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Why
study this topic?
This
is an important issue and should be mentioned in your coursework project
in the description of your study design and you should refer to it in
your evaluation.
It
is also an area of debate in the ‘A’ level because it is a
contentious issue in universities and colleges.
Have
a clear, specific and personal view which is your own and not just a
re-hash of these notes.
For
further reading, then look for books on Methodology of which there are
a number in the LRC and in most sensible book shops. Cardiff Central
Library is not too bad and should give you some titles to refer to in
your Bibliography section of the coursework and in the context section.
Terms
that you should use constantly and be familiar with:
- positivist
and anti-positivist (or phenomenonologist)
- empiricism
- qualitative
and quantitative
- hypothesis
testing
- data
- collation
of /collating data
- process
and meaning
- causal relationships
- scientific
and interpretative
- validity
and reliability
- Kuhn and
the scientific paradigm
The
measure of all scientific research is:
Reliability
- The scientific trustworthiness of the data, its repeatability.
Validity
- The appropriateness of the research methods, the quality and
accuracy of the data.
Key
textual references
Bilton
et al., Introductory Sociology 2nd Edition(1996) p 109-10
Giddens, Sociology 3rd Edition (1997) p 537 f
Selfe, Work Out Sociology (1987) p 12 f
Haralambos and Holborn, Sociology: Themes and Perspectives
(1990) 808-17, 826-7
Taylor et al., Sociology in Focus (199?) see index! p
21-4
Thompson and Priestley, Sociology Made Simple 2nd Edition
(1996) p 256-7
Jorgensen et al., Sociology: An Interactive Approach
(1997) p 292f
O'Donnell, Introduction to Sociology 4th
Edition (1997) p 23 f
Stephens et al. Think Sociology (1998) Chapter
5
Marcus and Ducklin Success in Sociology (1998)
Chapter 1
Fulcher and Scott Sociology (1999)Chapter
3
Kirby et al. Sociology in Perspective (1997)
Chapter 3
Best,
Griffiths and Hope (2000) Active Sociology has an enormous
amount devoted to methodology and should provide you with an excellent
guide to all that you need.
This
is such an important area of thought that you are strongly advised to
read and make notes on more than two of the texts suggested. Keep reading
over a period of time until you are absolutely clear on exactly the
differences between the two perspectives.
Interpretative/Phenomenological
and Positivist/Empirical Research - Revision checklist
note
- This is not intended to replace your own reading and research. It
is supplemental so that your reading will make more sense when you do
it.
| |
Interpretative
|
Positivist/Empirical
|
| key
terms |
phenomenology
quality
meaning
process |
data
statistics
positivist
empirical |
| thrust
of research |
feelings |
numbers |
| methods |
unstructured
interview
observations |
questionnaire
measurements |
| readability |
great
fun |
with
a calculator |
| scale
of work |
small
scale |
lots
of people |
| ease
of research |
one
person |
team,
big computer or secondary data |
| fashionability
rating |
high
among sociologists |
lower
generally among experts
typical of market research/voting
patterns because easier to comprehend for non-practitioner
|
| validity |
so
- so, depends on your topic, but supplements positivist work |
over-estimated,
see under ‘dark figure of crime’ |
| reliability |
easy
to cheat and select data |
over-estimated
if you believe the nature of society is to change! |
| perspective |
interactional |
post
Durkheim and in the British tradition |
| problems
to consider |
-time
factor
-making notes
-ethics
-ease with which subjects can manipulate the image they project
-possibility of becoming involved in criminal or deviant acts
|
-cost
of research
-time factor
-possibility of creating 'leading' questions
-reliability of responses
-have the correct questions been asked?
-interpreting statistics is a specialised field
-people can read too much into results (think of school league
tables)
|
| key
works |
American
work - see Goffman,
Becker, Whyte,
British work see Willis,
Hargreaves, Lacey,
|
British
work - see The Bethnal Green studies, Affluent Worker study, Halsey
and Glass on class |
Most
sociologists know that there is considerable unreliability with empirical
data. The current fashion is to look for meaning in social behaviours;
so statistical work tends to be left to statisticians. The government
does this so well with the Census, why should an individual researcher
bother?
Research
funding is limited and so people cannot afford to run huge surveys and
teams unless they have sufficient scientific kudos (e.g. Halsey
and the Oxford Mobility Study) to gain grants.
Marxists
tend to ignore the whole argument because they already know the answer.
They will use whatever method suits the topic. Pragmatists or Realists
use both methods to gain a better overall picture through a process
which is called triangulation.
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