Download Unit 1- Research Methodology Topic 1- Scientific method A scientific

Unit 1- Research Methodology
Topic 1- Scientific method
A scientific method or process is considered fundamental to the scientific investigation and acquisition of
new knowledge based upon verifiable evidence. In addition to employing the scientific method in their
research, sociologists explore the social world with several different purposes in mind. Like the physical
sciences (i.e., chemistry, physics, etc.), sociologists can be and often are interested in predicting outcomes
given knowledge of the variables and relationships involved. This approach to doing science is often
termed positivism (though perhaps more accurately should be called empiricism). The positivist approach
to social science seeks to explain and predict social phenomena, often employing a quantitative approach.
But unlike the physical sciences, sociology (and other social sciences, like anthropology) also often seek
simply to understand social phenomena. Max Weber labeled this approach Verstehen, which is German
for understanding. In this approach the goal is to understand a culture or phenomenon on its own terms
rather than trying to develop a theory that allow for prediction. Both approaches employ a scientific
method as they make observations and gather data, propose hypotheses, and test their hypotheses in the
formulation of theories. These steps are outlined in more detail below.
Sociologists use observations, hypotheses and deductions to propose explanations for social phenomena
in the form of theories. Predictions from these theories are tested. If a prediction turns out to be correct,
the theory survives. If not, the theory is modified or discarded. The method is commonly taken as the
underlying logic of scientific practice. Science is essentially an extremely cautious means of building a
supportable, evidenced understanding of our natural world.
The essential elements of a scientific method are iterations and recursions of the following four steps:
1.
2.
3.
4.
Characterization (operationalization or quantification, observation and measurement)
Hypothesis (a theoretical, hypothetical explanation of the observations and measurements)
Prediction (logical deduction from the hypothesis)
Experiment (test of all of the above; in the social sciences, true experiments are often replaced with
a different form of data analysis that will be discussed in more detail below)
Characterization
A scientific method depends upon a careful characterization of the subject of the investigation. While
seeking the pertinent properties of the subject, this careful thought may also entail some definitions and
observations; the observation often demands careful measurement and/or counting.
The systematic, careful collection of measurements or counts of relevant quantities is often the critical
difference between pseudo-sciences, such as alchemy, and a science, such as chemistry. Scientific
measurements are usually tabulated, graphed, or mapped, and statistical manipulations, such
as correlation and regression, performed on them. The measurements might be made in a controlled
setting, such as a laboratory, or made on more or less inaccessible or unmanipulatable objects such as
human populations. The measurements often require specialized scientific instruments such as
thermometers, spectroscopes, or voltmeters, and the progress of a scientific field is usually intimately tied
to their invention and development.
Measurements demand the use of operational definitions of relevant quantities (a.k.a. operationalization).
That is, a scientific quantity is described or defined by how it is measured, as opposed to some more
vague, inexact or idealized definition. The operational definition of a thing often relies on comparisons
with standards: the operational definition of mass ultimately relies on the use of an artifact, such as a
certain kilogram of platinum kept in a laboratory in France. In short, to operationalize a variable means
creating an operational definition for a concept someone intends to measure. How this is done is very
important as it should be done with enough precision that an independent researcher should be able to
use your description of your measurement and repeat it.
The scientific definition of a term sometimes differs substantially from its natural language usage. For
example, sex and gender are often used interchangeably in common discourse, but have distinct meanings
in sociology. Scientific quantities are often characterized by their units of measure which can later be
described in terms of conventional physical units when communicating the work.
Measurements in scientific work are also usually accompanied by estimates of their uncertainty. The
uncertainty is often estimated by making repeated measurements of the desired quantity. Uncertainties
may also be calculated by consideration of the uncertainties of the individual underlying quantities that
are used. Counts of things, such as the number of people in a nation at a particular time, may also have
an uncertainty due to limitations of the method used. Counts may only represent a sample of desired
quantities, with an uncertainty that depends upon the sampling method used and the number of samples
taken.
Topic 3- Positivism
Positivism asserts that the only authentic knowledge is that which is based on sense experience and
positive verification. As an approach to the philosophy of science deriving from Enlightenment thinkers
such as Henri de Saint-Simon and Pierre-Simon Laplace, Auguste Comte saw the scientific method as
replacing metaphysics in the history of thought, observing the circular dependence of theory and
observation in science. Sociological positivism was later reformulated by Émile Durkheim as a foundation
to social research. The overarching methodological principle of positivism is to conduct sociology in
broadly the same manner as natural science. An emphasis on empiricism and the scientific method is
sought to provide a tested foundation for sociological research, based on the assumption that the only
authentic knowledge is scientific knowledge, and that such knowledge can only arrive by positive
affirmation through scientific methodology.
In the original Comtean usage, "positivism" roughly meant the use of scientific methods to uncover the
laws according to which both physical and human events occur, while "sociology" was the overarching
science that would synthesize all such knowledge for the betterment of society. The term has long since
ceased to carry this meaning. There are no fewer than twelve distinct epistemologies that are referred to
as positivism. Many of these approaches do not self-identify as "positivist", some because they themselves
arose in opposition to older forms of positivism, and some because the label has over time become a term
of abuse by being mistakenly linked with a theoretical empiricism. The extent of anti-positivist criticism
has also diverged, with many rejecting the scientifically driven social epistemology and others only
seeking to amend it to reflect 20th century developments in the philosophy of science. However,
positivism (broadly understood as a scientific approach to the study of society) remains dominant in
contemporary sociology, especially in the United States.
Loic Wacquant distinguishes three major strains of positivism: Durkheimian, Logical and
Instrumental. None of these are the same as that set forth by Comte, who was unique amongst
sociologists in advocating a formulation with such a restrictive epistemology and grandiose
teleology. While Émile Durkheim rejected much of the detail of Comte's philosophy, he retained and
refined its method. Durkheim maintained that the social sciences are a logical continuation of the natural
ones into the realm of human activity, and insisted that they should retain the same objectivity,
rationalism, and approach to causality. He developed the notion of objective suis generis "social facts" to
delineate a unique empirical object for the science of sociology to study.
"Our main goal is to extend scientific rationalism to human conduct... What has been called our
positivism is but a consequence of this rationalism." (Émile Durkheim, The Rules of Sociological
Method, 1895)
The variety of positivism that remains dominant today is termed instrumental positivism. This approach
eschews epistemological and metaphysical concerns (such as the nature of social facts) in favor of
methodological debates concerning clarity, replicability, reliability and validity. This positivism is more
or less synonymous with quantitative research, and thus only resembles older positivist stances in
practice: since it carries no explicit philosophical commitment, its practitioners may have any of a variety
of viewpoints, including post-positivism and anti-positivism. The institutionalization of this kind of
sociology is often credited to Paul Lazarsfeld, who pioneered large-scale survey studies and developed
statistical techniques for analyzing them. This approach lends itself to what Robert K.
Merton called middle-range theory: abstract statements that generalize from segregated hypotheses and
empirical regularities rather than starting with an abstract idea of a social whole.
Topic 4- Critique of positivism
Historically, positivism has been criticized for its universalism, i.e. for contending that all "processes are
reducible to physiological, physical or chemical events," "social processes are reducible to relationships
between and actions of individuals," and that "biological organisms are reducible to physical systems."
Positivism has also come under fire on religious and philosophical grounds, whose proponents assert
that truth begins in sense experience, but does not end there. Positivism fails to prove that there are not
abstract ideas, laws, and principles, beyond particular observable facts and relationships and necessary
principles, or that we cannot know them. Nor does it prove that material and corporeal things constitute
the whole order of existing beings, and that our knowledge is limited to them.
Reactions against social empiricism began when German philosopher Hegel voiced opposition to both
empiricism, which he rejected as uncritical, and determinism, which he viewed as overly
mechanistic. Karl Marx's methodology borrowed from Hegel dialecticism but also a rejection of
positivism in favour of critical analysis, seeking to supplement the empirical acquisition of "facts" with
the elimination of illusions. He maintained that appearances need to be critiqued rather than simply
documented.
Various neo-Kantian philosophers, phenomenologist’s and human
scientists further
theorized how the analysis of the social world differs to that of the natural world due to the irreducibly
complex aspects of human society, culture, and being.
At the turn of the 20th century the first generation of German sociologists formally introduced
methodological anti-positivism, proposing that research should concentrate on human
cultural norms, values, symbols,
and
social
processes
viewed
from
a
resolutely subjective perspective. Max Weber argued that sociology may be loosely described as a science
as it is able to identify causal relationships of human "social action"—especially among "ideal types", or
hypothetical simplifications of complex social phenomena. As a non positivist, however, Weber sought
relationships that are not as "ahistorical, invariant, or generalizable" as those pursued by natural
scientists. Fellow German sociologist, Ferdinand Tönnies, theorized on two crucial abstract concepts with
his work on "Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft" (little community and society). Tönnies marked a sharp line
between the realm of concepts and the reality of social action: the first must be treated axiomatically and
in a deductive way ("pure sociology"), whereas the second empirically and inductively ("applied
sociology").
Both Weber and Georg Simmel pioneered the "Verstehen" (or 'interpretative') method in social science; a
systematic process by which an outside observer attempts to relate to a particular cultural group, or
indigenous people, on their own terms and from their own point-of-view. Through the work of Simmel,
in particular, sociology acquired a possible character beyond positivist data-collection or grand,
deterministic systems of structural law. Relatively isolated from the sociological academy throughout his
lifetime, Simmel presented idiosyncratic analyses of modernity more reminiscent of
the phenomenological and existential writers than of Comte or Durkheim, paying particular concern to
the forms of, and possibilities for, social individuality. His sociology engaged in a neo-Kantian enquiry
into the limits of perception, asking 'What is society?' in a direct allusion to Kant's question 'What is
nature?'