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theory and methods Flashcards

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Sociology 101 flashcards
1
Q

what does quantitative mean?

A

Data that is largely numerical in form

Useful to identify for measuring relationship between factors

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2
Q

examples of quantitative data?

A

Social surveys
Structured interviews
Official statistics

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3
Q

what is qualitative data?

A

Data consisting of words,meanings and interpretations

Conveys information about values and attitudes

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4
Q

examples of qualitative data?

A

Observations

Unstructured interviews

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5
Q

what is primary research?

A

Research that is carried out by the researcher themselves

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6
Q

what is secondary research?

A

Information that has not been generated personally,but gathered by someone else

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7
Q

what does practical mean?

A

is it possible to carry out

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8
Q

what does theoretical mean?

A

what do sociologist think about research found

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9
Q

what does ethical mean?

A

is it morally to to complete

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10
Q

examples of practical issues?

A 
Time and money 
Access 
Requirement of funding bodies 
Personal skills and characteristic of the researcher 
Subject matter
Research opportunities 
Is it safe
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11
Q

examples of ethical issues?

A

Informed consent- the right to refuse with full awareness of what’s involves
Confidentiality and privacy- keep the participants identity confidential
Effects on research participants- should prevent harmful effect on participants
Vulnerable groups- children,disabled
Deception
Right to withdrawn
Convert research- identify and purpose hidden

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12
Q

examples of theoretical issues?

A

Validity- method that produces a true or genie pitture arguably qualitative methods achieve this to a greater extent
Reliability- similar to replicability, a method in which when repeated by another research will give the same result

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13
Q

what is positivism?

A 
Reliable 
Is a science 
Objective 
Quantitative 
Macro 
Official stats,experiments, surveys
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14
Q

what is interpretivism?

A 
Valid 
Is not a science 
Subjective 
Qualitative 
Micro 
Unstructured,interview,observation
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15
Q

what is Representativeness ?

A

Weather the sample used are typical cross section of the group we are interested in
Ensure is representative or typical of the wider population
Find without studying every sample

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16
Q

what is a Methodological perspective?

A

Also influenced by the view of what society is like and how we should study it
Two contrasting perspectives- positivism and interpretivism

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17
Q

give 2 types of experiments?

A

lab

field

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18
Q

what are lab experiments?

A

Provide an environment when variables can be isolated and correlation between things can be measured (bandura/milgram)

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19
Q

what are field experiments?

A

Conducted in normal everyday situations unlike lab experiments variables cannot be controlled (rosenthal, jacobson,sissons)

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20
Q

what are Comparative method?

A

Sometimes used to analyse 2 or more different groups (durkheim)

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21
Q

what is a hypothesis?

A

testable statement

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22
Q

what is a independent variable ?
what is a dependent variable ?
what is a control variable ?

A

Independent variables- deliberately manipulated by the researcher in an attempt to change participants performance
Dependant variable- variable the researcher assumes will be affected by independent variables
Control variable- keep the same

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23
Q

what did Rosenthal and jacobson do?

A

Random sample 20%
Old teachers have a api intellectual growth
Tested IQ before and after
Teacher communicated their beliefs

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24
Q

give advantages of Rosenthal and jacobson experiment?

A 
Positivists 
Test hypothesis in controlled conditions 
Objective 
Field experiments are more valid 
Easy to isolate and manipulate
Repeatable 
Comparisons with similar research
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25
Q

give disadvantages of Rosenthal and jacobson experiment?

A 
Interpretivist would dislike 
Difficult to isolate a single cause 
Ethical issues 
Small scale settings 
Artificiality 
Lacks validity
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26
Q

what are official stats?

A

Quantitative data gathered by the government of other official bodies.

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27
Q

The social construction official statistics?

A

Socially constructed rather than being based on facts

Interpretivists make this criticism because official statistics create by social processes

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28
Q

advantages of the social construction?

A 
Important for planning and evaluating social policies ]
Cheap
Easy accessible 
Representative 
Cover a long life span
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29
Q

disadvantages of the social construction?

A

Might not tell the whole story
May change over time
Statistics are socially constructed
Produced by the state

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30
Q

what is Operationalisation?

A

Decide how you are going to measure your concepts

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31
Q

what are social surveys?

A

Are large scale about people’s lives mainly using questionnaires but sometimes interviews

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32
Q

before making a social survey they have to?

A

Choose a topic
Formulate and aim or hypothesis
Operationalisation concepts
Pilot study

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33
Q

what are sample frames?

A

List of the people forming a population from which a sample is taken

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34
Q

what are questionnaires?

A

A list of pre-set questions to which the respondents are asked to answer
Cheap
Fast
Efficient method for obtaining large amount of quantifiable data on relatively large sample of people

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35
Q

what are the 2 types of questionnaires

A

Structured- reliable, highly, pre-set questions with limited choice
Open-ended questions- less structured, no pre-set choice and open questions

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36
Q

what are interviews?

A

Structured or formal- based on structured, pre-coded questionnaire, administered by an interview
Unstructured or informal- like a guided conversation aims to obtain further depth and drawn out feeling and opinions
Group interviews- are unstructured

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37
Q

advantages and disadvantages of interviews

A 
time , money 
Venue 
Verstehen 
Bias 
Ethical issues- feel pressured to continue 
 Social desirability effect
Interviews are artificial situation
Problems of validity 
Do people give honest answers 
Unstructured they are unreliable 
Not easily repeated   
Take long time to conduct
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38
Q

what experiment did wills do?

A

group interviews with wc lads

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39
Q

what experiment did Laund humphreys do?

A

structured health surveys

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40
Q

what experiment did Dobash & dobash do?

A

unstructured domestic violence

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41
Q

what are the 4 types of observation ?

A

Participant observation
Convert
Overt
Non-participant observation

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42
Q

what is Participant observation?

A

involves a researcher joining the group they are studying and participating in its activities

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43
Q

what is Convert observation?

A

researcher conceals their own identity

44
Q

what is Overt observation?

A

researcher declares their own identity

45
Q

what is Non-participant observation?

A

observation without the researcher participating

46
Q

what did Venkatesh do?

A

Gang leader for the day- led a double life for 7 years

47
Q

what are the issues with observation?

A 
Making contact 
Observer role- how involved they are?
How do you leave the group?
Gaining verstehen 
Physical, theoretical and ethical issues
48
Q

Are documents quantitative or qualitative?

A

documents can be both

49
Q

what are the two types of documents?

A

public documents

private documents

50
Q

what are public documents?

A

produced by organisation such as government and schools

51
Q

what are private documents?

A

first person accounts, e:g letters, photo albums

52
Q

what 4 things does Scott argue you have to look at for historical documents?

A

Authenticity (is it fake)
Credibility (is it believable)
Representativeness (is it typical)
Meaning (have we interpret it correctly)

53
Q

who used context analysis to analyse gender roles?

A

Sharp and mcrobbie

54
Q

what is context analysis?

A

Is a method for dealing systematically with the contents of documents ones in the media

55
Q

what is Minority methods ?

A

Likely to be high in validity due to the close examination of an individual’s world. Learning through putting yourself in someone else’s shoes and therefore provides verstehen
Extremely small samples and their for under representation meaning we cannot generalize

56
Q

what does case study mean ?

A

a detailed examination of a single case of example

57
Q

what is Longitudinal research?

A

A study that follows the same sample or group over an extended period of time

58
Q

what is life histories?

A

A case study of an individual using qualitative methods
Aims - try and understand how individuals interpret their ‘life worlds’
High in validity, qualitative date
Training of interviewer to empathise with subject
Good listening skills
Extremely time consuming

59
Q

what is triangulation?

A

Using both quantitative and qualitative methods in your research

60
Q

explain Durkheim study

A 
Functionalist 
Macro 
Structuralism 
Positivism 
Social fact/objective
Suidice is not individually determined but is the result of social force 
Rates may vary between diffrent social groups and trends to remain constant 
Determined by too much/too little 
Social integration
Moral regulation
61
Q

give the 4 types caused by too much/ too little integration or regulation

A

Egoistic- under integration
Altruistic- excess integration
Anomic- under regulation
Fatalistic- excess regulation

62
Q

give 3 examples of things correlated with suicide?

A

Protestant and Catholics
Married and single
Parents and childless

63
Q

give some criticisms of durkheim study?

A

Official stats- suicide rates not reliably collected in past
Some people may not want death to be categonside as suicide

64
Q

what was douglas theory of suicide?

A

Rather than causes of suicide, douglas looks at the meaning of suicide not social fact but a social construction

65
Q

give some criticisms of douglas study?

A

Sociologists better at determining suicide than highly trained coroners
How can we truly discover the meaning behind suicide if cannot ask them

66
Q

explain Atkinson - ethnomethodology study?

A

Social reality is just a construct of its members
Agrees that suicide statistics are the result of croners ecisions but disagree that we can never uncover the decreased meanings
We need to study how coroners come to the decisions
Based on qualitative research, he found coroners made common sense assumptions

67
Q

explain Empirical

A

Empirical- information can be controlled or measured

68
Q

explain Theoretical

A

Theoretical- seeks to uncover causal relationship

69
Q

explain Objective

A

Objective- blocks out personal prejudices and political views

70
Q

explain Testable

A

Testable- can be tested and revisited

71
Q

explain Cumulative

A

Cumulative- builds on previous knowledge so their is an ever growing body of knowledge

72
Q

explain popper view on sociology as a science?

A

Criticisms positivist methods
No such thing as ‘objective’ truth
Advocates the conjecture and refutation model
Instead of typing to prove their hypothesis right they should try and prove them wrong
They should subject their hypothesis to the principle of falsification
Scientific knowledge is provisional or temporary

73
Q

explain what is meant by conjecture

A

Conjecture- a guess about something based on how it seems and not a proof

74
Q

explain what is meant by Refutation

A

Refutation- to say/ prove that a person, statement opinions is wrong or false

75
Q

give the criticisms of popper

A

Marxism cannot be scientific because it is impossible to prove social change will not occur in the future:
It is a hypothesis not a falsification
Can’t measure or prove ‘ideology or hegemony’

76
Q

explain kuhn view on sociology as a science?

A

Scientific enquiry is characterised by conservation and tradition which is the result of socialisation or scientist
Scientists are taught to operate within a set of assumptions which are assumed to be correct taken for granted
Assumptions ‘paradigms’
Only when anomalies frequently occur that a new paradigm is established
He challenged the notion that science is purely a method but scientific methods depends on the dominant paradigm of the time

77
Q

explain the criticisms of Kuhn?

A

Science is a social construction
Not objective but constructed within a framework of dominant assumptions
Doubtful its scientific as its not characterised by a single paradigm

78
Q

explain Keat and urry view on sociology as a science?

A

Discuss how much control does the researcher have over variables:
closed (controlled)
Open (can’t control)
Realists argue they study open system
Both natural science and social science attempt to explain the causes of events in terms of the underlying structure and process
Realists argue that science not only deals with observable phenomena but underlying observable structures

79
Q

overall view of keat and urry?

A

Argue it is scientific, little differences except some are able to study closed systems under lab conditions

80
Q

what did positivism say about values in sociology?

A

Positivism- argue that the sociologists job is to uncover ‘Truth’ and ‘laws’ of society

81
Q

what did Comte and durkheim say about values in sociology?

A

Comte and durkheim- argue that sociologist is free form values and bias, thus in a perfect position to suggest what is best for society

82
Q

what did marxism say about values in sociology?

A

Marxism- favours a scientific approach to study sociology
BUT
Values the strengths of communism taken for granted that it is ‘ideal’ not an objective approach but values laden

83
Q

what did weber say about values in sociology?

A

Weber- values are important to sociological research ‘ social action’
Positivism can tell us that there are more divorces happening but doesn’t mean people do not value marriage

84
Q

what did Goulder say about values in sociology?

A

Value freedom is impossible so sociologists should be open/ honest about these
Research is ‘historically’ bound
Research is influenced by the researchers personal agenda, career goals.
All researchers have their own opinions

85
Q

give Values in the research process that affect staying objective?

A 
Choosing which topic to research 
Interpreting findings 
Selecting which findings to include in the report 
Choosing a research method 
Recording responses 
Selecting appropriate questions 
Deciding what report will be used for 
Deciding where report will be published
86
Q

what did Philo and miller say about funding?

A

Philo and miller- argue that research is ultimately dictated by whoever is funding it
Research is rarely carried out for it own sake. Funding agencies might also only want particular findings

87
Q

who support value laden?

A

Committed sociologists
Marxism- value communism
Feminsim- values gender inequality
Interactionism- values individuals meanings and motivations
Gouldner- argues that functionalism is actually value-committed as it has an ‘ideal type’ of society at its centre

88
Q

what did becker say relating to values in sociology?

A

Value freedom is never possible
Positivism always examines the viewpoint of the powerful- the groups who get to define deviance,crime
We should look at the ‘underdogs’ rather than the ‘overdogs’

89
Q

what is Relativism (postmodern view) view of values in sociology?

A

Different groups, cultures and individuals have different views as to what is true
There is no way of judging whether any view is truer than another
There is no single, over-riding,just ‘pluralism of truth’ every truth is true for individuals- every truth is valid

90
Q

what is a social problem ?

A

Social problem- a social problems is some piece of social behaviour that cause public friction and or private misery and calls for collective action to solve it

91
Q

what is a sociological problem?

A

any pattern of relationship that calls for explanation

92
Q

what are the 7 factors that influence sociology on policy

A 
electoral popularity 
ideological and policy preferences of government 
interest groups 
globalisation
critical sociology 
cost 
funding sources
93
Q

explain electoral popularity

A

they may be unpopular with the voting public then the government in power are going to be reluctant to implement the policy because they want to stay in power

94
Q

explain ideological and policy preferences of government

A

if the researchers value- stance in similar to the government, they may sand more chance in influencing its policies

95
Q

explain interest groups

A

pressure groups seek to influence government for their own interests

96
Q

explain globalisation

A

international organisations who have lots of power can outweigh the evidence produced by sociologists

97
Q

explain critical sociology

A

the sociological perspective that are seen to be critical of the state and other powerful groups may be regarded as extreme, hostile or impractical and therefore unlikely to influence policy

98
Q

explain cost

A

research findings may offer a solution that the government may consider a good idea and workable, but if there is not sufficient funds they would be unable to implement the measures

99
Q

explain funding sources

A

results may be influenced by the funders so they may be tone down their recommendations to fit in with their wishes

100
Q

explain functionalist perspective on social policy

A

The government act for the good of it citizens
Role of the sociologist is to pass objective data to the policy maker
criticisms - policies are not aimed to equalizing for all

101
Q

explain marxism perspective on social policy

A

See social policies as serving the interests of the capitalist system
When conflict arises policies are offered to appease the working class- part of the false consciousness process

102
Q

explain feminist perspective on social policy

A

Argue their research has had a big impact on social policies since the 1960’s
Education- childrens books, learning materials
Family- policies reflect domestic and workplace changes for women

103
Q

explain the new right perspective on social policy

A

Believe that the state should have only minor involvement in social policy
Sociologists should aim at restoring individuals responsibility for their own and families welfare
Against welfare dependency
They support strong law and order policies

104
Q

explain the social democratic perspective on social policy

A

Support distribution of wealth from rich to poor
Townsend- recommendations on higher benefits
Black report- 37 far reaching recommendation to overcome inequalities including FSM’s

105
Q

explain the postmodernism on social policy

A

See no role for sociology in the realm of social policy making as sociology should merely exist to give individuals an understanding of their own personal lives within a social context

sociology (7 decks)

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