Importance of Research Proposal

- A detailed plan before carrying out the research

o Must be well-prepared before we go out an collect data
- Understand the social impact of conducting research
o Rationale: why are you conducting the research
o Social impact can be negative sometimes
- Application of social research
o Want to make policy recommendations to improve the policy or help people to improve
their everyday life

Literature Review

- Purposes – forwarding our voice and knowledge

o Tell the audience what has been studied already
o What is our current understanding on this topic
o The limitations or gaps in the literature
o Critique the existing research
- Common Mistakes
o Common mistake is to summarize one article after another
 poor organization
o very dated sources

SPSS Review

- two windows:
o variable view
o data view
- syntax
o computer language that records all of the steps you do in SPSS
- purpose of doing coding
o condense our categories
o example condense 15 categories into 3 main categories

Qualitative in-depth interview vs. Standardized interview

- qualitative
o open-ended
o gives you a lot of examples
o rich, unexpected, complex data
o needs to be aware of how our social identity affects the interview
- standardized interview
o close-ended questions with predetermined answers
o allows answers to be categorized

Ethnography (Field Research)

 - The purpose
o When do we use ethnography?
 When we want to explore a culture we are not familiar with
 Trying to understand logic/culture
- Types (observation – participation)
o Complete observer
o Observer as participant
o Participant as observer
o Complete participant
- Preparation, In the Field, Exiting
- Need to negotiate the relationship
- Saturation: if you do not see anything new coming from your observation, then you exit the field
- Things to consider
- Key concepts
o Gatekeeper: a person who can grant you into the community
 Must gain trust from gatekeeper
o Reflexivity
 How our social identity affects your data collection
 Outsider: need to work to gain trust
 Insider: people already trust you in the group, may be subject to bias
o Member Checking (after data collection)
 Validation: invite people in group to read your work to make sure you do not
misconstrue them

Non/reactive Measurement

- 1 question on final will ask what reactive/non-reactive measurement is about

- Reactive measurement
o People reacting to you and your question
o People can modify their behaviour and hide their true feelings
o Social desirability: people modify behaviours
- Non-reactive measurement
o No interaction with humans

Methods of Unobtrusive Research (non-reactive)

- Comparative-Historical methods
o Cross sectional: over time
o Longitudinal: one time
o Types of research:
 Historical event
 1 case, 1 time period
 Ex: 9/11
 Historical processs
 1 case, many time periods
  Ex: evolution of civil rights movement
 Cross-sectional comparative
 Many cases, 1 time period
 Ex: experiences of conflict in Russia
 Comparative Historical
 Many cases, many time periods
- Content Analysis
o Content that allows us to analyze human products
o Ex: analyzing pictures, documents
- (Critical) Discourse Analysis
o The way we use a language
o Try to understand the underlying meaning of the language
o What are peoples motivations?
o Critical discourse analysis adds politics into the discussion
 Power relations and imbalances
 Politicians can use language to reinforce a dominant ideology
- Naturalistic Observation
o Non-reactive measurement since you are just observing people with no intervention
- Secondary data analysis
o Analyzing the data set collected by someone else
o We are using someone else’s data, but the data set may not have all of the variables you
are looking for
o We have a big advantage thought because we do not have to collect all of our own data
o “data driven”
 Looking at the findings from other data and change our answers to fit theirs

What is Content Analysis?

- Quantitative content analysis

o Follow linear theory
o Theory ->RQ->Hypotheis->conceptualization/operationalization/measurement-
>Sampling -> content analysis
- Qualitative
o Does not look at the numbers
 Manifest
 Latent: trying to bring latent content to the surface
o Rich interpretation

Difference between content and Discourse Analysis

- Content analysis is broader than discourse analysis

o Includes pictures
- Discourse analysis is text-based only

Naturalistic Observation
 - Weak at explain causal relationship because we can only capture what is happening at that
moment, so we cannot prove anything

Sampling and Key Terms

- Purpose
o Quantitative sampling
 Want to generalize
 Probability sampling
 Statistical generalizations
o Qualitative sampling
 Want transferability
 non-probability sampling
 sampling for meaning
- Sample vs. Target Population
- Sampling Frame
o Operational definition of the target population
o List of people from which you can draw a sample
o Ex: university registry gives you a target population of current students
- Coverage Error
o Mismatch between two things: target population and sampling frame
 Everyone in the target population should be in your sampling frame
o Ex: if you use online survey, some people don’t have internet
- Sampling Error
o Use sample statistics to estimate population parameter
o The smaller the sampling error, the better the study is

Probability vs. Non-probability Sampling

- Probability sampling
o Everyone in the target population has an equal chance of being selected
o Use this for qualitative study so that we can make generalizations to as many people as
we can
o Types:
 Simple random
 Systematic random
 Stratified random
 Helps to reduce sampling error
 Ensures every group is represented
 Multi-stage cluster
- Non-probability sampling
o Not everyone in the target population has an equal chance of being selected
o Types:
 Convenience
 Find people around you
  Quota
 Use different criteria to select certain individuals
 Creates diversity
 Purposive
 Have methods to find certain individuals
 Snowball
 Find a gatekeeper that can refer you to other people

Research Ethics

- According to TCPS 2, there are 3 guiding principles of research ethics

o Respect for autonomy
 Participation in your study should be voluntary
 People should be informed before they conduct your study
o Concern for welfare
 Want people to be aware for risks and benefits of each
 If your research contains a high level of risk, you will not be approved
o Justice
 You should treat study participants fairly
 Should be given the same amount of information

Understand the ethical issues of different case studies discussed in lecture

- Nazi medicine
- Milgram Obedience Study
- Tearoom Trade Study (by Humphrey)

When can informed consent be waived?

- Two scenarios:
o If you are observing people in the public space
o If you are using official documents, then they can override informed consent

The Research Wheel

- Purpose
- Relationship between components
- Deduction and Induction
o Deduction: have a theory, and testing it with hypothesis (top-down)
o Induction: go straight to data; get data, form theory (bottom-up)
- Quantitative vs. Qualitative

Unit of Analysis

- Units:
o Individuals
o Social artifacts
 o Social groups
- Failure to identify unit of analysis leads to 2 mistakes:
o Ecological fallacy
 Taking observations from group and applying them to every individual
o Indiviudualistic
 Taking observation of individuals and applying them to the group

Design a Research Study

- Quantitative
o Linear
- Qualitative
o Non-linear (grounded theory)
o Collect data -> analysis -> collect more data

Types of Variables

- Independent variable
o Predictor variable
- Dependent variable
o Outcome variable
- Control variables
o Intervening variables
o Antecedent variable
 Spurious
 X and y have a relationship, but once cv is introduced, the relationship is
cancelled
 Non-spurious cv happens before x and y

Measurement Process

- Conceptualization
o Thinking process
- Conceptual Definition
o A statement that specifies the meaning of the concept
- Operationalization
o Using indicators that have quantifiable data
- Measurement
o Come up with specific questions to help the study participants connect themselves to
the issues

Key Terms in Quantitative Research

- Reliability
o Consistency of measurements
- Construct validity
o Does your measurement match the data?
 o The fit between the measurement and conceptual definition
o Are you measuring what you’re supposed to measure?
o Have to find the right indicator

Methodological Comparison

- Social Experiment – specifics

o Two groups: control and experimental groups
 One has the independent variable
o Random assignment to make sure the two groups are almost alike
- Survey Research
o Can have multiple research questions
o Looks at correlation, not causality
o Weaker internal validity because there is no random assignment or manipulation
o Can make generalizations
- Strengths and Weaknesses
- Causality vs. Correlation
o 3 conditions of causality: (internal validity)
 X comes before y
 Statistical association
 Elimination of all extraneous variables

How to Design a good questionnaire?

- Review..
- Common mistakes
o Ex: double-negative, no sensitive question at beginning
- Useable answers

Preparation for Quantitative Data Analysis

- Accuracy
o Cleaning
o Screening
o Check for outliers
- Missing data
o Check to see if they’re random or non-random
 Non random is systematic (worst case for missing data)
- Reliability & validity
- Normality
o Whether the data forms a normal distribution for your single variable
o (graph)
- Linearity
o Testing the relationship between two variables to see if there is one

Quantitative Data Analysis

 - Descriptive Statistics & Inferential Statistics
o Descriptive: describing your sample
o Inferential: trying to make an example of our sample for our target population
- Univariate, Bivariate and Multi-variate Analysis
o Univariate
 One variable
o Bivariate
 2 variables
o Multi-variate
 3 or more variables
- Statistical Control
o Can introduce another variable and see how it affects the main two
o Ex: relationship for education and income
 If you statistically control for gender
 If your numbers are very different between your controls, then gender matters
- Tests for significance (statistical significance)
o You can say something about your target population based on your sample
- Know the purpose of using different graphs, charts, or table
o Determine level of measurement
o Look at nominal, ordinal, or interval/ratio variables
o Ex: nominal is a bar graph
o Scatterplot uses bivariate analysis

Qualitative Data Analysis

- Data segmentation
o Breaking data into different parts
o Break raw data into smaller units
- Coding – open (line-by-line), axial, focused coding
- Analysis strategies
o narrative, ideal types, successive approximation, illustrative method
- Memo writing, analytic induction
o Memo writing: Write out whatever you have been thinking based on the coding
o Analytic induction: come out with a thesis statement, but is subject to change
- Meaning-making
o Trying to make sense of raw data
- Interpretation
- Understanding (theory development)