Download 3. Theory and practice of concrete sociological researches

Social research
LECTURE 5
PLAN
Social research and its foundation
 Quantitative / qualitative research
 Sociological paradigms (points of view)
 A focus group and its types
 A questionnaire
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Social research refers to research
conducted by social scientists (primarily
within sociology and social psychology)
Sociologists and other social scientists
study diverse things: from census data on
hundreds of thousands of human beings,
through the in-depth analysis of the life of
a single important person to monitoring
what is happening on a street today - or what
was happening a few hundred years ago.
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Common tools of quantitative
researchers include surveys,
questionnaires, and secondary analysis
of statistical data that has been
gathered for other purposes (for
example, censuses or the results of
social attitudes surveys). Commonly
used qualitative methods include focus
groups, participant observation, and
other techniques.
Social research (and social science in
general) is based on logic and empirical
observations.
 Charles C. Ragin writes in his
Constructing Social Research book that
"Social research involved the interaction
between ideas and evidence. Ideas help
social researchers make sense of
evidence, and researchers use
evidence to extend, revise and test
ideas".
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Social research thus attempts to create
or validate theories through data
collection and data analysis, and its
goal is exploration, description and
explanation.
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Research can also be divided into pure
research and applied research. Pure
research has no application on real life,
whereas applied research attempts to
influence the real world.
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Social methods can generally be subdivided into two
broad categories. Quantitative methods are
concerned with attempts to quantify social
phenomena and collect and analyse numerical data,
and focus on the links among a smaller number of
attributes across many cases.
Qualitative methods, on the other hand, emphasise
personal experiences and interpretation over
quantification, are more concerned with
understanding the meaning of social phenomena and
focus on links among a larger number of attributes
across relatively few cases. While very different in
many aspects, both qualitative and quantitative
approaches involve a systematic interaction between
theories and data.
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Quantitative methods are useful for
describing social phenomena, especially on a
larger scale. Qualitative methods allow social
scientists to provide richer explanations (and
descriptions) of social phenomena, frequently
on a smaller scale. By using two or more
approaches researchers may be able to
'triangulate' their findings and provide a more
valid representation of the social world.
 A combination of different methods are often
used within "comparative research", which
involves the study of social processes across
nation-states, or across different types of
society.
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Social scientists usually follow one or more of
the several specific sociological paradigms
(points of view):
 
conflict paradigm focuses on the ability
of some groups to dominate others, or
resistance to such domination.
 
ethnomethodology paradigm examines
how people make sense out of social life in
the process of living it, as if each was a
researcher engaged in enquiry.
 
feminist paradigm focuses on how male
dominance of society has shaped social life.

Darwinism paradigm sees a progressive
evolution in social life.
 
positivism paradigm was an early 19th
century approach, now considered obsolete
in its pure form. Positivists believed we can
scientifically discover all the rules governing
social life.
 
structural functionalism paradigm
addresses what functions various elements of
the social system perform in regard to the
entire system.
 
symbolic interactionism paradigm
examines how shared meanings and social
patterns are developed in the course of social
interactions.
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Focus group
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A focus group is a form of qualitative
research in which a group of people are
asked about their attitude towards a
product, service, concept,
advertisement, idea. Questions are
asked in an interactive group setting
where participants are free to talk with
other group members.
Variants of focus groups include:
 
Two-way focus group - one focus
group watches another focus group and
discusses the observed interactions and
conclusions
 
Dual moderator focus group - one
moderator ensures the session progresses
smoothly, while another ensures that all the
topics are covered
 
Duelling moderator focus group - two
moderators deliberately take opposite sides
on the issue under discussion
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Respondent moderator focus group one or more of the respondents are asked to
act as the moderator temporarily
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Client participant focus groups - one
or more client representatives participate in
the discussion, either covertly or overtly
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Mini focus groups - groups are
comprised of 4 or 5 members rather than 8 to
12
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Teleconference focus groups telephone network is used
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Online focus groups - computers and
internet network is used
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A questionnaire is a research instrument consisting
of a series of questions and other prompts for the
purpose of gathering information from respondents.
Questionnaires have advantages over some other
types of surveys in that they are cheap, do not
require as much effort from the questioner as verbal
or telephone surveys, and often have standardized
answers that make it simple to compile data.
However, such standardized answers may frustrate
users. Questionnaires are also sharply limited by the
fact that respondents must be able to read the
questions and respond to them. Thus, for some
demographic groups conducting a survey by
questionnaire may not be practical.
The ethics of social research
Two main assumptions of the ethics in
social research are:
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voluntary participation
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no harm to subjects