Research Methods in the Social Sciences

1. Research Methods in the Social Sciences Research Design

2. Outline • Definitions • Some golden rules • Research questions • Designs: • Experimental • Cross-Sectional • Longitudinal • Case Study • Comparative • Issues: • Reliability • Replication • Validity

3. Definitions • Research Design: • A framework for the collection and analysis of data. The choice of design reflects the researcher’s priorities and / or constraints. • Research Method: • A technique for collecting data. • Research Question: • Focuses the research; both data collection and analysis.

4. Ovreteit’s Golden Rules • Don’t collect data that already exists • Don’t invent a new measure when a proven one will do • Don’t ignore what is available • Measure what is important, not what is easy to measure • Don’t collect data when cofounders make interpretation impossible • Spend twice as much time on planning and design as on data collection • Analysing data takes twice as long as collecting if you have not defined which data you need and why • Data collection will take twice as long as you expect

6. The Research Question • Guides your literature search • Guides decisions about research design • Guides decisions about what data to collect and from where • Guides analysis • Guides writing up • Stops you from going off on tangents

7. The Research Question • Must be clear • Must be doable • Connect to theory / established research • Linked to each other • Have potential to create knowledge • Not too broad • Not to narrow

8. Research Design: Experimental • Laboratory or in the field • Need for a control group • Serious ethical concerns • Difficult to perform in social science

9. Research Design: Cross Sectional • Uses more than one case • At more than one time • Often uses surveys • Looking for patterns of association

10. Research Design: Longitudinal • A sample is surveyed a number of times over a period • Same sample or different sample • Sample need to have the same characteristic • Costly and very time consuming

11. Research Design: Case Study • Detailed and intensive analysis of one case • Weak generalisability • Subject can be: • A community • A school • A family • An organisation • A person • An event

12. Research Design: Comparative • Same methods for two contrasting cases • Difficult to make sure same data exists • Difficult to make sure data is measured the same way • Difficult to manage

13. Issues: Reliability • Concerned with consistency of measures • Stability: • Is the measure stable over time • Internal Reliability: • Is the scale consistent • Inter-observer consistency • Are we seeing the same thing

14. Issues: Replication • Is the study replicable • Procedures need to be spelled out in detail • Someone else must be able to re-create the study to test it

15. Issues: Validity • Does the measure really measure what the study says it does • Do any causal relationships (between independent and dependent variables) hold water • Can the results be generalised • Are the results applicable to people’s lives

16. Next Week Quantitative research: Designing a questionnaire. • Homework: • design two questions • Bring in a questionnaire you have found (online or through the post)