Ch 5- How Sociologists Do Research

Sociologists do research on about every area of human behaviour:

→ Macro level: they study broad matters as race relations, the military, and the global economic crisis

→ Micro Level: Study individualistic matters as pelvic examinations, how people interact in street corners, shyness

• All human behaviour is eligible for sociological scrutiny. Research is needed to test common sense ideas, since not all of them are true.

• Research Questions: Identifying, refining, evaluating

• Identifying: finding questions, can be from personal experience, literature, social theory, social trends/troubles

• Refining: refining your question, to manage the size/scope of the project

• Evaluating: must have social importance and scientific relevance

A Research Model:

1. Selecting a Topic

• Something you want to know more about. Something that drives the sociologist’s interest or their drive to learn more about social life

2. Defining the Problem

• After selecting a topic, they examine specific aspects of a topic

3. Reviewing the Literature

• Read what has been published, it helps narrow down the problem, identify areas that are already known, and learn what areas need to be researched

4. Formulating a Hypothesis

• A Hypothesis is a statement of what you expect to find according to predictions from a theory

• A hypothesis predicts a relationship between or among variables

• Variables are factors that change, or vary from one person or situation to another

Hypothesis will need operational definitions, which are precise ways to measure the variables

5. Choosing a Research Method

• Decide how you will collect your data

6. Collecting the Data

• Operational definitions measure the validity of the data gathered

• Must be sure the data are reliable

• Reliability means that if other researchers use your operational definitions, their findings will be consistent with you

7. Analysing the Results

• Testing your data depending on the technique which applies to the observations made. Those that apply to observations of people in small settings to the analysis of large-scale surveys

• If hypothesis has been part of the research, it has to be tested

8. Sharing the Results

• Sociologists will write a report to share their findings with the scientific community

• When the research is published, it belongs to the scientific community

• Their findings will be available for replication, so that others can repeat the study to see if they come up with similar results

Basic Research Methods (research design)

1. Surveys

2. Participant observation

3. Case studies

4. Secondary analysis

5. Documents

6. Experiments

7. Unobstructive measures