Download Lesson 3 – Sampling New

Starter
• Outline each part of the
PERVERT wheel
• What does each part stand for?
• How do we use it in research
methods?
Positivists and interpretivits…
• Positivism and Interpretivism are
the two basic approaches to
research methods in Sociology.
• Positivists prefer scientific
quantitative methods, while
Interpretivists prefer humanistic
qualitative methods
Positivists
• Positivists prefer quantitative methods such as
social surveys, structured questionnaires and
official statistics because these have good
reliability and representativeness
• Positivists see society as shaping the individual and
generally believe that one’s position in society
shapes one’s actions. The positivist tradition
stresses the importance of doing quantitative
research such as large scale surveys in order to get
an overview of society as a whole and to uncover
social trends, such as the relationship between
educational achievement and social class. This type
of sociology is more interested in trends and
patterns rather than individuals.
• In positivist research, sociologists tend to look for
relationships, or ‘correlations’ between two or more
variables. This is known as the comparative method
Interpretivists
• Interpretivists, or anti-positivists argue that individuals
are not just puppets who react to external social forces as
Positivists believe.
• According to Interpretivists individuals are intricate and
complex and different people experience and understand
the same ‘objective reality’ in very different ways and
have their own, often very different, reasons for acting in
the world.
• Interpretivists argue that in order to understand human
action we need to see the world through the eyes of the
actors doing the acting.
• An Interpretivist Approach to social research would be
much more qualitative, using methods such as unstructured
interviews or participant observation.
Why do positivists and
interpretivists prefer different
types of data?
Positivists = quantitative
Interpretivists – qualitative
They make different assumptions about
the nature of society and why we should
study it.
Complete page 5 of your booklet using
page 94 of the textbook
Factors influencing the choice of
topic
• Practical, funding and values
• Read and highlight page 7
• Complete ‘values’ using page
95 of the textbook.
Preparing research…
• How do we conduct research?
• What are the steps we need to take as
sociologists?
• Hints: Hypothesis, aim, operationalising,
pilot studies.
Formulating an aim or
hypotheses…
Hypothesis: is a possible explanation that can be
tested by collecting evidence to prove it true or
false.
E.G “differences in class cause differences in
educational achievement”
We can then collect evidence to test whether or
not this is true. If we find it is false we must
discard it. This may seem like a bad thing, but
this leads to further focus on the
question/hypothesis we want to find out.
Formulating an aim or
hypotheses…
• Positivists  hypothesis as a starting
point for research.
• This is because they seek to discover
cause-and-effect relationships e.g class
differences cause underachievement
• They will use quantitative methods such
as questionnaires they formulate
questions designed to discover whether
and why these factors are linked.
Formulating an aim or
hypotheses…
• Interpretivists often favour a
broad aim rather than a hypothesis,
since they are interested in
understanding people’s meanings to
find out what people think is
important, rather than to impose
the researcher’s own possible
explanations in the form of the
hypothesis.
Research Methods
Lesson 3
Preparing research
sampling
Objectives:
• To explain some of the factors influencing the choice of research
methods
• To describe what is meant by practical, ethical and theoretical
issues
Lesson Objectives
• To define key words such as sampling unit and
sampling frame
• To describe different types of sampling
techniques
• To explain the strengths and weaknesses of
each sampling techniques
Sampling
• Sociologists aim to produce generalisations
that apply to all cases of the topic that they
are interested in
• However it would not be possible to include
everyone in the research so they would have
to select a sample which is a smaller sub
group, drawn from the wider group that we
are interested in
• The sample must be representative of the
research population if they are wanting to
generalise the findings
The Sampling Frame
• This is a list of all the members of the
population we are interested in studying
• From this we can choose our sample
Sampling unit
The individual thing or person in that population
Sampling Techniques
• They use a range of techniques to obtain
their sample:
Representative sampling
Non-representative sampling
 Random
 Systematic
 Stratified
 Quota
 Snowballing
 Opportunity
Representative
Key Term: a cross-section. A researcher
may choose to study a sample of a larger
group. If the sample is representative,
those in it will be typical of the larger
group. This will allow the findings to be
generalised i.e applied to all members of
the group, not just those in the sample.
Sampling techniques
• Read through each sampling technique –
make sure you know the differences
between them…
• Use page 98 of the book to add more
detail onto stratified
Advantages/Disadvantages
• You need to know the advantages and
disadvantages of using each of these
sampling techniques
• Using the gap fill, fill in the gaps as a
group
• Copy them up into your table when
you’re finished
Non representative sampling
• Due to practical and theoretical reasons,
representative sampling may not always be used
• For instance, people may refuse to take part in a
survey...would this be practical or theoretical?
• Case studies are another form of un
representative sampling…what are they?
Name some practical reasons why it might
not be possible to create a representative
sample?
• Social characteristics of the research
population such as gender and class, may not be
known – it is therefore impossible to create a
sample that is an exact cross-section of the
research population
• Difficult to find or create a sampling frame for
that particular research population e.g all
truancies may not be recorded
• Potential respondents may refuse to participate
• Snowball or opportunity samples may be used
instead here
Name some theoretical reasons why it
might not be possible to create a
representative sample?
• Researchers may not choose to create a
representative sample due to their
methodological perspective
(positivists/interpretivists)
• Are positivists/interpretivists more likely
to create a representative sample? Why?
• Interpretivists are less concerned about
making generalisations, so therefore there
is less need for representative samples.
Test yourself – no notes!
Which type of sampling?
the researcher stratifies the population
in the sampling frame by class, age,
gender ect. The sample is then created in
the same proportions. E.g if 40% of the
population are males, the sample would
also have 40% males.
stratified
Test yourself – no notes!
Which type of sampling?
Random
Every member of the population has an
equal chance of being selected for the
sample, e.g picking names out of a hat
Test yourself – no notes!
Which type of sampling?
systematic
Using sample frame, names are selected
at fixed points. E.g every 10th name or
every 25th name.
Test yourself – no notes!
Which type of sampling?
Quota
This is similar to stratified, but instead of
choosing the samples for each category
randomly, the researchers look for the right
number of people for each category. E.g 500
men and 500 women to find
Task
Complete page
10 of your
booklet.
Apply your knowledge
• Complete the questions on
page 11
• Work in pairs if you feel
you need help.
Plenary- learning triangle
3 things
you have
learnt
today, two
things you
already
know, 1
thing you
still want
to know!