Research methods

Positivism

The scientific approach to studying society, often preferred by structural perspectives

Believe that structural causes that shaped and mould people’s behaviours

‘Macro’ approach

Looking at how large numbers of people are affected by societal issues

Positivism is a macro approach

Quantitative data

Numbers/the statistical form of data

Use graphs to find this data

Interpretivism

They believe people’s behaviour is influenced by the interpretations and meanings they give to social situations

To gain an understanding of the situation

‘Micro’ approach

On a small scale

Used for interpretivism

Use qualitative methods

Verhesten

Meaning empathy

Putting yourself in someone else’s shoes

Qualitative data

More in depth/literature e.g an article or interview

Covert observations

Where the researcher goes under cover and the people being observed are not aware of it

Overt observations (open)

When you know the person studying you/the group of people are there

Participant observations

As the researcher, you’re getting involved, taking part in the participants situations

Non-participant observations

You’re not getting involved as the researcher, detached from the participants actions

What method would you use for; “To study the factors affecting subject choice at GSCE.”

Interviews as the participants can explain in detail for their choice of GSCE subjects

What method would you use for; “To study the extent of religious belief in the UK.”

Questionnaires because it’s a large sample and you can answer the questions anonymously and truthfully

Interviews

A method of gathering information by asking questions orally or face to face

What type of questions are in structured interviews?

Closed questions

What type of questions are in unstructured interviews?

Open questions

Tony Parker (unstructured interviews)

Interviews, tape recorded with prisoners

Days out with prisoners on their release day or prison visiting rooms/ex-prisoners houses

Interviews took in the form of a conversation and did not include a pre-determined set of questions

Tony encouraged the prisoners to tell their own stories without specific questions to follow during their interviews

He offered guidance at the beginning e.g ‘before i being i explain that it will take 45 minutes to an hour, at the end of there is any part of the conversation you don’t want to use, i won’t use it’

Practical strengths and weakness of structured, unstructured and semi-structured interviews

S: easy to pre-ciss and quicker to analyse

U: Time consuming, difficult to get access, may not have funding

SS: Mix/ a range of questions

Ethical strengths and weakness of structured and unstructured interviews

S: Informed consent, reduced harm caused by checking questions

U: Informed consent, clear briefing, can spend time checking the participants understand what is being asked of them

Theoretical strengths and weakness of structured and unstructured interviews

S: More reliable as can ensure the questions are the same, can maintain consistency

U: Valid, can build a rapport and gain vershten, however it’s no reliable, small-sample and can generalise

Strengths and weakness of Group interviews

P: Time consuming, can go on for a while and takes time to analyse

E: May not get all voices/points across within the group of participants

T: May increase validity because you can get more of a rapport and vershcten

Lab experiment

Controlled environment, artificial setting and manipulated by the researcher

Field experiments

Research takes place in a natural setting and the researcher is manipulating the variables

P.E.R.V.E.R.T

Practical- Cost/time/access

Ethical- Harm, informed consent, deception

Reliability- If you can repeat it, you will get the same results

Validity- Seeing the whole/broader picture, need to see detail and reasons behind the data and the truth

Example- Reference to at least one study on your answer e.g Milgram experiment

Representative- Represent the demographics that you want to study, mirrors target population and more likely to be represented as lend themselves to bigger sample groups

T- Which perspective you are coming from e:g a positivist or interpretivist

Types of questionnaires and surveys

Postal

Web-based

Hand

Open

Closed