8439348
Description
Flashcards by Eleanor Ferry, updated more than 1 year ago
|
Created by Eleanor Ferry
about 7 years ago
|
|
| Question | Answer |
| LABORATORY EXPERIMENTS | Advantages: - can replicate it - reliable for producing same results Disadvantages: - impossible to control the variables - small scale so may not be representative - can't be used to study the past - ethical objections to experiments on humans - Hawthorne Effect (unnatural behaviour) |
| FIELD EXPERIMENTS | Advantages: - natural and realistic Disadvantages: - more realistic, less control over the variables - unethical since carry out experiments on subjects without their consent/knowledge |
| COMPARATIVE METHOD | Advantages: - avoids artificiality - used to study past events - no ethical problems Disadvantages: - less control over variables than the field experiements |
| QUESTIONNAIRES | Advantages: - quick and cheap - no recruiting - easy to quantify - reliable -allow comparisons - useful to test hypotheses - objective - representative - fewer ethical issues Disadvantages: - data limited and superficial - low response rate - inflexible - snapshots - lack validity, not give true picture - impose researchers' meanings |
| STRUCTURED INTERVIEWS | Advantages: - training straightforward and cheap - suitable for gathering factual info - results easily quantified - representative - high response rate - reliable Disadvantages: - certain people have more time to do the interview, unrepresentative and undermine validity - false picture of subjects being studied as use closed q's - false data from those who lie - inflexible - feminists argue SIs are patriarchal and distort women's experience |
| UNSTRUCTURED INTERVIEWS | Advantages: - develop rapport, useful with sensitive subjects - interviewee have opportunity to give their opinions - able to explain meanings - flexible - open-ended and exploratory Disadvantages: - time consuming - small sample - not representative, harder to make valid generalisations - not reliable, not standardised - answers not pre-coded, difficult to quantify numbers |
| OVERT OBSERVATION | Advantages: - avoids ethical problem when gathering info - able to ask naive, important questions as an outsider - can openly take notes - use interview methods to check insights from observations Disadvantages: - group may refuse permission or not give a full view - risk of Hawthorne Effect |
| COVERT OBSERVATION | Advantages: - reduce risk of altered behaviour, valid info Disadvantages: - keep up an act - can't take notes, no questions, new member can change group's behaviour - ethical issues as immoral to deceive people, lie about reason for leaving |
| PARTICIPANT OBSERVATION | Advantages: - qualitative data, valid - verstehen, authentic data - flexible,open minded - build rapport Disadvantages: - time consuming - stressful and demanding - ethical issues as deceiving people and partaking in immoral/illegal activities - small sample, not able to make generalisations - difficult to compare with studies, not able to produce reliable data - lack of objectivity - biased in favour of subjects - Marxists and functionalists argue it doesn't look at wider structural forces which shape our behaviour |
| OFFICIAL STATISTICS | Advantages: - free - Census used which saves time allow comparison between groups - collected at regular intervals, show patterns and trends - representative, able to make generalisations - reliable Disadvantages: - only collected to benefit gov. so may not have info available for certain topics - different definitions from the gov. to sociologists - definitions change over time, comparisons difficult to make - some stats less representative than others - dark figure |
| DOCUMENTS | Advantages: - personal documents enable to give insight to actors reality - sometimes only source of info from past - able to check primary method results - cheap - saves time Disadvantages: - researcher may need special skill to understand document - not all documents survive or obtainable - credibility - authenticity |
Want to create your own Flashcards for free with GoConqr? Learn more.