Sociology .

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TIl.ory and

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NATIONAL EXTENSION COLLEGE

Sociology fA I level

Theory an '¥J_thods I

NEe

AGknowtedgements

Written by: Roger Gomm

Project Manager: Linda Deer Richardson

We should like to thank the other team members, Pat McNeill and Penny Henderson, for their help in preparing this material.

Page design by: Vicky Squires

Page layout by: Brenda Hopton and Mary Bishop Cartoons by: Roger Gomm (author)

Printed by: NEC Print

'A' level Sociology course Theory and Methods module

First printed in 1990

Reprinted in 1991, 1992, 1993, 1996

ISBN 185356114 2 ISBN 1 85356 225 4

Copyright © 1990 National Extension College Trust Limited 18 Brooklands Avenue, Cambridge CB2 2HN

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.

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The National Extension College is an educational trust and a registered charity with a distinguished body of trustees. It is an independent, self-financing organisation.

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We are grateful for permission to use the following:

Abbott, P, and Wallace, C, Introduction to Sociology: Feminist Perspectives, 1990, Routledge (pp.3-5).

Atkinson, W.M, Kessel, N, and Dalgaard, J, 'The comparability of suicide rates', Brttisb fournal o/psychtatry, 127, 1975 (table).

Caudrey, A, 'Whose research?' New SOCiety, 23 October 1987. Reproduced with the permission of New Statesman and Society.

McNeill, P, 'Reading sociological research' in Research Methods, 1990, Routledge (pp. 133- 137).

Townley, C, and Middleton, M, Sociological Perspectives, 1978, The Association for the Teaching of the Social Sciences (cartoon).

Contentsmm

Page

What Is sociology about? 4

Part 1: Sociological perspectives 5

Unit 1: Macro-sociological perspectives 6

(Study ttme. 4-5 bours)

Introductory activities - 'Planning for Educania' 6

Functionalist sociology 13

A closer look at conflict sociology 16

Unit 2: Micro-sociological perspectives 27

(Study time. 8-10 bours)

Changing the lens 27

Symbolic interactionists and ethnomethodologists 29

Bridging the gap between macro- and

micro-sociology 32

Assignment 1 35

Part 2: Sociological research 36

Unit 3: The nature of social reality and the logic of

sociological enquiry 37

(Study ttme: 4-5 hours)

Theories, concepts and models 46

Unit 4: Techniques of data collection 48

(Study time: 4-5 bours)

Picturing reality: criteria for good research 49

Assignment 2 55

Unit 5: Sociology, values and common sense 57

(Study ttme: 2-3 bours)

To whose benefit is research? 57

How might values bias research? 59

Sociology and common sense 64

Activity answers 66

Readings 76

1:

'Reading sociological research', appendix from McNeill, P, Research Methods, Routledge, 1990.

Caudrey, A, 'Whose research?', New Society.

23 October 1987.

79

76

2:

Introduction

Theory and Methods

What i$ sociology about?

If I could tell you what sociology is all about in this introduction, in a way that you would understand, there would be no need for an 'A' level course. However, I will tell you three things about sociology so that they don't come as a surprise to you.

First, sociology is not about 'society'. It is about sociologists' ideas about society. You have to learn what kinds of sociologists there are, and what they think. Only when you have learned to think like a sociologist will your own ideas be acceptable as sociology.

Secondly, sociologists don't agree with one another. Sociology is really a series of debates between different kinds of sociologists. Students often complain that there are no 'right answers'. In one way this is true. There are no right answers to questions such as 'Why do people put up with social inequality?', or 'Why do some kinds of children do better at school than others?' But there are right answers to questions like 'How do Marxist sociologists explain the persistence of social inequality?', or 'How do feminist sociologists explain differences in educational achievement between boys and girls?'

Thirdly, despite their disagreements on many issues, sociologists do agree with each other on what is good sociological practice: logical argument backed up with sound evidence. If I had to give one single good reason for studying sociology it would be that it develops thinking skills.

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SOCiology 'A' levell © 1990 National Extension College Trust Ltd.

Theory and Methods

Partl

Part 1

SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES

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At the end of this part of the course you should:

• be aware that sociology is made up of a number of perspectives, and that different kinds of sociologists do not necessarily agree with one another

• be familiar with the names of the different sociological perspectives and be able to identify them when you come across them.

W Further Reading

Cuff, E, and Payne, C, Perspectives in Sociology, Allen & Unwin, 1984 or

Brown, C, Understanding Society, John Murray, 1979

Both these books give very thorough and dear accounts of sociological perspectives apart from feminism. For feminist SOCiology you could look at:

Abbott, P, and Wallace, C, Introduction to Sociology: Femintst Perspectives, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1990.

5

Sociology 'A' level@ 1990 Notional Extension College Trust ltd.

Unit 1

Theory and Methods

. ObjectiVes

J

At the end of this unit you should:

• know that there are four main macro-sociological perspectives: functionalism, Marxism, Weberianism and feminism

• be able to recognise these perspectives when you come across them

• know that a crucial difference between them is the question of who benefits from the way in which societies are organised.

I think introductions are boring, so instead of giving you one I am asking you to plunge right into sociology. I want you to use what you already know about Jiving in society to design part of a social system. Then we wlll see what sociological lessons we can draw from the exercise.

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[ Activity 1

" u

Planning for Educania: Phase One

You have been appointed as a consultant to the Department of Education and Culture in the new state of Educania. Your task is to design a complete

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Sociology 'A'ievel © 1990 National Extension College Trust Ltd.

Theory and Methods

Unit 1

education system for the country. Read the text below and then fill in the section, 'Your choices'.

Background

Educania is a newly independent country but is quite heavily industrialised with industries owned by multinational corporations. The population is ethnically diverse. Most of the top managers, professionals and technologists are ex-patriates who will eventually leave the country and will have to be replaced by Educanians.

The largest single group of Educanians is the Maxims. They are found at every level of society, but because of their voting power they provide the ruling elite of the ministers, top civil servants, top military men and police chiefs. The members of this ruling elite have adopted the lifestyle of the expatriates and have been able to use their political power to gain directorships in the subsidiaries of multinationals and to raise money to buy their own businesses. Since this is the group which is in power, it is the group which will pay your consultancy fee.

The other Educanians are divided among many different ethnic groups with their own languages, customs and religions. They resent the power of the Maxims.

The tasks

The tasks which the education system will have to accomplish are:

(a) to promote national unity and social stability by welding together the diverse elements of the population into a common sense of nationhood. The education system will have to counter the activities of 'extreme' political groups. There are several ethnic minority movements aiming for separatism, and an important left-wing 'Educanian Liberation Front'. This is especially strong among the labour unions but takes its leadership from well-educated Educanians who are not Maxims, especially teachers. One of Educania's problems is that it is over-supplied with people who were educated in overseas universities, who cannot find jobs and are very critical of the government. On the other hand the majority of the population can scarcely read or write.

(b) to provide the country with the types and quantities of trained labour it will need for economic growth. This means raising the general level of literacy and numeracy and training technical, administrative and professional people. It also means developing favourable attitudes towards industrial employment.

To give you some ideas, I have provided a list below of some of the questions you will need to consider. Your choices will determine the sort of education system Educania will have.

SOciology 'A' level © 1990 National Extension College Trust Ltd.

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Your choices

1 Will you allow private education to continue?

(Many of the Maxim elite have their children educated privately.)

YES/NO

2 Will you allow children/young people to be sent abroad for education? (Most of the ex-patriates and some of the Maxim elite send their children abroad to schools and colleges.)

YES/NO

Unit 1

Theory and Methods

3 Will education be compulsory?

(Many people rely heavily on the labour of their children for the family income.)

YES/NO

If 'yes' what will be the compulsory:

starting age .

minimum leaving age .

4 Will there be selection so that students are allocated to different kinds of schools or different streams within schools?

YES/NO

If 'yes':

at what age(s) will there be selection? on what basis will there be selection?

how will the different kinds of selective schools/colleges differ from one another?

5 Will schools serve particular ethnic groups?

(Most existing schools are for particular ethnic groups.)

YES/NO

or

Will there be an attempt to create 'ethnic balance' in each school?

YES/NO

6 Will schools feature the culture of all the ethnic groups in Educania (for example in worship, in history, in craftwork, in perpetuating traditional stories and music)?

YES/NO

or

Will they feature a modem Educanian curriculum?

YES/NO

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Sociology 'A' level@ 1990 NaHonal Extension College Trust ltd.

Theory and Methods

Unit 1

7 What will be the language of instruction (tick appropriate box):

Each child's own language (if so to what age )

Maxim

English

o o o

8 What will be most strongly emphasised in the curriculum (tick appropriate box):

The importance of being a loyal citizen of Educania 0

The rights of each ethnic group to its own traditions and autonomy 0

General education, literacy and numeracy, the arts and sciences 0

Vocational skills 0

9 Will the curriculum, and the system as a whole, be designed

either to (tick appropriate box):

make sure that the brightest children reach their full potential? 0

bring everyone up to an adequate standard of literacy and numeracy

for work in the modernising economy? 0

I Activity 2

Planning for Educania: Phase Two

Now check that you have designed an education system which will:

• promote national unity

• provide the country with the types of labour it will require

• please the people who have commissioned the work.

Which group or groups do you think will do best in the system you have designed?

..... , A_C_fiV_ity_3 __,11ib?

(When I mark an activity with 'JOT' it means that I don't think it will be worthwhile your keeping what you have written.)

Sociology 'A' level © 1990 Nafional Extension College Trust Ltd.

9

Planning for Educania: Phase Three

Here is an account of the system I would have designed as it might be given in a speech by the Minister for Education and Culture:

'Promoting national unity, blah, blah, progress and prosperity, blah,

blah, counteracting the divisive influences of backward tribal cultures, blah, blah, while giving due respect to valued traditions, blah, blah. Learning to respect the forces of law and order, blah, developing the

Unit 1

Theory and Methods

vocational skills so sorely needed in the modern world, blah, blah, understanding the world of work, blab, blah, keeping at bay tbe misguided forces of the looney left wbo are potsonmg young minds with unrealtstic aspirations blab, blah, blah ... '

Now try writing a similar kind of speech as it might be given by the leader of the Educanian Liberation Front in reaction to the system you have designed.

Answer on p.66 .. (When an activity is marked Answer on p. there is an answer or a comment for you to look at at the end of the module.)

L,___.....;;,...__ _ ____.I IIliD A I Activity 4 _ ~

Answer on p.66 ..

Planning for Educania: Phase Four

The table below gives two sociological views on the role of education. Which one most closely corresponds with the views I attributed to the Minister of Education, and which to the views I attributed to the leader of the Educanian Liberation Front?

Table 1

Consensus view

Contlict view

Education has:

1. A selection function

It selects people and helps to place them in the most appropriate positlons in adult life according to their abilities.

2. An economic function

It produces people with the general skills and attitudes and (to some extent) the specific skills required by the economy of the SOciety.

3. A socialisation function

It promotes the attitudes and values which people must share if there is to be social stability.

A national education system will be

of benefit to .

"You will complete this table later.

•

3. Justifies inequality

It promotes ideas and values which help those who are powerful to stay powerful, particularly the idea that inequality is the result of differences in individual ability.

A national education system will be of benefit to ... n •••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

Education:

1. Reproduces inequality

It helps to perpetuate existing inequalities.

2. Reproduces labour

It produces a majority of people with the general skills and attitudes and (to some extent) the specific skills required to allow them to be exploited by those who benefit from their labour.

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Sociology 'A' level @ 1990 National Extension College Trust Ltd.

Theory and Methods

Unit 1

Interests and perspectives

There is a fairly simple key to understanding the differences between these two sociologtcal views. It comes from asking the question, 'Who does the system benefit most/whose interests does the system serve?'

L__~ _ ___,I 1m A I~tivity 5 _ ~

1 Here are two paragraphs on interests. Which fits the consensus view and which fits the conflict view?

A Any society is made up of groups with different interests, and social life is a struggle between groups trying to impose their interests on others. Social stability most benefits those who are currently doing well out of the system. A national education system will be designed to serve the interests of the more powerful social groups.

B Everyone's interests are served by a social system which is stable and efficient in producing goods and services. A stable and efficient society has to have leaders, managers and so on to organise things on behalf of others, and these people have to be adequately rewarded. Therefore inequality is an important part of a stable and efficient society, hence inequality is to the benefit of everyone. A national education system which efficiently selects people for their role in society, trains people for their adult roles and promotes national stability will be to everyone's advantage.

Answer on p.66 .. 2 Now go back to Activity 4 and fill in the unfinished sentences at the end of each column in the table.

Answer on p.66 ..

I Activity 6

Look at the carton overleaf. Which sociological view is it satirising?

Sociology 'A' level © 1990 NatIonal Extension College Trust Ltd.

11

Unit 1

Theory and Methods

What shape is society? Mackie

Write your answer below.

Answer on p.66 ..

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Sociology 'A' level @ 1990 National Erlanslon College Trust Lid.

Theory and Methods

Unit 1

So far you should have learned that:

• there are at least two kinds of sociological view (perspectives) on the part played by an education system in society: consensus and conflict perspectives. Actually these perspectives offer explanations for all features of social life, not just education.

• there is an important difference between these two perspectives; one sees society as serving everyone's interests, the other sees it as serving mainly the interests of powerful groups. Conflict theorists see all societies as made up of groups with different interests, often competing to get their own way. Consensus theorists view any stable society as serving the interests of everyone.

• the two perspectives bear a rough and ready relationship to commonsense views. Consensus theory usually sounds rather like the views of those in power who approve of the system. Conflict perspectives usually sound like the views of people who are critical of the system.

,.... . .,. _ 1:;:0$ •..

PunotlonafistsQClology

The major consensus theory is called 'functionalism'. Although this kind of sociology started in Europe in the nineteenth century with Emile Durkheim, it became mainstream sociology in America and Britain in the period from the 1940s through to the end of the 19605.

W Textbook

The next Activity is based on your set text, Fundamentals of Sociology by McNeill and Townley (we will refer to it from now on as M&T for short). I want you to read what the textbook says on functionalism, and in order to focus your reading I want you to answer some questions. It will probably be better to read the passage once, and then read it again to answer the questions.

Sociology 'N level@ 1990 National Extension College Trust Ltd.

13

Read M&T pages 23-31, then try the questions below.

_I A_c_tiv_ity_7 ....... 1 ~

(When I write 'BANK' by an activity you will need to write on a separate sheet of paper and then store your notes for future use, for example, when revising. Because notes easily get disorganised it is important that you make sure you can identify what they are about. Therefore, I suggest you always mark them with the Activity number and write them so that you can understand them later. So, for example, you might write:

Unit 1

Theory and Methods

Activit}:' 7(a)

"the al'\alo9Y of society beil'\9 like al'\ Ol"9C1l'\ism toIsed by ftoll'\ctiol'\alists is toIseftoil becatolselis I'\at toIseft.!1 becatolse, , ,)

Here are the questions:

(a) Functionalists view society 'as an organism in which all the parts function in a way that ensures the continued wellbeing of the whole organism, like the various systems in the human body .. .'. Do you think this is a useful analogy? Would it be sensible to say that societies were 'sick' or 'healthy' in the same way as one might say that a body was sick or healthy?

(b) As used by functionalists, the term 'function' might be loosely translated as 'useful in keeping the social system going'. What is it that suggests to a functionalist that some institution is 'functional'?

(c) Talcott Parsons argues that to stay stable any society has to have devices to solve four kinds of problems (has to meet four 'functional imperatives'). The textbook gives examples drawn from large-scale social systems, but Parsons would argue that the same kinds of problems have to be solved by any smaller unit of society, Take for example a firm, a school, or a club, and apply Parson's GAIL model to it.

(d) The 'manifest function' of taking a register in school is to check who is present and who is absent. What would be the 'latent function' of the activity?

Answers on p.66-67 ..

Function and dysfunction

W Textbook

Read again the passage in M&T on Merton, page 28, and then look at the text below.

According to functionalists:

The functional promotes stability and the efficient operation of society. The dysfunctional leads to disintegration and inefficiency.

And according to Merton, some institutions can be functional in one respect and dysfunctional in others. But how can we know what is functional and what is dysfunctional?

Read the following dialogue:

How to outsmart a functionalist

You:

So in any real society some things will be functional and some will be dysfunctional.

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Sociology 'A'level © 1990 Nal10nal Extension College Trust Ltd.

Theory and Methods

Unit 1

Functionalist: Yes, but mostly institutions will be functional otherwise the whole system would have collapsed.

You:

. .. and what is functional is what promotes social stability?

Functionalist: Yes.

So when things change, that means something is dysfunctional?

Functionalist: Oh no, change is necessary for social stability. Social stability doesn't mean stagnation.

You'

So if social changes happen then some changes are functional and some are dysfunctional.

Functionalist: That's right.

You'

You:

So how do you tell the difference?

Functionalist: It's obvious. Those changes which keep the system stable are functional, and those which threaten its stability are dysfunctional.

We seem to be going round in a circle here. Give me some examples of dysfunctional changes.

Functionalist: Increase in family breakdown, increase in crime, increase in civil disorder, that sort of thing.

You'

Why are these necessarily dysfunctional? Some kinds of civil disorder lead to the improvement of social conditions, or giving people more civil liberties. Is that functional or dysfunctional?

Functionalist: The new situation would probably be more functionaL

You'

You:

And some kinds lead to coups and dictatorships and so on.

Functionalist: Those would be dysfunctional, probably.

But wouldn't the dictatorship be a new kind of social stability?

Functionalist: Well maybe but ...

You'

You:

So it seems to me that the only way you have of deciding between what is functional and what is dysfunctional is by making a moral judgement. Those changes you like, or those things which lead to changes you like, you call functional, and those you don't like, you call dysfunctional.

You flushed out one of the weak points of functionalist thinking, which is that in order to use the key term 'functional'. the functionalist has to make a moral judgement about what is a good society, and what is not. There is nothing wrong with making moral judgements, but functionalists pretend they don't do this. Since moral judgements can vary from person to person, there can be no correct way of applying the terms functional and dysfunctional.

Sociology 'A' level @ 1990 NaHonal Extension College Trust Ltd.

15

Unit 1

Theory and Methods

Write a note to yourself about the problem of using the concept of function as used by functionalists.

L-I A_C_tiv_ity..;;...._8 --il1 ~

You should now know the meaning of the following terms as used by functionalists:

function, dysfunction, organic analogy, social facts, functional imperatives, manifest and latent functions.

It would be a good idea to obtain a set of index cards and begin to build up your own glossary of terms. A suitable format for references would be something like this:

Ft.tl'\ctions, manifest al'\d latent

Manifest - intel'\ded o",tcome of some activif}.' e.g ....

Latent - ",nintended I"'e.st.tlt e.g .... "tel"ms t.tsed by flAnctionalistsl

Coined b)! 'Roberl K. Merlol'\:

Textbook 'Ref; page 28

N6.C Co",I"se R4E~es 13-16

l. elONl'toot at conflict$O£iQt~_ .. _

I Activity 9

W Textbook

Read M&T pages 31-37 to the end of the section on Max Weber. Read the textbook once, then read it again to check your answers to the questions.

(a) What does it mean to 'reify' society? Show you understand by writing a sentence which reifies society.

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Sociology 'A' level © 1990 National Extension Collage Trust Ltd.

Theory and Methods

Unit 1

(The answers to the questions below are all in the textbook, so r won't give you them.)

(b) According to Marx, 'the most fundamental conflict of interest is between those who own the means of production and those who do not'.

For Marxists:

What are the main conflict groups in a capitalist society?

What is meant by 'the means of production'?

(c) Give three ways in which, according to Marxists, the subordinate groups in society are controlled.

(d) What, according to Marx, is the main reason for social change?

Marx and Weber

Or rather Marxists and Weberians: most Marxist sociology has been written since Karl Marx (1818-1883), and most Weberian sociology since Max Weber (1864-1920).

These are both kinds of conflict sociology, since both see societies as being made up of groups with different interests competing with each other, and both see social change as the outcome of conflict. The two views differ from each other in two main respects.

Sociology 'A' level @ 1990 National Extension College Trust Ltd.

17

Unit 1

Theory and Methods

1. In the analysis of the here and now

This is adequately described in the textbook but the following summary might help.

Marxists:

The basis of inequality is the relationship of groups to the means of production; it is economic. Ownership of the means of production gives economic and political power and power over ideas.

In capitalist societies the fundamental conflict is between the interests of the bourgeoisie and the interests of the proletariat. There are other conflicts of interest (between other classes, between men and women, between nations) but they are either sideshows or knock-on effects of the struggle between the two great classes.

Weberians:

There are three equally important bases of inequality - position in the economy (class), ranking in prestige (status), and power (or party) which comes from the alliances made between individuals and groups. Class, status and party are always inter-related but in different and ever-changing combinations.

There are other important conflicts in society which cannot be reduced to the struggle between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. They are equally worthy of sociological attention (and hence much studied by Weberian sociologists) .

2. According to how they handle social change Marxists:

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Sociology 'A' level © 1990 National Extension College Trust ltd.

Social change is the outcome of the struggle between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie, often shaped by new technological developments or new ways of organising production. Eventually the proletariat will prevail, capitalism will be overthrown and a socialist society will take its place. Marxists thus claim that social change is heading in a particular direction.

Weberians:

Social change is the outcome of struggles and compromises between many kinds of interest groups in society. The future is open-ended.

W Textbook

Read M&T pages 40-43 ('When this perspective ... ' onwards). I want you to read these pages in conjunction with your answers to the 'Educania' Activities (1-4) and especially with the 'Conflict' column of Table 1 (p. 10).

Theory and Methods

Unltl

L-I A_C_tiv_ity_10 __.1 ~

Now try the following questions:

I have given my own answers to the last two; the others are in the textbook.

1 According to Marxists, in what way does the British education system reproduce existing inequalities (reproduce the class structure)?

2 According to Marxists, in what way does the curriculum serve as a means of social control?

3 How would Marxists in Educania describe a curriculum for all children based on Maxim culture and taught in the Maxim language?

4 According to Marxists, what other social institutions perform the functions of justifying inequality and damping down rebellion?

Answers on p.67 ..

Sociology 'A' Ievel@ 1990 NatIoI1a1 Extension College Trust ltd.

19

UnIt 1

Theory and Methods

W Textbook

Check the table in M&T on pages 42 and 43 against Table 1. Note that although you have been reading about Marxism, it is not the only conflict theory - and both tables apply to a range of conflict theories. You will see that Table 1 expresses the same ideas as the table in the textbook, but applied specifically to education.

IL-A_c_tiv_ity..:....._l1 __.1 ~

Using the newscutting below (Item 1) as a basis, write a consensus and a conflict version of the news report.

The consensus version need not use these words but should include ideas about the desirability of social integration, common values and national efficiency, and the undesirability of conflict.

The conflict version need not use these words but should include ideas about the inevitability of conflict, the struggle for power and attempts to dominate.

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Sociology 'A' level © 1990 Nat10nal Extension Colege Trust Ltd.

Item 1

Language Riots in Educania (from our correspondent)

Following the announcement that Maxim Ministry of Education building before being would be the official language of Educanian broken up by troops.

schools, children and parents from the The decision, which followed from the minority tribes went on the rampage today. recommendations of educational consultants, In Triniville the St Marjorum State Primary was justified today by a junior Minister as School was gutted by fire in an orgy of necessary to forge a modem nation from the destruction as children and parents protested diverse ethnic groups making up Educania. at the Government Ordinance. Elsewhere The Ministry said 'Literacy is the basis of there were sit-ins and walk-outs and a progress for Educania, and that must mean twenty-four hour picket was mounted on the literacy in a common language.'

Theory and Methods

How to outsmart a conflict theorist - maybe

YOU: You make a great thing about conflict. However, if I look around I do actually see some conflicts, but I also see a lot of people rubbing along together quite amicably: workers and bosses, rich people and poor people, and so on.

Conflict theorist: I think you're missing the point. Not all conflicts of interest show themselves in aggravation.

YOU: So when I see workers co-operating with bosses that isn't evidence against a conflict theory?

Conflict tbeortst: No because it's part of the struggle to persuade people to act against their own interests. In the co-operation between workers and bosses you would be seeing the victory of the bosses in misleading workers about their real interests

You: Which are ...

Conflict theorist: ... to change the way in which work is organised so that they get a bigger share, more power, better conditions and so on.

You: So what you are saying is that absence of any obvious conflict is not evidence that conflict isn't there, and could actually be evidence that it is. There's something about that argument which makes me uneasy. Let me try another tack. When you say 'interest' is it you who is defining what people's interests are?

Conflict theortst: Well, I suppose so, but in an unequal society its pretty obvious that people's interests include at least better working conditions, more control over their own lives, higher income, etc. and if I were a Marxist I would go on to say that all these things would be achieved through a socialist society.

You: So if the people themselves don't agree with you?

Conflict theorist: Well, they won't necessarily. because the way the system works is to mislead people about their true interests.

You: So in the last resort it's the conflict theory which says what people's interests are?

Conflict tbeorist: I suppose so.

You: And the bottom-line is that it's the theorist's value judgements about what people deserve which defines their interests.

You mayor you may not have won this argument. What you have done is to discover the most tricky aspect of the study of power. As Lukes says:

'Indeed is it not the supreme exercise of power to get another or

others to have the desires you want them to have ... ' Lukes, S, Power:

A Radsca! View, page 23, Macmillan, 1974

Sociology 'A' level@ 1990 Natlonal Extension College Trust Ltd.

Unltl

21

Unit 1

Theory and Methods

Key terms

You should now know the meaning of the following terms:

capitalism, reification, interests, coercion, dissensus - used by everyone in much the same way

Legitimation - used by all conflict theorists

Ideological State Apparatus (I.S.A.) means of production, mode of pt"Oduction, false consciousness - used particularly by Marxists.

Summary

So far you should have learned:

There are at least two kinds of sociological perspectives: functionalist or consensus perspectives, and conflict perspectives. You have encountered two varieties of conflict perspectives - Marxist versions and Weberian versions. As the course proceeds you will learn more about both as they are applied to particular topics.

You probably want to know why you have to learn all these perspectives. Why can't you just learn the one that's right? Well, principally because you are learning sociology, and sociology is made up of a number of different viewpoints - that's what sociology is. In fact, today there are very few SOciologists who could be described as functionalists. The heyday of functionalism was the 1940s through to the 1960s. But it is important to know about functionalism, firstly because much modern sociology was developed to correct functionalism, and secondly because a functionalist kind of thinking is still very important - not among sociologists but among politicians, economists and the general public.

There is a vigorous Marxist sociology today which produces very interesting and challenging ideas. However, orthodox or mainstream sociology is Weberian. This is possibly because Weberian sociology, while recognising the importance of conflict in society, provides a much more open and flexible framework than Marxism. Marxists would not, of course, agree.

Sociology 'A' level © 1990 National Extension College Trust Ltd.

Feminist sociology

More recently a further conflict perspective has become influential in sociology: feminism. While there is a wide variety of feminist theories (including Marxist feminism) they all agree that an important conflict of interest is between males and females - that in contemporary societies males form the dominant group and that societies are organised for their benefit, This particular form of oppression is called 'patriarchy'.

Theory and Methods

Unit 1

L-I A_c_tiv_itv_12 ...... 1 ~

Studying sociology

I Activity 13

Look back at Table 1 and, on a separate sheet of paper. write a feminist version of the conflict theory column.

Answer on p.67 -

Where does 'A' level Sociology fit in? You are nearly at the end of the section on macro-sociological perspectives (conflict and consensus theories). Perhaps this is a good time to check your understanding by asking you to apply what you have learned to the study of sociology itself.

You are following an NEC course in 'A' level Sociology. Let's see what kind of sense macro-sociology can make of the activity of studying sociology to 'A'level.

Below are four viewpoints CA, B, C, D) which give different explanations of studying sociology. Can you identify them as belonging to particular sociological perspectives?

Use the grid on page 25 to fill in the perspectives and then the 'identification clues' to show what evidence you used to identify them.

A Just as the natural sciences have given rise to technologies for managing the material world, so the social sciences provide techniques for understanding and managing people. It is important therefore that the education system includes the social sciences within the curriculum, and especially that it prepares and selects able people for occupational specialisation in fields such as social research, personnel, social work and communications, as well as for the production of new sociological knowledge. 'A' level Sociology is one device which functions to prepare and select in this way.

B There is a nice irony in the fact that someone's knowledge of the theories of Karl Marx displayed in an 'A' level examination may decide their position in the class structure of a capitalist society. At first Sight the existence of a subject such as 'A' level Sociology may give a misleading impression of the openness and liberalism of the English school curriculum. After all, does it not include the study of 'subversive' theories such as Marxism and feminism? Doesn't it draw attention to the gross inequalities in British society, and undermine the right-Wing rhetoric of the Tory Party and its captive newspapers? Well yes, but look at the way in which 'A' level Sociology is taught. It is taught to only a small group of elite students, who have their sights fundy fixed on higher education and a professional career. They are rather unlikely to read about Marx and rush to the barricades if that means giving up going to university. Secondly, while the content might be subversive the process of learning is anything but: read, make notes, write this essay, sit this examinationall are part of the way in which the education system prepares students for the discipline of the workplace, whether the essays are sociological or geographical. Thirdly, the very existence of subversive elements in the curriculum serves to lay a liberal veneer over a coercive process.

Sociology 'A' Ievel@ 1990 Notional Extension College Trust ltd.

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Theory and Methods

C More than twice as many girls as boys take 'A' level Sociology. This reflects a pattern of choices where the 'hard sciences' such as chemistry, maths and physics are male preserves, while the humanities, biology and sociology are more favoured by females. It hardly needs saying that in terms of career prospects the hard sciences are a better meal-ticket. The 'A' level subjects habitually chosen by girls lead to lower-paid professional occupations, usually in the state sector. This is just another instance of the way the education system works to filter women into the lower levels of the occupational hierarchy.

D Sociology examinations are an interesting sociological phenomenon. Like other 'A' levels they are used to select out a minority of people who will be allowed to compete for places in higher education and for desirable jobs: they are part of the process of class formation. The fact that there is an 'A' level Sodology course to study is the successful outcome of a struggle between different kinds of academics to install their interests in the curriculum. They thereby ensure not only new recruits for the discipline but teaching jobs for its members. Sociology is an esoteric body of knowledge managed by those who have gained entry to the small elite who call themselves 'sociologists'. It is sociologists who say what is correct sociological knowledge. The sociology examination tests candidates to see how far they have become members of this academic sub-culture. The acid test is whether the candidate recognises the questions in the way intended by the examiner. Being a good candidate, then, means playing a particular kind of language game - decoding questions and encoding answers in a way that will count as membership of a select group.

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Theory and Methods

Viewpoint Perspective Identification clues
A
B
C
D Answers on p.68 ,..

What makes you do what you do?

All the sociology we have discussed so far gives the impression that our individual behaviour is determined by the social system in which we operate. The sociologists we have been studying have the following ideas about how 'society' controls our actions.

Socialisation - Through childrearing, education, the mass media, advertising and our daily experience we are given ideas. values and desires and ways of understanding.

Social control- When our behaviour is approved of we are rewarded for it (with an income, with praise, with honours). When our behaviour is disapproved of we are punished (with ridicule, with blame, with exclusion, with violence, with imprisonment, etc.).

Although conflict and consensus theorists sometimes use different words, they agree on the importance of socialisation and social control as forces

Sociology' A' level © 1990 Naffonol Extetl$1on College Trust Ltd.

Unit 1

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Unit 1

Theory and Methods

determining individual behaviour. Where they disagree is that consensus theorists think that socialisation and social control work to everyone's benefit, while conflict theorists believe they work to benefit dominant groups.

How do you feel about it?

Do you feel that your life is controlled by social pressures, or do you feel that you have considerable freedom to 'do your own thing'?

L-l A_C_tiv_i....;.ty_1_4 __,11I&?

On a separate sheet of paper, make three lists:

1 of those aspects of your life where you actually feel constrained and limited by social pressures

2 of those aspects of your life where you rarely feel constrained but suspect that this is because you have been socialised to conform with social expectations

3 of those aspects of your life where you feel you are free to make your

own choices and do your own thing.

Look at your list and decide whether the constraints are advantageous to you, or someone else, or serve the interests of some dominant group(s) in society.

If you feel that your life is very much controlled by social pressures, you are neither right nor wrong but you should realise that you actually have a great many choices. You don't have to conform to social expectations, but if you don't you have to be prepared to face the consequences - social control. In our SOCiety different kinds of people have more or less choice.

If you feel that you have considerable freedom, then you are neither right nor wrong but you probably have less freedom than you think. Try setting your watch at a time different from other people and insisting that they abide by your time rather than theirs. Try buying goods in English shops with Deutschmarks. Invent words of your own and try using them to communicate with others.

The issue of whether individual action is determined by 'society' is not a dear-cut one. No kinds of sociologists believe that human beings are robots with no free will. Sociologists do, however, differ according to their view of how much room for self-determination social life allows, and how different kinds of society allow for different degrees of self-determination.

We are now about to pass on to look at some sociological perspectives which view people as being much more creative and autonomous - the interpretive perspectives.

Socialisation, social control, patriarchy.

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26

Theory and Methods

Unit 2

At the end of this unit you should:

• know the difference between a macro-sociological and a microsociological approach

• know that many sociologists try to combine macro- and microsociological approaches

• know that there are two important micro-sociological approaches called symbolic interaction ism (interactionism) and ethnomethodology, and know the differences between them.

So far we have been looking at society on the grand scale. All the perspectives we have looked at can be grouped together as 'macrosociology'. There is yet another group of sociological perspectives which focuses down on the finer detail of social life: micro-sociology.

\ Reproduced from Townley, C and Middleton, M. Sociologiall penJ1eC1ItJes, 1978, Association Jor the Teaching of the Social Sciences

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Unit 2

Theory and Methods

The difference between macro- and micro-sociology is not just one of focus. Macro-sociologists and micro-sociologists also differ in their views of how societies work. I find it useful to describe macro-sociologies as 'sociologies of structure' and micro-sociologies as 'sociologies of meaning'. You will already understand what is meant by a sociology of structure: that it has something to do with how all the components of society gear together and influence each other. By using the term 'sociologies of meaning' I am pointing to the fact that these kinds of SOciology are particularly concerned with how people make sense of their lives, and act accordingly.

L ___.I IZiIi A

~ctivity 15 . ~

Item 2

Item 2 is a photograph of a busy pedestrian area. People are doing something very ordinary but very clever: walking about without bumping into each other and without upsetting each other in other ways. What do people need to know in order to be able to do this?

These are the kinds of questions you should ask yourself:

• What signals do people give each other to avoid collisions?

• How do you recognise people walking together?

• When should you apologise?

• Whom can you walk with?

Think about this and jot down some notes on a separate sheet of paper, then turn to my answers for this Activity on pages 68-69, before coming back to this point in the text.

People walking about in a pedestrian area is a social organisation. It is an organisation which is produced by the people who do it, drawing on their knowledge of how to do walking about properly. In the same way, education systems are what are done by people who know how to do

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lheory and Methods

education, families are what are done by people who know how to do family. and so on. This is a very different view from that given by macrosociology.

Item 3 MACRO-SOCIOLOGY

MICRO-SOCIOLOGY Onterpretive Sociology)

Society (through socialisation and social control)

+

influences

•

The Individual

+

action _. interpretation _.. action _.. interpretation

~~_<:/

making sense

to produce

+

Action

e, ".....6 .":--,. .... Ii"· ...... 1<.. . d' f""'- 1?iA"t ...i2od' '1', ."dst· '. .J& fi!.f# - m

oymJ;;oJOdC . !I·lJeraCdonJDI~ an:·, e .:ril.omeu', .' Q 0.. :I ~ ~ @:t ~ mtr

There are two main strands of interpretive or micro-sociology: symbolic interactionism (interactionism for short) and ethnomethodology. We begin with some reading to introduce you to the ideas of interactionists.

W Textbook

Read M&T pages. 47-48, then answer the following questions to check your understanding in conjunction with the second part of the diagram (Item 3).

Interactionism

&...1 A_c_tiV_ity~16 ....... 1 ~

1 How, according to symbolic interactionists, do we acquire our identities? 2 If in everyday life we understand other people by getting 'inside the head' of the other person, how should sociologists study society?

Answers on p. 69 -..

SocIolOgy 'A' level@ 1990 National Extension College Trust Ltd.

Unit 2

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Unit 2

Theory and Methods

Ethnomethodology

I Activity 17

It really is very difficult to explain what ethnomethodology is, so I'll start by showing you how it differs from interactionism. Here's a transcript of a few moments of a school lesson.

Teacher: And the kidney

Robinson: Please sir, Bygraves ate it

(Laugbtef)

Teacher: Can you tell me, Philips

If these were all the data we had from this class in this school, the interactionist would not be able to say very much about it. An interactionist would want to know about the history of relationships between the teacher and the pupils; the beliefs and attitudes of teachers and different groups of teachers in the school (the teachers' culture); the beliefs and attitudes of different groups of pupils (pupil cultures): this particular teacher's beliefs about Bygraves, Robinson, Philips, this particular class, education, how pupils' behaviour reflects their home background, and so on. And then the interactionist would show us how Robinson's utterance was a move in a game played out between pupils and teachers - one of the games that make up classroom life - and what the games meant to the players.

There may not be enough data for an interactionist here, but there is enough to keep an ethnomethodologist busy for a long time.

Looking at the classroom transcript, how did you know that the teacher's first utterance was a question? You try first, then I'll tell you.

One of the ways in which we recognise questions is by recognising the next utterance as an answer (and one of the ways in which we recognise answers is by recognising an earlier utterance as a question). But the teacher's second utterance is essentially 'the same question' but now with a precise address to Philips.

What about Robinson's utterance? Was it an answer? Is the teacher deaf? We don't hear the teacher as being deaf; we hear the teacher's question to Philips as being a rebuke to Robinson. We hear a rebuke to Robinson, though no rebuke was spoken. We hear the first utterance as a question by hearing the sequence question - response - rebuke - repeat of question. By hearing the second question as a rebuke (as signalling a wrong or nonanswer), we actually know more clearly what the teacher meant by his first question. It would be a good guess that he wasn't asking about the whereabouts of a particular (and edible) kidney, but about the location of kidneys in some kind of body or other.

Apart from showing how incredibly clever people are in understanding language, the dtscusslon above illustrates the kinds of things that interest ethnomethodologists. The ethnomethodologist's question is: 'By what methods do people make sense of the world, and by making sense of the worJd make it a sensible place?'

Usually ethnomethodologists are interested in generally understood methods of making sense (as above), whereas symbolic interactionists tend to take these for granted and focus on the way in which interpretations vary from group to group.

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Theory and Methods

Unit 2

1 Activity 18 ·1 The joke in the cartoon is not just a play on the words 'taking for granted'. L... --~--------'. Tum to page 66 in M&T to find out what an 'ethno' might achieve by stealing a car.

W Textbook

Here is some more reading from your set text to help you sort out the difference between the perspectives we have studied so far. Read from page 52 (second paragraph) to page 57. You will see that there is often only a fine line between interaction ism and ethnomethodology and for many purposes they can be lumped together as interpretive, microsociological or phenomenological perspectives. When you get to the bottom of page 55 complete the first two questions in Activity 19.

Now read pages 324 - 327 and answer questions 3 to 6. Finally, read section 6 on page 329, making notes, and answer question 7.

L-I A_c_ti_Vi_ty_1_9 __,J ~

Record your answers to the questions below on a separate sheet of paper.

1 Functionalists explain deviance as a failure by an individual to internalise norms during socialisation. How would they explain educational failure?

2 Conflict theorists explain deviance as due to deprivation or due to the fact that the rules from which people deviate are made by powerful groups against the interests of the deviant. How would they explain educational failure?

3 Briefly, in your own words how does the Rosenhan experiment illustrate the idea of labelling?

4 In symbolic interactionism, a sense of identity is something which is built up from the messages people give you about yourself. How might people in a mental hospital learn to be mad?'

5 This isn't in the text, but how might the ideas of labelling and deviancy amplification be applied in schools?

6 Why am I asking you to apply ideas about deviance to educational failure?

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7 What does Hargreaves' ethnomethodological study of labelling illustrate about the rules of social life?

Answers on pp.1R - 70 "'"

Bridging the gap Detween macro- and micro~soclol()gy %

How to annoy an interpretivist

You: I must say I feel more at home with an interpretive approach - it seems to be dealing with the kind of things I experience every day.

Interprettvtst: That's right It's all about unravelling the everyday world.

YOU: But there is one thing that bothers me, and it's this. While your approach seems to describe how people behave, and to be likely to give very rich descriptions, it doesn't seem to me to do much to explain why they behave as they do.

Interprettvtst: I don't agree. The approach is one that very clearly explains people's actions in terms of their perspectives: their understandings of their situation.

YOU: Oh yes, but where do those perspectives come from?

Nice point. This is the most telling criticism made by macro-sociologists about micro-sociology: that the way in which individuals or groups of people interpret the world is not a sufficient explanation for their behaviour. Their ways of interpreting in turn have to be explained. Macrosociologists would claim that the only way to do this is to relate the ideas and values of individuals and groups to the social structure. Max Weber is the classic writer best known for his attempts to bring together macro- and micro-sociology (see M&T p. 44). The logic is like this:

Item 4

Society J,

Position of individuaVgroup in social structure

!

Particular way of understanding the world

J, Individual Action

Item 4 illustrates one possible way of reconciling the two parts of sociology.

Here's an example in text:

Item 5

sharp and Green in their study of progressive primary schools found that teachers believed that each child should be treated as a unique individual and allowed to develop at their own pace. Indeed, it was

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Theory and Methods

Unit 2

considered counterproducttve to set children to work at tasks for whiCh they were not 'ready'.

1bey also found that teachers were more likely to see pupils from mtddle class backgrounds as 'ready'. Thts was partly because they saw good speech and a good general knowledge as evtdence of readiness, and partly because middle class children were more assertive and demanding of the teacher's attentiOn. Thus the concept of readiness allowed teachers to o18antse thtngs so that by and la1]1e mf.dtJle class pupils made faster progress, while working class pupils were allowed to play more and organise their own ttme, on the grounds tbat they were not yet fready'. (So far Sharp and Green's analysts is solely tntetpretattve, and draws heavtJy on the idea of labelling)

Sharp and Green also a1gU8 tbat the vieWs of teachers, and the way they act on tbem, derive.from tbe fact that they are mtddJe class and schools are middle-class instttutWns. In operation in the classroom the teacher's mtetpretauons seroed to foster the progress of middle-class pupils and hence to reproduce the class structure. (Thus, what Sharp and Green observed at the miCro-sociologtcallevel is made sense of at the macro-soctologtcal leuel.)

Summarised from Sharp, R and Green, A, Education and Social Control, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1975

This example is illustrated in diagram form below (Item 6). Item 6

Social class structure

I

Position of teachers in class structure

Reproduction of class structure

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33

You should now know that sociology divides, not very neatly, into macrosociological approaches and micro-sociological approaches. What unites macro-sociological approaches is the notion that there is something called 'society !the social system/social structure! capitalism/patriarchy' which hangs together. has an existence over and beyond the people who inhabit it, and determines their behaviour, What divides macro-sociological

Unit 2

Theory and Methods

approaches are conceptions of what this 'society' is like, in whose interest it operates, and what causes it to change.

Micro-sociologists, by contrast, home in on the meaning of social life to people, how people interpret their situation and act on the interpretations they make. Some micro-sociologists are sceptical about the existence of anything which can be called 'society', different and separate from the interpretations and actions of individuals. Others are not so sceptical.

There are many attempts to build bridges between macro-sociology and micro-sociology which pursue the question: 'How do the intepretations of individuals derive from and create the social structure?'

I Activity 20

Look at Item 7. This should be familiar to you as a catalogue of different sociological approaches, but can you remember which sociologist goes where? Write the names of Althusser, Becker, Durkheim, Garfinkel, Mead, Merton and Parsons in appropriate places on the diagram. Use the index of the textbook if you get lost.

Item 7

SOCIOLOGY

I

individual in SOCIETY (macro)

I

POSITIVIST

(scientific)

INDMDUAL in society (micro)

I

PHENOMENOLOGICAL (interpretive)

f

consensus

II

functionalism

(structure/system)

I

(meaning)

conflict

Marxism Weberianism

feminism

symbolic

interaction ethnomethodology

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Theory and Meihods

Unit 2

One final self-check question for this unit to see if you have understood its main theme. The central question for all kinds of sociology is the question of why and how social life is orderly and predictable.

Here are three statements about the source of social order. Name each one with a sociological perspective.

A Social order is something which is created minute by minute by the largely unthought activity of individuals who apply their common-sense knowledge to the situation at hand. Making sense of a situation is imposing order on experience. Acting on that sense produces action which is likely to appear 'in order' to others.

I Activity 21

(

B Social order derives from the existence of a well-integrated social system, adapted to its environment and inhabited by individuals who have been socialised to perform the activities required of them.

C Social order derives from the ability of powerful groups to constrain the activities of others and to order their activities.

Answers on p.70 ...

Labelling, deviancy, ampllfication

Sociology 'A' Javel@ 1990 NaI10nal EJrtensIon College Trust Ltd.

35

You are now ready to complete your first assignment. Turn to the Assignments section in the Course Guide, read the introductory material and then do Assignment 1.

Part 2

Theory and Methods

Part 2

SOCIOLOGICAL

RESEARCH

By the end of this part of the course you should:

• know that sociologists differ according to how they view social reality

• know that there is a tool-kit of methods used by sociologists for collecting information

• know that there are no foolproof techniques of research, and that different techniques have different advantages and disadvantages

• know that the research methods used by sociologists vary according to their differing views of social reality

• have considered the difficulties of excluding values from scientific work.

• be able to describe the way in which sociological thinking is superior to common sense.

W Further reading

McNeill, P, Research Methods, Routledge, 1990.

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Theory and Methods

ff %
1M %
% m
$ &_
(%
s @ % By the end of this unit you should:

• know that sociologists differ in how they view social reality and how different views of social reality suggest different ways of studying society.

We begin with a series of short activities to help you get a feel for sociological research. Ideally I would like you to set aside two or three hours to work continuously through to Activity 31.

Before you can research anything you have to have some idea about what it is like. If you had to research ojllflips, you would have to know, at least vaguely, what an ojliflip was. So the fundamental questions for sociological research are:

• What are social phenomena?

• What kind of stuff is social life made of? and hence

• How should it be studied?

The idea of reality itself is tricky. What is 'real '? How do you know something is real?

SocIology 'A'level@ 1990 Natfonal Extension College Tnstltd.

Unit 3

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UnIt 3

Theory and Methods

I ~A_c_tW_~ __ 22 I~

My guess is that you regard wakeful experiences as more real than dreams. Why?

Answer on p.70 ..

It may seem a problem at first that we cannot see 'society'. We can see only people and the things they make. Someone hostile to sociology might say: 'There is no such thing as society, therefore it can't be studied in the same way as things like plants or rock formations which can be directly observed and accurately measured.'

L __ ___,I 1m A ~twity23 _~

Can the coastline of Britain be accurately measured? What would be the problems in so doing?

Answer on pp. 70-71 ..

The fact that you cannot 'see' society is not the kind of problem that bothers other kinds of scientists. 'Landscape', 'ecosystem', 'dimate', 'universe', 'electron' and 'coastline' are all abstractions similar to 'society'. The logic of sociological enquiry is identical to that of other scientific subjects.

J.

J.

Item 8

The way climate works

The way society works

governs

governs

J.

the rainfall, temperature.

individual behaviour.

J.

Therefore if you study the regularities in rainfall, temperature, etc., you will understand how climate works.

Therefore if you study the regularities in individual behaviour you will understand how society works.

I want to start you looking at this logic of enquiry by looking at an example from another science - plant ecology.

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Unit 3

L IIl'iIA

~tivity 24 . ~

Item 9

Distribution of selected plant species and soil acidity (pH). Figures refer to the numbers of quadrants out of 100 in which the plant species were found. A quadrant is a square frame which is thrown on to the ground by a botanist to take a random sample of plant species.

Soil acidity
(pH value) Species A Species B Species C
3 5 SO 70
7 27 47 SO
9 63 58 0 1 What can you say about the relationship between plant species and pH value:

(a) for Species A? (b) for Species B? (c) for Species C?

2 How would you check the suggestions you have made above?

Answen on p.7lIf your answers were something like mine you are already at least half-way to understanding the so-called 'scientific' or hypothetico-deductive method. This is important to the discussion of whether sociology is a science, because some definitions of 'science' restrict this term to those disciplines which use the hypothetico-deductive method for creating and testing knowledge.

39

W Textbook

Tum to M&T, page 64. There you will see a diagram of the hypotheticodeductive method.

I Activity 25

Use the textbook diagram to identify the stages you went through in doing Activity 24. You don't know what a 'hypothesis' is? But you've already said 'hello' to one.

Hypothesis: If Species C is intolerant of high acidity, then we should never find many plants of Species C where the pH measurement is high.

or

Hypothesis: If Species C is intolerant of high acidity, then it will not thrive if we plant it in soil with a high pH.

A hypothesis is an 'if X then Y' statement where the 'then' refers to some observation which could be made if the 'W part of the statement is true. Or

Sociology 'A' level @ 1990 National Extension College Tl\JSt Ltd.

Unit 3

Theory and Mefhods

rather, 'not untrue'. The h-d method does not claim to deliver the truth. What it does claim is to eliminate the untrue. Thus point 10 in the diagram should strictly read: 'Theory, made up of hypotheses which have been properly tested and have not been found to be untrue'.

In science yesterday's 'truths' often become today's untruths, but yesterday's errors rarely become today's truths.

Although the stages in the diagram are numbered, it actually doesn't matter where you start. In fact, almost nobody does research in this order. What most scientists do is to write up the results to distinguish the stages, which makes it easy for others to check their reasoning and their methods.

Now let's try the same methodology on a social phenomenon: thefts in schools.

I Activity 26 I~
Item 10
School Number Size of Boys or Catchment Theft rate
of thefts school girls area (number of
thefts per
pupil number)
1 16 BOO Boys Mixed 1:50
2 13 1300 Girls Middle-class 1:100
3 4 800 Co-ed Middle-class 1:200
4 6 600 Girls Middle-class 1:100
5 40 1200 Boys Inner city 1:30
6 17 6BO Co-ed Working-class 1:40
7 70 2100 Boys Working-class 1:30
8 9 450 Boys Working-class 1:50
9 30 1500 Co-ed Mixed 1:50
10 No figures supplied 1 Formulate a hypothesis about the relationship between thefts and gender which could be tested against the figures in the table (Item lOJ. Is your hypothesis confirmed or disconfirrneds

2 Fonnulate a hypothesis about the relationship between school size and thefts which could be tested against the figures in the table. Is your hypothesis confirmed or disconfirmed?

3 What other kinds of hypothesis are you tempted to fonnulate?

Answers on p.71 '-

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Theory and Methods

Item 11

Interviews from school number 3 about one particular theft.

Headmaster

This might seem a rather trivial offence but we set high standards in this school and it is an indication of a lack of respect both for property and for school discipline which many of the children have. If you let such matters pass, then it's like the early signs of woodworm - sooner or later the whole structure will collapse, so you can see that my staff and I treat such matters seriously. What we usually do, and what we did in this case, was to make a note on the child's record card - quite openly. No secret about it, you know - we're not into that game - and to bring the child on to the stage at assembly and charge him with the offence in front of the whole school. In that way we can use one child's misdeeds as a lesson to the others.

Classteacber

What happened was that I confiscated a bar of chocolate from Geoffrey Parkin who was just about to eat it at registration. I put it in my desk and when I looked in it at lunch-time, it wasn't there. Well, at afternoon registration I said I wanted to know who had taken it and Stephen just jumped up and said it was him - without the faintest hint of guilt, mind you. Well, that made me rather cross and whereas I might have glossed the whole matter over, the fact that he was so unabashed made me take it seriously. I really thought he ought to be made an example of.

Another teacher

Well, I don't know much about it. Except that the poor kid was hauled up in assembly and his charge read out. I don't hold with that kind of public shaming. When kids do anything wrong in my classes I deal with matters myself. There seems to be a policy in this school of making mountains out of molehills.

Stephen

Well, she took the chocolate from Geoff and put it in her desk, which I don't think was right anyway because he wasn't going to eat it, he was just waving it about saying, you can't have any - you know, because he owed me some from the day before. Anyway I thought, well, if I get it back then I'll take my share. Anyway, when I got it I couldn't find Geoff so I shared it with John because he kept look-out, so I gave Geoff some chewing gum afterwards, which was fair. Anyway, I can't see why they said he was stealing because it was Geoff's chocolate and the teacher stole it from him, and anyway some of it was really mine.

Geoff

I was just showing Steve my chocolate - you know mucking about - when she said 'Geoffrey Parkin, bring that chocolate out here: And she put it in her desk and Stephen said, 'Don't worry I'll get it back: I said he'd get into trouble and I kept out of the way, but he got it all the same - and anyway, he and someone else ate it. But he gave me some chewing gum to make up.

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Item 12

Interview with head teacher at another school which refused to co-operate in the survey.

'In this school we are very careful as to how we treat, what shall we say, 'missing property', because you know children don't necessarily share adult views about ownership - I mean, rulers and pencils and rubbers and to a certain extent sweets are fair game, not quite but almost common property, and we find that with a little help from staff the children are able to work things out for themselves. Personally I would never charge a child with theft in most circumstances. Cases would have to involve a quite long history of taking property, and taking it maliciously, before I would call that a theft. Two sorts of things to watch out for are children who take things because they've got personality problems and in those cases such children can't really be blamed and need help rather than punishment, and on the other hand taking property as part of bullying - and we really put our foot down hard on that.'

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~IA_c_tW_i~ __ 27 ~I~

What problems do these additional data raise about the statistics in Item 10? (Answers are in the text below.)

It should be apparent by now that the research dealing with plant species and the research dealing with thefts are not quite the same kind of exercise. The reason is that theft is a social category while plant distribution and soil acidity are natural phenomena. By saying that theft is a social category I mean that what is a 'theft' is a matter of interpretation, and that unless someone says 'it's a theft', then it isn't. On the other hand, plant species will still be what they are and where they are whether anyone says so or not.

Theft, then, is a social phenomenon: a matter of how people describe things; how they give meanings to events. What about other social phenomena?

L-I A_c_tiV_i_~_2_8 ...... 1 ~

Try the following: a kitchen, a road accident, a motor car. Are they social or physical phenomena?

Answer on p.71 ..

If social phenomena are different from physical phenomena, how can we study them? Let's go back to thefts in school.

Is it a problem of operationalising terms?

Some sociologists would say that the problem is not really that social phenomena are different from physical ones, but that they are more difficult to define precisely - after all, we have already seen how difficult it is to define precisely something as 'physical' as the coastline of Britain.

Theory and Methods

Urlf3

Thus the difficulty with the data on thefts in schools was that people were not using the term 'theft' in standardised ways. Since 'theft' was not standardised (operationalised), the numbers were counting different things. If we could make up a definition of theft that was precise and unambiguous then we could compare like with like.

1.-1 A_c_tiv_ity_29 __.1 ~

1 Construct a definition of 'theft' suitable for comparing the level of thefts between different schools. In technical terms this is called 'operationalising' theft.

Z How would you make sure that only those events corresponding with your definition were counted as thefts and that none which corresponded was missed?

Answers on p.7' --

Or is it a fundamental problem of studying social phenomena?

Let us suppose you were successful in producing a standardised definition of theft. This still leaves another problem. Why should your definition of theft be better than anyone else's?

L_____;;_ __ __.I 1m A ~ctivity 30 . ~

Take your definition of theft and apply it to the accounts given in Items 11 and 12. How many people would agree that the theft in question fitted. or didn't fit your definition? Who would have made the correct classification?

I think you should have recognised that theft is not a thing which exists independently of the sense people make of it. Rather a theft is a theft when people define it as such, and people are inclined to disagree. That is in the nature of thefts. A theft is a meaning given to a set of circumstances.

Theft was a really tricky example, because there is usually a great deal of disagreement about whether or not something is a theft. There are other areas of social life where there is little disagreement. For example, there is little disagreement about the interpretation of 'voting Labour' or 'chronological age', so there are few difficulties about correlating voting habits with age. There would be considerably more difficulties in correlating 'left-wing views' with 'maturity'.

A3

Back to the hypothetico-deductive method

None of what has been said so far rules out the use of the hypotheticodeductive method. Here's a hypothesis which is consistent with treating thefts as something rather different from plants:

Hypothesis: If a 'theft' is a product of the way in which people in school react to complaints, then more thefts will be reported from schools with formal disciplinary procedures and well-established methods for reporting trouble than from schools where disciplinary matters are dealt with more informally.

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Unit 3

'Theory and Methods

&-1 A_c_tiv_ity_31 ........ 1 ~

What would be the difficulties of operationalising terms to test this hypothesis?

Where does all this leave sociological research?

It leaves it split down the middle. There are two sociological views which can be expressed as in Table 2.

Table 2

Two views on social reality Ifwo views on research

PositlvJst

(most macro-sociologists and some micro-sociologists)

Social phenomena may be different from natural phenomena but they are similar enough to be studied in the same way. That is, using a scientific method, with standardised definitions, preferably collecting numerical data (a quantitative approach). The preferred techniques of data collection are:

...

·We will fill this in later

Intetp~

(most micro-sociologists)

Social phenomena are not like natural phenomena. They arise out of the interpretations people make. In any situation there are likely to be different interpretations by different people. Rather than try to impose one 'correct' definition on the phenomena, we should instead study how it is that people interpret their experience. But interpretive research can be every bit as disciplined and rigorous (scientific) as positivist research. The methods which are most appropriate are qualitative rather than quantitative. The preferred techniques of data collection are:

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Theory and Methods

Summary

OUf original questions for this unit were: 'What stuff is social life made of?' and 'How should it be studied?'

You should now know that there are two sociological views on this. One is that social life is made up of phenomena which are not very unlike natural phenomena - institutions, systems, sub-systems and so on, and that the appropriate methods for study are very like those of the natural sciences - a positivist approach. The other view is that social life is made up of interpretations, which are very different from natural phenomena and require a different - interpretive - method of study.

A useful way of remembering the difference is through two slogans:

'Treat social facts as things', said Durkheim (see page 24 of your textbook).

'Treat social facts as accomplishments', said Garfinkel (see page 66 of your textbook).

What can be observed?

We can study directly only what can be observed. What can be observed ranges from answers to questionnaires to observations of people in their 'natural habitats'. But sociologists are never interested just in observables. They are interested in what these observables tell them about 'society'.

Look back at Item 8 on page 38 and you will see that sociologists, like other scientists, look for patterns in what is observable and from this hope to be able to work out what generates the patterns - the underlying principles.

So, what can be observed when we look at individual behaviour? Look back at Item 3 on page 29. Well, one set of sociologists observes something called 'society' influencing the behaviour of individuals, and another set of sociologists observes people making interpretations and acting accordingly. For these latter SOciologists, if there is a meaning for the term 'society' it means the rules/methods/interpretative frameworks that people use to make sense of the world. This kind of sociologist is much more likely to use the term 'social life' than 'society', just to avoid making society sound thing-like.

W Textbook

Read M&T pages 58--61.

I ._ A_C_tiv_lty...;..__32 ___.1 ~

This section of the textbook covers the same topics as you covered in working through the Activities above. It is worth reading just to make sure that you understood the implications of the exercises. In addition I want you, on a separate sheet of paper, to make a list of the factors McNeill

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Unit 3

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notes which influence a sociologist in choosing a topic for research. Keep the list. It will come in useful later.

~ ... &4N'"6e .' ....... L'" -_ .... ~ ... -rs :"'HeQrl~eol':IC' __ p;r.Ul QI~ _"I''l.Y1ORiI

W Textbook Read M&T pages 61-63.

I Activity 33

In order to illustrate the text I have provided you with two models referring to thefts in schools (Models A and B. Item 13). Look back at Table 2 and identify which model is positivist and which is interpretive (page 44).

Answer on p.72 ..

MODEL A

MODELB

Item 13

Social class (different standards of morality/discipline in the home)

t

Schools with different social class make-ups

+

Teachers' ideas about social class and discipline

/~

Schools with different social class make-ups

<,

Different styles of discipline

/'

Different levels of commUted

theft

Different levels of reported

theft

How to outflank a natural scientist

You: You're pretty snotty about sociology because you don't think it's scientific.

Scientist: Too true. a lot of half-baked ideas mixed up with common sense. There's nothing in sociology which has the rigour and discipline of scientific method.

YOU: You'd agree though that any approach that calls itself 'scientific' ought to adopt methods which are appropriate for its subject matter?

Scientist: Right.

46 SOCiology 'A' level © '990 National Extension College Trust Ltd.

Theory and ~thods Unit 3

YOU: And I'd agree that the methods used by natural scientists are appropriate for studying natural phenomena.

Scientist: Gee, thanks.

You: But if I could demonstrate that social phenomena were not like natural phenomena, you'd have to accept that the methods of the natural sciences were not necessarily appropriate for studying social phenomena.

Sctentfst: I suppose so.

You: In which case you couldn't say that sociology wasn't a science just because it didn't use a natural science methodology.

Scientist: I'd have to think: about that. Maybe social life can't be studied scientifically.

YOU: Or maybe sociology is just a different kind of science.

~IA_c_tW_i~~~ ~I~

In your own words, and on a separate sheet of paper, outline the argument that social phenomena are different from natural phenomena and therefore need different techniques of study. (You are on your own here, but all the answers are in this unit.)

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Unit 4

Theory and Methods

By the end of this unit you should:

• know that there is a tool-kit of methods used by sociologists for collecting information

• know that there are no foolproof techniques of research, and that different techniques have different advantages and disadvantages

• know that the research methods used by sociologists vary according to their differing views of social reality.

W Textbook

Read M&T text on 'Data collection', pages 68-77.

I Activity 35

As you read McNeill's text, make notes on the following topics so that you know what the terms mean. Write the notes straight into your glossary. Put page references to the textbook if you like.

• the difference between primary and secondary data

• a representative sample

• closed and open questions

• structured and unstructured interviews

• observation and participant observation

• quantitative and qualitative data (often called 'hard' and 'soft' data)

• content analysis

• resource and topic.

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lheory and Methods

Unit 4

Picturing reality: criteria for good research

Think of research as a process of building a picture of the world. Ideally the picture needs to be:

Relevant - i.e. it needs to show those features of the world in which the sociologist is interested. Putting matters the other way round, any picture is only a partial representation. Relevance means leaving out those features which are not of interest, and highlighting those which are.

Valid - i.e, it needs to be an authentic picture of what it is supposed to represent. For example, the table used for thefts in schools didn't validly record thefts; it may have validly listed head teachers' reports of thefts.

Reliable - i.e. it should be the same picture as might be produced by another person using the same methods, or by the same person on another occasion. Any differences should be due to changes in the object of study, not due to differences between the researchers.

Representative - it might be interesting to do a detailed study of some small comer of social life, but is it worth while? It will be most worth while if what is found in one place can be used to stand for or represent things that happen much more widely.

Objective - objectivity is very difficult to define. It is easier to define 'notsubjective', i.e. not influenced by what the observer wants the research to tum out like, not influenced by feelings about the research subjects.

The Activities which follow (36-40) are based on short extracts which describe the advantages and disadvantages of different sorts of research - the sample, the interview, participant observation. The aim of these Activities is to get you thinking critically about sociological research methods. Check your answers with mine.

L-I A_c_tiV_i....;;.ty_3_6 __.1 ~

Item 14

'In Social Survey work the advantage of taking a sample is that it is easier and cheaper than studying the whole population, but a sample must be selected so tbat what is true of it, is also true of the population from which it is drawn. This is the principle of "representativeness " ... For choosing a sample tbefirst requirement is a "samplingjrame"the list of the population from which the sample is drawn. '

Society Today 27.2.86

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49

Record your answers to the questions below on a separate sheet of paper. 1 Suggest a suitable sampling frame for:

(a) a study of elderly people living within a defined geographical area (b) a study of juvenile delinquency

and for each sampling frame you suggest, discuss its shortcomings.

Unit 4

lheofy and Methods

2 Describe one way in which a representative sample might be drawn (refer to your textbook for the answers).

3 How could you check the representativeness of a sample drawn from a defined geographical area?

Answers on p.72 ..

Item 15

SCientific interviewing

Intenneunng is a common technique used by sociologists to gather data. Those sociologists who like to proceed like natural scientists usually take great pains to draw up a carefully worded set of questions, and try to standardise their performance as interviewers so that they behave in exactly the same way with each respondent. They often call ther 'interview schedule' or 'questionnaire' a 'research instrument' claiming by analogy with the measuring gauges used in laboratories that it will always give the same results under the same circumstances. As for the correct behaviour of the interviewer, it is almost as if they wished they could avoid being present at all, but failing that tbey should be suitably anonymous, without conveying any particular interest in the respondent's answers, and without conveying anything of themselves except what is necessary to progress the respondent through the intenneui.

The object of all this care is to make sure that nothing 'trreleoant' in the wording of the questions or the performance of the interviewer will influence the answers: that the answers will simply be 'real' opinions, or the 'real' knowledge of the respondent ...

Answer on p. 72 ..

L-I A_C_'iV_ity...:...,.._37 ...... 1 ~

Imagine a series of interviews with male and female respondents conducted by a male interviewer ill-at-ease with women. Look at the list of criteria in Item 15 for good data collection. What fault would have been committed?

Item 15 continued

. , .Sociologists of an interpretivist persuasion query the sense of these procedures. From their point of view this kind of 'performance by interviewers looks like an inevitably unsuccessful attempt to deny what is the essence of an interview: that it is a social event which involves two people both of whom will be very busy trying to make sense of what is going on, and trying to behave appropriately, From the interpretive viewpoint, the attempt to eliminate all the elements of a social situation which might influence the respondent'S answers succeeds only in setting up a different kind of social situation - the interview situation, This in itself is likely to influence the responses people give. And indeed are the answers people give to interviewers who behave like prcfessional strangers likely to be a good indicator of the kinds of views people will express in the pub, to their spouses, at work, to the boss, etc. - in all those situations where the audience is different?

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Theory and Methods

Unit 4

L-I A_C_tiV_ity~38 ---,1 ~

Answer the following with reference to Item 15.

1 Why do sociologists who conduct social surveys place a great premium on standardising the performance of the interviewer?

2 Why from an interpretivist viewpoint is standardisation unlikely to achieve the desired result?

3 If you have recently been interviewed for a survey, write a brief account of how you experienced it.

4 Comment on the idea of 'real' opinions in the light of the fact that the same people can be heard expressing different views in the hearing of different audiences,

Answers on p, 72 ....

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Item 16

DtjJerences in abtlity to use language are often thought by educattonaltsts to explain educational success and fat/ure: de.ftctent language use leading to deflc1ent thought and understanding. Thus the dialects of black Americans have been used to explain the poor educational showtng of black pupas in the American school system.

Much research evtdence was mobtltsed to verify this. For example, when asked questions about pictures and objects, black teenagers could often be recorded givtng only monruyllabtc replies, or no replies at all. Most wh#e teenager.s by contrast appeared to be more /tngutsticaJly able in the same circumstances.

Wtlliam Iabou, an American socf.o-ltnguist, questioned the validity of these data by pointing to the socialfeatures of these msenneus. They were conducted in schools, often by white interotewers, certainly by interviewers who would be equated with authority by black teenagers. The tntennetu situation reproduced all the features of tbe school system

from whtch these youngsters were altenated: a situation in whtcb tbey had learned that most of their answers would be wrong, and that the safest thing to do was to say as ltltle as possible. taboo» own recordings of black speech were made casually in the natural surroundings oftbe teenagers' home community. He found them articulate and capable of expressing complex abstract ideas.

Summarised from Labov, W, 'The Logic of Non-standard English', in Keddie, N, TInker Tat/or ... Penguin, 1973.

I .._ A_c_ti_Vi_ty_l_9 __.11I6?

Answer the following questions with reference to Item 16.

1 Look at the list of criteria for good data collection. In Labov's view, what fault was committed in the school interviews?

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Theory and Methods

Urit4

2 Labov's account of his own interviews says: 'Clarence brought along a supply of potato chips, changing the interview into something more of a party.' Does this make you more or less favourably disposed to Labov's methods? Why?

Answers on p. 73 ...

3 Complete the following paragraph:

Many social researchers take great pains to standardise the situation in which interviews are conducted, usually by asking standard questions and by behaving in exactly the same way towards each respondent. This is in order to make sure that differences in responses are not just the results of the interviewer treating them differently. Unfortunately this strategy falls down if different sorts of respondents interpret the same standardised procedures differently - if what is the 'same' performance for the interviewer is a 'different' performance for different kinds of interviewee. This is well illustrated by Labov's criticism of work on black dialect in America. Here, Labov ... (what does Labov say?)

Refer to Item 16 for your answer. Item 17

Many tnterpretee researchers favour participant observation as a research method. 1bts is wbere researchers jOin the life of tbe people they are studying, not only to be able to observe people in their natural

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surroundings, but also to learn to see thtngs and feel things as they do. One of the worries of parttctpant obseroers is 'sympathettc bias': the idea that they may be tnjluenced to gtve a Ietndly but biased account of research subjects who have become.friends. Paradoxtcally, the more successjUl they are in becoming members, the more dfjJtcult tt is for them to avoid sympathetic bias.

I Activity 40

In terms of the criteria for good data collection, what kind of fault is sympathetic bias?

Answers on p. 73 •

L-I A_c_tiV_ity_41 __.1 iI&?

Copy the diagram from page 73 of M&T. Superimpose two more axes on it:

Meaningfulness High - Low Representativeness High - Low.

·Summ:ory I

You should now know that there are a number of techniques for collecting data, and that each has its problems. There is no foolproof method. Methods which allow for a high degree of representativeness because they study large numbers of people don't allow the researcher to get close to the ways in which people experience their lives - they are Iowan meaningfulness. Methods which are reliable (like the experiment or the standardised interview) often give invalid data because they establish an artificial situation. Methods which get close to the way in which people experience their lives are very vulnerable to subjectivity and may give invalid data for this reason.

As McNeill indicates (page 73), it is advantageous to use several methods so that each can compensate for the shortcomings of the others.

W Reading

Since you are more likely to read research than to do research, this section will have been important in giving you an insight into how to read research critically. In the Readings section at the end of this module you will find reprinted the Appendix of McNeill's Research Methods (1990). I suggest you

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Theory and Me1hods

Unit 4

I Activity 42

I Activity 43

I Activity 44

read it now as a recap on what we have covered in this section, and refer to it when you read any piece of sociological research. On this article the terms 'ethnographic research/ethnography' occur - these terms usually refer to the results of participant observation research. Add the term to your glossary of key terms)

Refer back to Table 2 (p. 44). 'Two views on social reality', and complete the lines 'preferred techniques of data collection'.

Now copy the following on to Table 2.

Positivtsts view validtty as achieved througb tbe use of precisely defined concepts, operationalised tn a measurable way, wttb the data collected through standardised means - you might call this 'sctentijtc valldUy'.

Intetpreltvtsts view validity as achieved througb techntques which allow reality to show USe!! With as ltttle interference by the researcher as possible- you might call this 'naturalistic validity'.

Before you go on to Unit 5, there is another chance to check how you are doing by sending an assignment to your tutor. Assignment 2 is designed to help you develop the skills of writing a sociological essay. You will find details in the Assignments section of the Course Guide.

I have also given you suggestions for two pieces of personal research (Activities 44 and 45) to do if you have time. You will be able to see how I approached the problems if you look at my answers at the end of the module. Send your notes on your research to your tutor with Assignment 2.

Personal research (1)

Together with writing up your notes this Activity will take at least 3 hours. If it grabs you it could take a lot longer. If you are housebound, Activity 45 is an alternative.

This is a simple piece of research, in the naturalist tradition associated with interpretist theory. Like much naturalistic work its object is descriptive rather than explanatory. The project builds on 'Notes on the Art of Walking' (see p. 68--69), which you should re-read.

I expect you've noticed that when someone is window-shopping they seem to create an area of personal space between themselves and the window, such that people hesitate to pass between the window and the looker. I want you to go window-shopping and provide a more detailed description of this social phenomenon. Focus particularly on the question 'Under what

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conditions do walkers acknowledge the rights of a window-shopper to an unimpeded view of the window?'

The 'conditions' will involve variables such as:

• different kinds of walkers (how will you classify them, and apply the classification?)

• different kinds of window-shopper (well, there's only you and unless you can press friends and family into the exercise you will have to speculate about how your particular characteristics influence other people's behaviour)

• distance between the window and the window-shopper

• different kinds of shop

• different densities of pedestrian traffic (in relation to the space available

for pedestrians - narrow pavements/pedestrianised shopping precincts)

Your most difficult problem is going to be operationalising 'respecting the window-shopping rights' - how will you recognise this happening (you probably won't be able to do this in advance)?

Record each observation under the following headings:

Location. Kind of shop. Distance between window-shopper and window. Degree of obstruction caused by window-shopper. Pedestrian flow (crowded or not). Kind of pedestrian. Behaviour of pedestrian.

Answer on p. 73-74 ..

I Activity 45

Personal research (2)

This is an alternative research activity for people who are housebound - but even if you are not housebound you can do it if you like. It is difficult to give a timing since the activity requires short observations on and off over a period of time.

Your research starts from the observation that when people talk it is necessary to arrange things so that everyone doesn't talk at once. Conversations involve tum-taking. Your brief is to observe how it is that people:

• know whose tum it is

• know when they can take a tum

• pass the tum over to someone else.

Answer on p. 74 ..

Sociology 'A'level@ 1990 Notional Extension College TllJSt ltd.

Theory and Methods

Units

. ObjectiVes

By the end of this unit you should:

• have considered the difficulties of excluding values from scientific work

• know that different sociological approaches contain systematic biases, and be able to detect them

• be able to describe the way in which sociological thinking is superior to common sense.

1here are two problems lurking around when academics write about 'values' in science

1 the question, 'To whose benefit Is research?'

2 the question, 'How far might the values (desires, wishes, etc.) of the researcher bias the picture of the world. emerging from his/her research?'

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Well, to whose benefit is the social order? Those sociologists who believe that society is organised for everyone's benefit have a strong tendency to believe that research benefits everyone. Those sociologists who believe that society is organised to serve the interests of dominant groups tend to regard some research as propping up the powerful and other kinds of research as undermining their power.

Theory and Meihods

UnitS

Look back to Activity 5, p. 11.

1 What kinds of sociologists do you think would regard most research as being to everyone's benefit?

2 What kinds of sodologists would think that research commissioned by governments or by industry would tend to benefit the rich and poweIful?

3 And for these latter sociologists, what kind of research might undermine the poweIful?

L ___.I EI A

~ctivity 46 . ~

Go ....

Answers on p.74 ..

Marxists, feminists, many Weberians - and, indeed, some functionalists - are quite explicit that their research is value-driven. They believe that the purpose of research is to make the world a better place. Hence the choice of research topics requires a value-judgement that this or that feature of social life is unacceptable, and research which may lead to improvement is therefore a 'good thing'. And this is so whether what is unacceptable is (say) a high frequency of strikes, or the continued failure of strikers to win higher wages or better working conditions. Different sociologists commit themselves to different ideas of what is good or bad in society.

Some sociologists, however, take a very hard 'scientific' line and claim that they do research which is neutral in value. All they do, they say, is to search for the truth. What is done with the information they produce they claim is not their concern. 'We do the research; it is for politicians or managers to decide how it is used.

VAWE FRI1E R£S_~_iU\CH INC

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Theory and Methods

UnitS

How to de-neutraJise a neutral

Neutral· In my view, the scientist's role is simply to find out the truth. It's not our job to decide how our research is used. I'm neutral on that.

YOU: But given you can't research everything, how do you decide

what to research and what to leave alone?

Neutral: Well, everything's researchable ...

You: But in the real world?

Neutral: Well, a lot depends on research grants.

YOU: Which come from?

Neutral: From industry and government mainly.

YOU: So it would be true to say that the actual selection of research topics tends to reflect the interests of powerful groups?

Neutral: I guess so, but the knowledge produced is available to everyone. You.' But who has the power to put the results of research into practice?

Neutral. I know what you're getting at. You're one of those people who doesn't believe that governments and wealth creators act in everyone's interests.

YOU: And you do?

Neural: Yes.

YOU: Gotcha!

Neutral: What do you mean, 'Gotcha'?

You.' What I mean is that you are quite prepared to commit your research to the service of the rich and powerful because you actually believe they occupy their positions legitimately - whether you are right or wrong about that, it doesn't sound very neutral to me.

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Individual researchers may have personal prejudices, and this may influence and distort their work. In addition, they may prefer their results to come out one way rather than another. For example, the high value placed on 'success' and on novelty in scientific research has been a very important motivation for cheating in science. A New Scientist readership survey on this topic in 1979 brought a huge response documenting the high frequency with which natural and medical scientists invent and massage data. In areas such as cancer and AIDS research, for example, the stakes are very high. Large financial rewards on the one hand, or the loss of a research grant on the other produce a situation in which inventing

UnitS

Theory and Mefhods

data to show success is very tempting. Sociologists are rarely under such intense pressure.

What is much more important than individual bias, personal prejudice or cheating, is systematic bias.

Systematic bias

Systematic bias refers to bias which is found among large groups of academics. It arises in various ways.

Firstly, different perspectives have built-in biases: conflict theorists tend to look for and accentuate evidence of domination and conflict, consensus theorists tend to the opposite bias. Micro-sociologists are inclined to ignore the influence of large-scale social structures on individual behaviour, while macro-sociologists can be said to give too little attention to individual choice and self-determination.

Secondly, sociologists operate in the real world, and in the real world the money for research, permission to research and the ability to publish are often controlled by governments, companies and other powerful agencies who are able to skew research to serve their own interests. In the Readings section at the end of this module there is an article, 'Whose Research?' which describes the problems of government-funded research.

Thirdly, since sociologists are real people it is inevitable that they are sometimes influenced by the common-sense ideas of their times. What is topical and newsworthy often influences the choice of research topics (and gets funding) in preference to what often turns out to be more important in the long run. However, -the really difficult kinds of bias to detect are those which arise from common-sense ideas which are so deeply-rooted that they are rarely questioned. These are easier to see in societies other than our own. For example, in South African academic life until very recently the common-sense notion that blacks and whites are essentially different kinds of human being led to different psychological, psychiatric and educational theories for blacks and whites.

It may be very worrying for you to learn that all sociology has a bias. Why do we put up with any of it at all? The answer is that there is no kind of knowledge which isn't biased. Where social life is concerned sociology is the best kind of knowledge we have, because it is constructed in such a way that any biases it contains have a good chance of being detected - sooner or later.

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L-I A_c_tiv_ity..;;...._47 __.1 ~

Read the following item and answer the questions below. Item 18

Tbeories - the ways in which we try to make sense of what is going

on - whether our own everyday common-sense theories or sociological ones, do not arise out of the data, but on the contrary our theories determine what we select to examine in the first place, and the range of possible explanations available to us, For example, theories which suggest that a woman ~ role is natural (biologically detennined) limit the questions tbat we can ask about women and the range of possible

Theory and Methods

answers to these questions. If we accept that it is women ~ btology that determines that they are the ones to look after children then we do not ask wby men do not look after children. If women say that they are dissatisfied With their role as wtves or mothers then our tbeory leads us to assume tbat there is something wrong With tbem - either tbey are not fully, biologically women, or they are mentally til, for example.

Soctology .. , is about understanding the relationship between our own experiences and the social ssructure: we inhabit. However, in the 1960s and 1970s women began to express tbefeeling tbat sociology dtd not relate to their experiences; because it examined the world only from tbe perspective of men ... The realisation of thts failure of sociology to speak of the experiences of women, and its consequent failure to theorise comprehensively, led feminists to examine more closely why thts was the case- why SOCiology, despite its claims to neutmltty, had a malestream bias. Dorothy Smtth (1979) argued that this was because women ~ concerns and experiences were not seen as authentic, but subjective, while men ~ were seen as the basis for the production of true knowledge. Consequently, sociological knowledge portrayed women as men saw them, not as they saw themselves ...

Feminists have made a number of criticisms of sociology:

1 that sociology has been mainly concerned With research on men

and by implication With theories for men,

2 that research findings based on all-male samples are generalised

to the whole of the populanon;

3 that areas and issues of concern to women are frequently

overlooked and seen as unimportant;

4 that when women are included in research they are presented in

a distorted and sexist way;

5 that sex and gender are seldom seen as important explanatory

variables.

In summary, sociology is seen as, at best, sex-blind and at W01'St sexist ... the ways in whiCh men dominate and subordinate women are either ignored or seen as natural. '

Abbott, P, & Wallace. C, Introduction to Sociology: Feminist Perspectives, pages 3-5, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1990.

Sociology 'N level@ 1990 Nat10nal Edenslon College Trust Ltd,

UnitS

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UnitS

Theory and Methods

1 What do the authors mean by saying: 'Theories ... do not arise out of the data, but on the contrary our theories determine what we select to examine in the first place, and the range of possible explanations available to us'?

2 Explain the cartoon as a comment on the way in which theories determine what is counted as evidence.

3 In your own words, and briefly, what do the authors mean by a 'malestream' bias in sociology?

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Theory and Methods

UnitS

4 What 'common-sense' thinking might explain the 'malestream' bias in sociology?

5 Rewrite the last paragraph of the extract, substituting age and ageist for sex and sexist, and adultCs) and child(ren) for women and men. What does this tell you?

6 How would you expect the authors of this passage to be biased?

Answer. on pp.74-75 -.

This extract and the questions were intended to show you what 'systematic bias' might look like in sociology.

W Reading

In the Readings section for this module there is an article called 'Whose Research?' Read it quickly but noting the kinds of research which the government is reluctant to commission and/or publish, and the difference between censorship and self-censorship.

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UnitS

Theory and Methods

I Activity 48

For Activity 32 you made. 3. list of factors which might influence a sociologist in choosing a research topic. Now I want you to use the list to produce a mirror-image, on a separate sheet of paper. The question is 'Why do some topics which might hold a sociological interest rarely get researched, or if they do get researched, why don't they get published?' To make the list you will find 'Whose Research?' useful and it will be helpful to re-read the passage on systematic bias and Item 18.

Answer on p.7S ...

~IA_c_tN_ity __ 49 ~I~

Read Item 19 and answer the questions which follow, to test your understanding of the difference between sociology and common sense.

Item 19

Sociology is not common sense. Indeed, sociology is vtgorously opposed to common sense. When soctologtsts find common sense in their subject they make every effort to root it out. This is not because sociology is right and common sense is wrong. Sociology may be right or wrong, but common sense can never be either.

Firstly, there is no such thing as common sense. My common sense is not necessarily yours. What I say is common sense today, I might contradict tomorrow. In everyday life 'common sense' is just a phrase we use to claim that what we are saying is beyond question - 'u's common sense'. But the claim is mere rhetoric. It is not backed up by any systematic appeal to evidence: if tt were it would cease to be common sense.

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Secondly, common sense reasoning is unprincipled. By contrast sociological reasoning (or at least good sociological reasoning) lays out the steps of an atgument systematically, shows where and how the atgument is supported by evidence, and states how the evidence was collected. Sociological reasoning lays its cards on the table; commonsense reasoning keeps such cards as tt has up its sleeve. Sociological reasoning offers itself up for crittcism; common sense simply claims that it is common sense, and therefore cannot be challenged.

Lastly, sociological reasoning is reflexive. SOCiologists attempt to examine the assumptions on which their own research and arguments are based, so that they are not misled by irrational and unsupportable ideas. If they fail, then some other sociologist will likely detect their common-sense biases for them.

Theory and Methods

UnitS

In short, the superiority of sociology over common sense ts not so much that it ts correct, but tbat the way.s tn which It might be incorrect can eastly be detected.

1 In what way might the use of the hypothetico-deductive method make sociology superior to common sense?

2 It what ways could a sociologist make it easy for readers to detect bias in his or her research?

3 Cheating in science is quite common, but cheats don't get away with it for long - why?

Answers on p. 75 ...

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Acttvity answers

Theory and Methods

ACtMty answers

Activity 3

I think the leader of the Liberation Front would say something like this: 'Denying the legitimate aspirations of the diverse peoples of Educania, blah, blah, consolidating the power position of the Maxim elite, blah, lackeys of the international capitalist class, blah, blah, training factory fodder for the multinationals, blah, blah, multinational corporations exploiting Educania for the benefit of rich plutocrats in Britain and the USA, blah, blah, brainwashing a generation of Educanians into believing that wage slavery is the highest form of life, blah, blah, blah ... '

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Activity 4

I would expect the views of the Minister of Education to be close to the consensus view and the views of the leader of the liberation Front to be close to the conflict view.

Activity 5

1 A - conflict, B - consensus. 2 (consensus) everyone

(conflict) those groups that are most powerful.

Activity 6

It satirises the consensus view which puts a great premium on the importance of inequality for social stability.

Activity 7

(a) It is a useful analogy insofar as it directs attention towards the interconnectedness of different areas of social life. Further than this I think it is misleading. There is widespread agreement about what constitutes a healthy or a sick body. What would be a 'healthy' or 'sick' society would be a matter of opinion. You might regard a revolutionary political movement as a kind of illness attacking an otherwise healthy society. I might regard it as a kind of therapy to cure an unhealthy society.

(b) The very fact that some institution continues to exist is taken by functionalists to indicate that it is functional. If it exists it must be functional. It must be functional because it exists. Yes, this is circular reasoning.

(c) My example is a youth club. Goal attainment is the function of the committee in making decisions, and of the leader in following the policies of the committee. Adaptation involves securing funds, by applying for grants or holding jumble sales. Integration (in this club) is attempted by involving the members in the decision-making process, by entering the club for competitions against other clubs to give a

sense of solidarity, etc. Latency is about sorting out quarrels, dealing l with the personal problems of members, etc.

Theory and Methods Activity answers

(d) Possible latent functions of taking a register might be that this activity can be used to mark the beginning of a lesson. It can be used to dramatise that the school day has started and the teacher is (or should be) fully in charge. The register also makes teachers accountable to their superiors and in this sense functions to control their activities.

Activity 9

(a) For example: 'Society cannot afford to spend too great a proportion of its resources on supporting the poor.' Note how this makes 'society' into an actor (people act, societies don't) which owns resources (people own, societies don't) and how it divides 'society' from 'the poor' - who presumably are not part of the society which cannot afford to support them. Always try to avoid writing as if society does things, wants things, values things, is threatened - avoid writing about society as if it were a person.

Activity 10

3 As a device to consolidate Maxim power and to ensure that Maxim children had the best chances of educational success.

4 Religion, the mass media, the family - virtually any established institution can be described as an Ideological State Apparatus (ISA).

Activity 12

Education:

1 Reproduces the dominance of males over females.

2 Prepares males for the better-paid, more prestigious occupations and females for lower-paid work and domesticity.

3 Encourages girls and boys to think of themselves as very different kinds of beings, and of the social differences between males and females as being natural and hence fair.

4 Is in the best interests of males.

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How far the education system does work in this way we will investigate in the module on Education.

SOclologV . A' level @ 1990 Nationoi Extension College Trust Ltd.

Activity answers

Theory and Methods

Activity 13

Viewpoint Perspective Identification clues
No hint of any conflict of interest
A Functionalist in society
Uncritical references to allocating
able people to important positions
Openly political
B Marxist References to ideological function
of education
Refers to the way in which
education reproduces male/female
inequalities
C Feminist (But actually this passage wouldn't
look out of place in a Marxist or a
Weberian text.)
Focuses on conflicts other than
D Weberian that between capital and labour,
i.e. between different kinds of
academic: 68

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Activity 15

The Art ofWaJ.king

If we had to programme a robot to walk about without bumping into people and without committing other walking errors we would find that the amount of skill and knowledge we would have to give it would be huge. Simply to navigate, the robot would have to be able to judge the speed, trajectory and estimated time of arrival of other walkers. It would also have to know how to give information to human walkers about its own speed, trajectory and time of arrival. In human walking most of this problem is solved by all walkers knowing that proper walking is walking at more or less constant speeds, in more or less constant directions; erratic, zig-zagging, variable-speed walking causes all kinds of confusion, and people who walk like that are regarded as very odd. This is not just a practical problem, but a moral one. People behave as if they had rights to certain areas of ground. If I am walking in a constant direction at a constant speed and giving good evidence of this, then in public spaces I claim the right to the space immediately in front of me. It is a matter of complaint if you get in my way, and if you do you are likely to apologise.

There are other problems to be solved in walking - for example, the question of which people are walking together and who is walking alone. Generally it is not regarded as proper to walk between people who are walking together. What knowledge would we have to give our robot to enable it to recognise 'togetherings'? Walking in step and walking side by side are usually part of maintaining a togethering. Sometimes this is a tricky matter: where lamp-posts intervene or the path is suddenly too narrow a

Theory and Me1tlods

Activity answelS

togethering is briefly disrupted. It is usually, however, very quickly restored.

Walking together is not an optional matter. Try falling into step with a stranger and see what happens. Similarly, watch out for people bickering in the street: falling out with each other and falling out of step with each other.

Our robot would not only need to know a great many rules for walking, but would need to have some rules for knowing when the rules applied. Thus, for example, in the rush hour, rules about not walking in step with strangers seem to be suspended.

Based on Ryave and Scbenkien, 'Notes on the Art of Walking' in Tumer,R (ed.), Etbnometbodology, Penguin, 1969.

Activity 16

1 For symbolic interactionists we build up our sense of identity in interaction with other people by interpreting the messages they give us about ourselves. For example, if my answers are always different from yours in this course, either you will begin to feel pretty stupid or you will begin to regard this as a pretty stupid course.

2 By using research techniques which allow them to come to understand the world in the same way as the people they are studying. The most usual techniques are participant observation, where the researcher joins the group he or she is studying for long periods of time, and long indepth interviews.

Activity 19

1 In functionalism, educational failure can be:

(a) functional - part of the process through which people are placed in society according to their ability

(b) dysfunctional - a waste of talent and a cause of disaffection. In this case the likely cause is a failure of socialisation due probably to a family background which fails to give young people the attitudes, values and knowledge they need to benefit from education.

How you would tell the difference between functional and dysfunctional educational failure is a problem - see pages 14-15.

2 In conflict theories educational failure usually derives from the control dominant groups exert over the education system. They might deprive of resources the schools attended by children from other groups, or they might construct an education system in which their own children were at an advantage, e.g. the language of education being the language of the dominant group, the general knowledge and beliefs required for passing being those of the dominant group, etc. - see your earlier work on Educania.

3 There are two aspects of labelling. One is the way in which people treat others according to their labels - in this case the pseudopatients were treated as mentally ill not because they showed symptoms but because they were labelled. The other aspect is the way in which being labelled

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Actlvlty answers

Theory and Methods

changes someone's beliefs and feelings about themselves. Several of the pseudopatients found it hard to go on believing they were sane when everyone treated them as mad.

4 See the answer above.

5 Throughout the educational process children are summed up and treated as bright or dull, naughty or good - day in and day out. Labelling may affect decisions made about pupils - which stream, which set, what is to be said in a school-leaving report - and is also likely to affect pupils' beliefs in their own abilities. If everyone treats me as stupid, I am likely to believe myself stupid, give up, and attain the kind of performance expected of stupid people - this is one example of deviancy amplification. What is thought to be true becomes true. You can think of other kinds of deviancy amplification associated with school discipline.

6 I'm glad you asked that question! I'm asking you to apply sociological thinking about deviance to the topic of education in order to show you that sociological perspectives are much the same irrespective of the topic they are applied to. This is a blessing for the 'A' level student, because what you have learned in one context can easily be tailored to answer questions in another.

7 Hargreaves' study shows how shifting and uncertain the rules of social life are, such that it is never very clear whether or not someone has broken a rule. By extension he illustrates that labelling is a very messy process because teachers constantly change their minds, and pupils don't necessarily recognise that they are being labelled, or believe in the labels that are placed on them.

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Activity 21

A Interpretive - actually this is closer to ethnomethodology than to symbolic interactionism.

B Consensus/functionalism.

C Conflict (not enough evidence to label it as Marxist, Weberian or feminist).

Activity 22

I also think my wakeful experiences are more real than dreams, because I live in a culture which regards dreams as unimportant, ephemeral, unreal experiences. Some people in Britain, and many people elsewhere in the world, regard dreaming experience as much more authentic and real than wakeful experience. I don't think it would even be a sensible question to ask who was right.

Activity 23

Yes, you could measure the coastline of Britain, but the answer you would get would depend on the measuring tool you used and your assumptions about where the coastline was. You could use a metre rule, or a pair of dividers, or a micrometer or an even more delicate measuring instrument, and as your measurements became more refined so the coastline would

Theory and Methods

Acl1v11y answers

become longer and longer. Or at least, in theory it would. Even with a metre rule, and certainly with a pair of dividers. you would find that the 'coastline of Britain' had disappeared and you would have to invent it by making decisions about which cape, or which pebble, or which grain of sand, or which electron, was 'on the coastline' and which was outside. 'Coastline' thus turns out to be an abstraction and 'in reality' something whose existence is created by the act of measurement, and altered by the technique and the scale used to measure it.

Activity 24

1 Species A is much more likely to be found in soils with a high pH value.

Species B is tolerant of a wide variation in soil acidity. Species C is intolerant of high pH. And soil acidity is an important factor in determining the distribution of plants.

2 In order to check these conclusions you may have suggested: (a) repeating the survey somewhere else

(b) conducting an experiment planting the same species in various soils of known pH,and measuring their growth.

Activity 26

1 If theft is related to gender then there should be a Significantly higher theft rate for one kind of single-sex school as compared with the otheris there?

2 If theft is related to school size then large schools should have significantly higher theft rates than small schools, or vice versa - do they?

3 I'm tempted to look at the relationship between social class of pupils and thefts.

Activity 28

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All these phenomena have a physical existence, but in order to understand them as social phenomena we would have to know what they mean to people. An assemblage of wood and metal, ceramics and foodstuffs is a kitchen because people intended to create a kitchen and do kitchen activities in it.

Activity 29

1 My guess is that you found this difficult - it is.

2 You could brief all the staff to use your definition, and then check out a sample of cases to see whether they had used it as you intended. This would still leave you with a problem of those cases where people disagreed as to what really happened.

Act1vlty answers

Theory and Methods

Activity 31

The terms 'formal' and 'informal' would need to be operationalised. This would not present any insurmountable difficulties.

Activity 33

A - positivist, B - interpretive.

Activity 36

1 (a) The records of general practitioners would be ideal in an area where most old people are registered with a local practice, but these are confidential. The next best thing would be the electoral register, but since this does not distinquish age your sample would select a great many non-elderly people who would have to be deleted as soon as their age became known.

(b) The most obvious sampling frame is the record of criminal offences by juveniles - but this gives you only juvenile delinquents who get caught: a highly unrepresentative sample. An alternative is school registers, selecting a sample at random and asking young people to identify themselves as delinquent or not - again problematic.

2 The easiest way is to check the sample against something which is known for the population as a whole. Thus, if an area has 18 per cent of its population over 65, then your sample ought to have about 18 per cent over-65s. This can be done more confidently in the years immediately after a National Census.

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Activity 37

The research would be unreliable because the results will have been produced by the peculiarities of the interviewer. It will also be invalid for female opinions because the results will likely reflect the unease of the interviewer rather than the opinions of the respondents.

Activity 38

1 To avoid unreliability and the invalidity which follows from unreliability. 2 Because a standardised performance creates an unnatural situation.

3 The last time I was interviewed I was very irritated by the fact that I had to answer questions I really didn't have opinions about, and was forced to choose between answers when I wanted to say 'it all depends what you mean by ....

4 Opinion research relies on the idea that people have opinions in the same way that they have red hair or freckles. I don't believe it.

Theory and Methods

Activity answers

Activity 39

1 From Labov's viewpoint the school interviews were invalid as a method of judging the linguistic ability of black children. What they recorded was the reaction of black children to school-like situations.

2 Since I favour naturalistic research this makes me more favourably disposed to Iabov's methods. The naturalism of the research allowed black kids to show how well they could use language, while the standardised school interviews prevented them from demonstrating this.

Activity 40

Subjectivity or a lack of objectivity - add the term 'sympathetic bias' to your glossary.

Activity 44

When I did this research I operationalised 'respecting window-shoppers' rights', as:

• Respecting the space by not entering it, Le, making a detour.

• Violating the space but respecting it by apologising, or making an apologetic gesture.

• Violating the space but recognising it by (for example) speeding up/turning slightly sideways as if slipping through a narrow gap/ducking/doing a huge stride over the space.

• Violating the space but doing a show of not having seen the windowshopper, e.g, eyes to the front focused on the distance.

• Apparently not recognising the rights of the window-shopper at all.

• Challenging the rights of the window-shopper, e.g. complaining about

obstruction.

There were, of course, all kinds of difficulties in classifying reactions. Without a videotape, and even with one, the results will be rather rough and ready. I found that children, adolescents and elderly ladies were the least likely to respect my rights as a window-shopper, while middle-aged people and elderly men were most likely to. But maybe that has something to do with my being a middle-aged male, and you may of course have classified people in a different way.

Doing the observation in a different way - using children as the windowshoppers - showed me that children have no window-shopping rights at all.

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The density of pedestrian traffic did influence the results. The more crowded it was, the fewer people made detours, and the more seemed to avoid recognising my rights at all. But even under the most crowded conditions on a narrow pavement, the majority of people gave some acknowledgement of me as a Window-shopper with window-shopping rights. I used only an impressionistic measure of pedestrian flow.

Ac1ivlfy answers

Theory and Mefhods

Now you've done this activity you can tell your friends that you've been doing ethnomethodology - because that is what you have been doing.

Activity 45

Here are some of the ways in which people manage tum-taking:

A basic routine for turn-taking when people are in conversation is for the speaker to begin speaking in eye contact with the listener and then to look away - continuing to speak but making eye contact from time to time with the listener to check whether he or she wants a turn. Listeners may interrupt verbally - although this may lead to a complaint - or they may make various non-verbal signals to indicate that they want a tum - leaning forward or pushing the head forward, raising a hand or a finger. Listeners may also indicate that it is OK for the tum to stay with the speaker - nods, grunts, yeses, nos, echoings. Sometimes turns are handed over explicitly - 'What do you think, Leonard?' - but this is actually quite unusual.

Tum-taking routines are interesting in themselves, but equally interesting is the way we read someone's character or mood from the way they handle tum-taking - what do you think about people who:

• never look you in the eye?

• never give you a tum?

• don't take a turn when it is offered (when a turn is offered there is a social obligation to fill it with something)?

Once again, when you've done this Activity you can tell your friends that you've been doing ethnomethodoIogy.

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Activity46

1 Functionalist (consensus) SOciologists. 2 Conflict theorists - of any variety.

3 Research uncovering hidden aspects of power and domination; research documenting poverty and deprivation and linking this with the privileges of the rich and powerful.

Activity 47

1 The authors give the example of a. woman's role. A further example might come from contrasting those theories which believe that intelligence is measured by intelligence tests (IQ tests) and those which believe that intelligence tests measure only an ability to do intelligence tests. One theory counts intelligence test data as evidence, the other as nonsense. In general any theory tells us what is real and what is important, and hence what can count as evidence. This is called 'theorydata dependency'.

2 The cartoon makes the same point as above. In addition it suggests that data are created by the techniques we use to collect data - in this case a pastry cutter.

Theory and Methods

Activity answers

3 My suggestion would be: 'Sociology distorted by patriarchal assumptions' .

4 The authors suggest the 'common-sense' notion that women's thinking is subjective and unreliable. while men's is objective and reliable.

5 Your reaction to the result belongs to you. I asked you to do this exercise to show you how easy it is to take things such as the power of adults over children for granted, and regard them as so 'natural' as not to be worth thinking about or researching.

6 Feminists have an obvious bias towards uncovering the way in which males dominate females.

Activity 48

Reasons for non-research or non-publication of research:

• not of sociological interest to particular kinds of sociologist

• not topical

• common sense valuation as trivial and unimportant

• common sense blind-spot, e.g. something regarded as so natural it

doesn't need explaining

• no funding available

• topic unavailable because of rules of privacy and confidentiality

• censorship and self-censorship.

You will have noticed that both systematic biases and power playa part in determining what doesn't get researched.

Activity 49

1 The hypotbetico-deductive method forces us to think systematically, define our terms carefully, and test our ideas against evidence. At the same time, following this method shows other sociologists how we have proceeded so that they can check our arguments.

2 Following the hypothetico-deductive method, or otherwise giving a very careful account of our reasoning. Giving a full account of the way in which research was conducted; full publication of research data so that research can be checked and/or repeated by others.

3 For all the reasons in the last two answers, which is why cheats get away with it for much longer in commercial and military research where research is treated as secret and not published.

Sociology 'A' level @ 1990 National Extension College Trust ltd.

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Readings

Theory and Methods

W Reading 1

Reading sociological research

A sociological research report should always include an account of how the research was done. If it does DOt, the reader cannot assess the merits of the research. Most books do contain such an account, and these should be read very carefully. They are usually in an early chapter, or in an Appendix. Virtually every study mentioned in this book includes one.

The account that the researcher gives will make many points explicitly, all of which should be carefully noted, but many will be only implicit, and it is imponant that these are identified and brought into the open. In addition, the reader must be on the alen for what has been left out in this official version of what happened (see p. 129).

The most important implicit assumptions are usually those that the researcher makes about the nature of what is being studied - social reality. Within this Usumption is a model of man and of society, and of the relationship between them. The debate about positivist and interpretive research methods centres on these assumptions (see pp. 116-21).

So, when you are n:adiog a research report, and especially the section about methods, you should ask you.rselfthe following questions. Does the writer answer them, either explicitly or implicitly? If not, why do you think this is?

Remember that Dot every one of these questions applies to every research study.

Why did the researder choose to sllUly thu topic?

Is there any indication of whether the results are likely to be 'useful' in some way? Perhaps in relation to some aspect of social policy? Or is it more a matter of description? Was the resean:her tJying to discover causes? Or just describe a social context? Or increase our understanding? Or a mixture of these?

Who was the research done for? Does the author suggest that the subjects of the research stand to gain from it in any way?

What wen= the circumstances in which the choice of topic was made, and the research done? Was it a lone researcher, perhaps working for a Ph.D.? Or a researcher with substantial backing from an institution? Was there a team of researchers? Was the research pan of a wider programme? Was it a mixture of these?

Huw was the research paid for?

Do you think that this affected the choice of research topic, or the way the research was carried out? Or how it was reponed?

What were the YUItJn:h mahoth wid?

Why were these methods chosen? How far were they dictated by the topic of the research? Could any other methods have been used to study the same topic?

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Theory and Methods

Readings

How was acass gained tD tJu mbju;rs of tJu reuaTCla?

Did anybody's permission have to be asked? Could the subjects of the research have refused to be studied? Did the researcher get to know the people beiDg studied? If so, how?

Does tJu muly use all primdty data. or UCOIIda", dtna,. or both? If secondary data is involved, how is it used?

Is there tIfD' clem- ptefomta for S11m!J11IIBIIrodr. or for etImograpIaie methods, or for experiments?

If there is such a prefcreace, is it explained or justified? How?

Does 1M researcher operatioJtoliae any COIICepu? If so, which ones? And how?

Does 1M ~ disam probkttu of objeairJity. bias. fIIIIl fKIlue-fiwdom? What does the author seem to mean by these tenDS? How are the problems dealt with? Whose side does the resaudler seem to be on? Anybody's? Or does it seem to be a neutral and objective account?

Is rluTe a ~ of wlwllsr tile meardt is srimJific?

What does the researcher seem to mean by the term 'scientific'?

Is "" question of ~ 1fIised?

If it is, is rqxesentativeness or typicality claimed? Is sampling discussed or described? If so, what kind of sampliDg is it?

Is the question of wzlidUy discussed?

How does the raearcher claim validity, if at all?

Does the researcher discuss the effect that the research may have had on the people being studied?

Is 1M qawrion of relilJlnliI.y discussed?

Do you think that, if someone else had done the research, they would have come up with a similar account? If not, why not?

Does die researclu, discuss any ethical problems raised by the research? Are there problems of secrecy, or of anonymity? Is there any question of the subjects of the research suffering any hurt or disadvantage as a result of the research being published?

Sociology 'A' level © 1990 National Extension College Trust Ud.

n

How is evidence presented?

Is it mainly in quantitative form, in tables and graphs? Or in qualitative fonn, with many Quotations direct from those studied? Or is there a mixture of these, and are they used to complement each other?

ReadIngs

Theory and Methods

I/Ihe resetlrth is mQinly 0/ the surwy fYPe. mluJt does the researther say about:

Sampling methods; questionnaire design; training interviewers and standardizing interviews; doing a pilot survey; data analysis?

Is the questionnaire reproduced in the book? What do you think of the questions? Are they clear? U oambiguous? Are they the right questions? What other questions would you have asked?

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Sociology 'A' level@ 1990 National Eldenslon College Trust ltd.

1/ the researth is mainly 0/ the ethnographic type, mhat does the researcher say about:

Joining the group being studied; adopting a role that is acceptable to the group; overt or covert research; leaving the group; 'going native'?

What has been left out 0/ the accouJll of how the research mas done? How frank and honest do you think the researcher has been in this account? Do you think the research really went as described? What other problems would you expect the researcher to have had?

How mighl a researther mith di/fermllheoretical assumptions have tackled this research?

What methods might have been used? How might the results have differed?

Abow all. do jIOU haw a ckar idta of mhy rIris resean:h topic IUaS chosen? Why these methods toer8 adopted? How the resean:h fDQS carried our? And hom the cortClasioru rDml' reachtJ? Do jIOU haw any tnem ora mherher the research report gives a '"" picture?

Appendix from McNeill, P, Research Methods, Routledge, 1990.

Theory and Meff10ds

Readings

W Reading 2

, I received a series of draft summary reports from undersecretaries and other civil servants in the Department oi tbe Environment-the recommendations were so diluted as to be unrecognisable.,

New SocietJ 23 October 1987

ADRIANA CAUDREY

79

Whose

research?

The DHSS is tightening control on its researchers. Should this be seen as a threat to

academic freedom? !

i A sinister new clause has crept into the Department The government's increasingly narrow, policy-

i of Health's latest contract with its social researchers. related and cost-effective demands were recently i It has unleashed the paranoia building up among spelled out in a confidential memo from health minis-

\1 them. For. concealed in the small print, is the warning ter Edwina Currie to a disenchanted health researthat from now on the DHSS may veto any research cher: "It is our intention that the research we support , publication and will also lay claim to all research has greater relevance to Departmental policy and the I material. At a time when academic freedom is being needs of the NHS. To that end we are ... trying to i ~ igorously fought for. the government's decision to gear the capacity of our funded Research Units to , appropriate a researcher's entire intellectual property meet the Department's research requirements and, as I is seen as highly provocative. It could precipitate a a matter of policy, examining all completed research I major clash between the agents of political expediency reports for timeliness and relevance as well as scientI and those of academic integrity. ific excellence. in order to decide whether we have i Heads of government-funded research units are had good value for the money spent on that research."

I now joining forces against the new clause. At least Ministerial control over research in the Department ten of them are demanding a meeting with the depart- of Health is borne out by a recent circular which ment's chief scientist. the official overseer of research. announced that researchers would no longer be encoI This latest swipe has confirmed their suspicions that uraged to put up ideas. Instead the DHSS would comI the government is trying to censor them. Previous mission what it wanted. It outlined six key research

I indications have been more subtle. Only occaSiOnallY! areas. The top three were AlOS. community care and have academics complained of "ideological editing" health management. An example of a piece of AIDS· I of their reports. More commonly. research is turned related research eagerly awaited by the department is

I ~~::;c~~~~:'~n~fcr;~r~i~~;~~~~~~~Cu:~ i~~~!~~: I fs s:~~~~~~ tt~I?~;~v;~,::o~ ~~~~r~~~~~~~~rJ~~:'

ing "Big Brother" and actually censoring their own cialising in the problems of childhood. or mental work. Their paranoia is reflected in the fact that very illness. that their research will be elbowed out.

few of them dared be quoted by name in this article.

One senior researcher commented: "This is a A tighter regime

government that knows what direction it's going in

and what it wants to hear." Research has to be The new clause in the DHSS contract confirms the pertinent [0 policy and has to back up what the tighter regime. It is seen as particularly retrograde government wants to hear. One researcher remarked: because the OHSS had a reputation for being relatively "They can't have it both ways; if they want things to liberal. The change is. that where in the early eighties be politically relevant, they will also be politically the document stated that the department would comhot." But the government is highly selective about ment on a research report ("Any comments made which topical research it buys. Many issues indirectly shall be considered by the II uthor but the author related to government pot icy have become taboo=- shall he free nevertheless to allow publication in the for example. research on wealth distribution and occ- original form if he thinks fit") by the mid eighties the upational mortality. document had introduced tight copyright controls.

Research arrangements have become much tighter. Although researchers were still allowed to publish The research divisions are more closely watched by even in the face of departmental disapproval. they ministers. Research budgets have been trimmed and were for the first time warned that the finished product there is increasing pressure for projects to satisfy might have to carry a disclaimer.

narrow criteria. Researchers are given their brief on But the latest contract is tar more ngorous. It the Rothschild model of consumer contractor. where reads: "The copyright in all research materials [includthe researcher's duty is to keep the customer satisfied. ing basic factual data sometimes referred to as raw There is less and less scope for researchers [0 put up data I ... shall vest from the outset in the Crown." their own ideas or reach them in collaboration with It also lays down that: "Any publication of research civil servants. (There are exceptions. however. The material.:. or of matters ar!sing from su~h material Home Office. which has Ii huge in-house research unit. or results LS subject to the prior consent 01 the Seerestill collaborates with outside academics, especially Itary or State." No longer can a researcher decide criminologists.) In addition. the government is increas- I to "p~bl~sh and be damned." ~oreover. if his ruw ingly using market researchers. These do not share I L?atenal LS no longer hIS own. his right to re-analyse (he academic's drive to get research published and tor ~uture research-the stock-in-trude 01 the ucu-

are used (0 delivering what the customer wants. dernic+-is removed,

Sociology 'A' level@ 1990 Nat100cl Exlens!on College Trust ltd.

ReadIngs

Theory and Meihods

New seal." 23 October 1987

These developments are significant for Richard Berthoud, a researcher at the Policy Studies Institute. Five years ago he worked on the first major study into the workings of a supplementary benefit office. His findings were extremely critical and showed that the system allowed staff to be off-hand and patronising (0 claimants. This was not music to the department's ears. Berthoud recalls that his findings were received with "consternation." from the department. Diplomatically, he revised his draft slightly. Tht! department was uneasy, but did not prevent Berthoud from publishing,

He says the research clearly caused embarrassment to the officials directly respcnsible for the benefit staff. Subsequently. he has noticed more bureaucratisation of the research process throughout Whitehall. "They seemed to be showing us that they could censor us if they wanted to." He is alarmed at the implications of the new clause and points out: "We exist for the purpose of publishing. It would be against our constitution and charitable status not to."

Other researchers have experienced blatant suppression. David Radford, now assistant chief executive at Wolverhampton Council. used [0 be a researcher for the Housing Institute. Under the last Labour government he was commissioned to produce a report on rent assessment methods. His research was completed soon after the Conservatives came to power. He says that after he had submitted it: "I received a series of draft summary reports from under-secretaries and other civil servants in the Department of the Environment-the recommendations were so diluted as to be unrecognisable." He would not accept the "ideological editing," and the research remained unpubiished. The experience showed him that, "The end had come for government-sponsored research on housing."

The government has also been known completely to disown and undermine its own research. The fate of the 1983 NAcNE-National Advisory Committee on Nutrition Education-report into the connections between diet and health is a notorious example. The report uncompromisingly recommended a dramatic cut in the nation's fat intake. The government disowned the study and insisted it bore the Health Education Council's imprint. It also delayed its publication, restricted the print run and finally chased it with another report by a health committee. This made less drastic recommendations. In this case, commercial interests were at stake.

According to one ex-civil servant a government's methods of interfering with research "range from factual. legitimate correction through to dotting of i's and crossing of t's, and changing the policy slant." Another tool of supression is the unspoken understanding that a research department which offends is unlikely to have its contract renewed: "There is nothing as crude as a blacklist, but there is an unofficial grapevine about who is reliable."

While some researchers have become increasingly compliant others have resolutely refused to compromise. One senior charity researcher told NEW SOCII!l'Y that he was recently invited to write a foreword to a

I standard government volume. He wrote an explicit reference to the increasing social divide in this counI try. One by one, every government department

I objected to the reference. "J was asked to obscure . it." he said: "but I felt I was a guest celebrity and I ! refused." In the end it went in, unaltered.

! Some academics, like Radford, have chosen to Ileavc government research behind them. Others are

I content to play the game, however much the rules are changed. But many speak of a climate-of demoralisation which stifles research. One expert in the

, The government is increasingly using market researchers. These do not share the academic's drive to get research published and are used to delivering what the customer wants.,

, People talk a lot about the heavy hand of government coming down on them. But self-censorship among researchers is just as dangerous. If they aren't careful, they'd write themselves out of business by being too circumspect and boring. ,

relationship between policy research and government says that researchers are too ready to apply selfcensorship: "People talk a lot about the heavy hand of government coming down on them. But self-censorship among researchers is just as dangerous. If they aren't careful they'll write themselves out of business by being too circumspect and boring."

One government head of research strongly denied that there was a down on researchers. He told NEW SOCIETY that they were frequently their own worst enemies. It was a trahison des clercs-betrayal of standards by intellectuals-for researchers to compromise. Equally, it was justified for Whitehall to demand "research relevant to policy." But he argued that there is an important role for disinterested research. If government was not commissioning it, then other research bodies should do so

Here lies another problem. Not only has government narrowed its research remit. but it has also cut back funding to the research councils. The ESRCEconomic and Social Research Council-is an obvious casualty. In 1982 the Rothschild scrutiny into the council made two emasculating recommendations. First, it prescribed cutting £6 million from its annual budget and diverting the money to the pure science councils. It also re-christened the erstwhile Social Science Research Council. the Economic and Social Research Council. Social researchers felt that their discipline had been doubly demoted.

Those who subscribe to a conspiracy theory reckon that the government is bent on silencing the social rmarchers one way or the other. This apparent lack of receptiveness to social research is creating a call for other channels for funding. Roger Jewell, director of Community and Social and Community Planning Research, is campaigning for Parliamentary Select Committees to have their own research budgets. He believes that this is one way to circumvent the stranglehold of commission by cabinet. Others, however. point out that such research would still be politically determined and that impartial sponsors are needed.

In the meantime other researchers with projects unpopular with the government are refusing to be silenced. A group of academics, are seeking funding for research into how social workers will help to administer the new social fund which will replace single payments. It is a politically controversial transition from an open-ended one-off payment, which is the claimant's by right. to one which is cash-limited and only paid on discretion. Gill Stewart. of Lancaster University. one of the researchers campaigning to do the research. says there was an unfavourable response to it when the department was sounded out so they made no official application. She told NEW SOCIETY:

"This is important research which would not be done otherwise." Clearly it is extremely relevant to policy, perhaps a little 100 relevant. Other researchers have teamed up to produce a publication called Radical Health Statistics, to provide the sort of sccio-medical ligures which are being cut back by the government.

Government statisticians complain that there has been a reduction in the output of figures. Sue: Corby, assistant general secretary of the First Division Association, the top civil servants "union" which includes statisticians and economists says: "There is increasing concern that the scope and frequency of statistics has been reduced. Also. we are worried that the government is more concerned with studies on the implementation of policy rather than its formulation."

Looked at in isolation. the subtraction of a figure here, the addition of a clause there, or the shelving of a piece of research. does not seem inordinately disturbing. Taking these factors together one can see why researchers have a heavy sense of foreboding .•

Caudrey, A, 'Whose research?', New Society, 23 October 1987.

Sociology 'A' level@ 1990 Nallonal ElCtenslon College TlUlt Ltd.