Answer 11

Theoretical - different researchers have different views on best research type
Aims - researchers could sometimes twist data to confirm a hypothesis

Question 12

Why might funding influence a research?

Answer 12

Researchers may avoid areas that aren’t lucrative or they choose subjects based on lots of funding

Question 13

What are some hard to access groups

Answer 13

gangs and cults - dangerous and uncooperative

Question 14

What are some ethical issues in research?

Answer 14

Confidentiality - researcher can identify a given persons response but promises to to do so publicly
Harm - can be physical or psychological
Anonymity - neither the researcher nor the the finding can identify a response with a respondent
Honesty - use of deception is often necessary to get authentic behaviour
Effects of the people being studied - could be harmed which could be traumatic
effects on wider society - lead to discrimination or show which groups need help
issues of legality and morality

Question 15

What is representativeness?

Answer 15

The extent to which a sample mirrors a researchers target population. and reflects its characteristics

Question 16

What does PERVERT model?

Answer 16

Practical - time, cost and location
Ethical - research meets ethical guidelines
Reliability- research can be repeated
Validity - the research has measured the intended variable
Examples - sociological studies
Representativeness - the sample is typical of the rest of the target population
theoretical - refers to positivism and interpretivism

Question 17

What are the different types of sampling?

Answer 17

Simple Random - pulling names out a hat
Systematic - select participants systematciallly
Stratified - divided by a criteria and chosen randomly from each group
Quota - told to select people who fit certain categories
Snowball - researcher identifying someone and they suggest others
Cluster - dividing a population more and more

Question 18

What is a questionnaire?

Answer 18

A formalised set of questions for obtaining information from respondents

Question 19

What is the difference between open and close questions?

Answer 19

Open allows respondent to answer freely while closed limits number of responses to a question

Question 20

What is operationalising concepts?

Answer 20

define key concepts or variable in a measurable way

Question 21

What is the imposition problem?

Answer 21

Respondents may not be able to express their true feelings as the the questions have been pre chosen

Question 22

What is a pre coded questionnaire?

Answer 22

A format to ask questions based on predetermined categories in a questionnaire form

Question 23

PERVERT of questionnaires

Answer 23

P- cost effective but low response rate
E - includes bias
R - questions can be repeated
V - no option to clarify doubt
E - demography
R - reach a large number of people
T - positivists

Question 24

What are the strengths and limitations of questionnaires?

Answer 24

Strengths:
Quick and cost effective
No need to train interviewers
More ethical
High reliability
Representative

Limitations:
inflexible
low response rates
social desirability bias
no opportunity to clarify how the respondent interprets the question
May understand question wrong a

Question 25

What is a structured interview?

Answer 25

Interviewer has a predetermined set of questions and goes through these formally

Question 26

What is an unstructured interview?

Answer 26

Set of issues the interviewer wants to pursue but the questions are less set in stone

Question 27

What are the strengths and weaknessweaknesses of structured interviews?

Answer 27

Strengths:
quick and cost effective
high reliability
representative

Weaknesses:
inflexible
likely to lie

Question 28

What are the strengths and weaknessweaknesses of unstructured interviews?

Answer 28

Strengths:
dynamic discussion
real opinion and attitudes expressed
interviewee can express real feelings

Weaknesses:
risk wandering off the point
researcher could influence answers
hard to categorise answers

Question 29

What is participant observation?

Answer 29

Where the sociologist joins in with the group being studied - used by interpretivists

Question 30

What does verstehen mean?

Answer 30

Understanding people from their own perspective

Question 31

What is non participant observation?

Answer 31

observer does not join in with group but remains outside - used by positivists

Question 32

What is the problem of covert participant observation?

Answer 32

Involves deception and could out researcher at risk of being found out

Question 33

Examples of observations:

Answer 33

Goffman: Asylums - covert participant
Barker: the making of a moonie - covert participant
Patrick: a Glasgow gang observed - covert participant
Humphrey’s: The read room trade - overt non participant

Question 34

What are the strengths and weaknesses of participant observation?

Answer 34

Strengths:
Emic (within one culture) approach
Avoids researcher bias as removes hawthorne effect
A holistic approach

Weaknesses:
Difficult to record data
Time consuming
Risk of losing objectivity

Question 35

What are the strengths and weaknesses of non-participant research?

Answer 35

Strengths:
objective
easy to record data
researcher dies not interfere with behaviour

Weaknesses:
hawthorne effect
ethical concerns
looking from the outside

Question 36

What are experiments

Answer 36

Positivist research form
controls as many factors to claim that a particular factor that was manipulated caused the effects

Question 37

What are the differences between lab and field experiments?

Answer 37

Lab - conducted in controlled environments in which all the causes are controlled by the researcher
Field - conducted in the real world under social conditions

Question 38

What are the two types of variables?

Answer 38

Dependent - the test subject
Independent - the changes made

Question 39

What are some examples of studies using experiments?

Answer 39

Bandura: bobo dolls
lab experiment - children exposed to aggressive models were more likely to act in physically agressive ways

Mayo: Hawthorne studies
field - altered physical conditions such as lighting, heating and breaks to see impact on employee motivation

Question 40

Pervert of lab experiments

Answer 40

P - cannot get many sociological subjects into small scale setting of a lab
E- manipulating subjects reactions
R - easier to repeat as it is in a controlled environment
V - CV and IV are tightly controlled os the results are likely to be as a direct result
E - Bandura bobo rolle
R - smaller sample size which reactions are manipulated
T - positivist prefer this as it gets definitive results

Question 41

Pervert of field experiments

Answer 41

P - access is likely to be more of a problem
E - involves a lot of deception. and lack of informed consent
R - harder to get similar conditions to replicate
V - lesser opportunity for the Hawthorne effect and gets more natural reactions
E - Mayo Hawthorne studies
R - people act more natural
T - interpetivists prefer as it gives a more authentic reaction

Question 42

What is secondary sources of information?

Answer 42

Information that sociologists did not collect themselves - have to be cautious over reliability and validity

Exp. census, official statistics, newspapers and radio, diaries, historical documents

Question 43

What is content analysis?

Answer 43

involves collecting primary data as the sociologists personally collects the information that he wants

Question 44

What are the strengths and weaknesses of content analysis?

Answer 44

Strengths:
cheap and fast
can be checked and corrected
no researcher effects
Historical focus

Weaknesses:
limited to what is recorded
validity - maybe be subjected

Question 45

What is semiotics?

Answer 45

Involves reading an image to work out the meanings that are contained within it

Question 46

What is a survey?

Answer 46

• questionnaires or structured interviews
• pre set questions
• large number of people
• usually quantitative data

Question 47

What is the census?

Answer 47

Every 10 years the government collects data on the size structure and characteristics of the population
the forms were designed for self completion by form fillers and could be posted back
a majority publicity campaign helped raise awareness of the census and its importance

Question 48

What are official statistics and their advantages and disadvantages?

Answer 48

• quantitative data gathered by the government

pros:
freely available
easy to access
more representative
reliable

cons:
expensive for the government to collect
researchers limited to available data

Question 49

Examples of official statistics?

Answer 49

Durkheim used statistics to argue that suicide was caused by factors in society

Interpretivists say official statistics are socially constructed

Question 50

How can documents be assessed?

Answer 50

authenticity - data could be forged and secondary data cannot always be sure weather it is authentic
credibility - people often leave various pieces of data out of memories
representativeness - big problem with older sources such as historical documents
meaning - is it interpreted the way it was intended to be?

Question 51

What is a cast study?

Answer 51

a detailed study of one particular case or instance - exp. a study of an individual group or community
life history is a case study of a particular individual

Question 52

What are the strengths and weaknesses of case studies?

Answer 52

adv:
test the usefulness of theories of social life
useful in generating new hyptheses
see the world from the point of view of an individual or group

disadv:
may not be representative
may not be reliable or valid
raises questions about accuracy of recall or facts

Question 53

What are longitudinal studies?

Answer 53

designed to study development and change over a period of time

Question 54

What are the strengths and weaknesses of longitudinal studies?

Answer 54

Adv:
possible to study change over time
possible to discover the causes of changes
provide more valid data as they can refer back to older studies

disadv:
original sample size will drop as people die
those in the sample are conscious of being studied
problem of cost

Question 55

What is triangulation?

Answer 55

a variety of methods is used to try to give a more rounded picture of the topic under study - uses both positivit and interpretivist method

Question 56

What are the uses of triangulation?

Answer 56

• provide qualitative data to check quantitative data and vice vers
• check the findings of secondary data
• overcome doubts about representativeness
• make research more reliable
• build up a fuller picture of the population
• overcome or compensate limitations of one research method
• check validity of finding obtained

Question 57

What is the difference between hard and soft statistics

Answer 57

hard - included birth, death and marriage rate as they are registered by law meaning they are entirely objective
soft - any other kind of statistic like crime and unemployment

Question 58

What does socially constructed means

Answer 58

they represent labels that people give to the behaviours of others

Question 59

Why can official statistics be called statistical icebergs

Answer 59

only a small fraction of data is reported while the large majority goes unreported

Question 60

What does the research population mean?

Answer 60

the group that has a certain characteristics that is of interest to the researcher

Question 61

What is Poppers falsification principle?

Answer 61

any scientific research must subject its hypothesis to falsification