Social Research Methods

    Computer-assisted qualitative data analysis: using NVivo
    What are the two types of node used in NVivo?
    Key concept 25.1 (p606) explains “nodes” as “collections of references” about aspects of your research data. In other words, nodes are like files in which you have inserted all references about a particular aspect of your research. NVivo has two types, called “hierarchical” nodes and “non-hierarchical” nodes. “Hierarchical” nodes are created by default, since they are for organizing your concepts in a hierarchy. By creating hierarchies of concepts you gradually start building towards a grounded theory. The “non-hierarchical” nodes are for what you regard as “free-standing” concepts – those that don’t seem to relate to other concepts directly.
    Reference: Bryman: Social Research Methods: 5th Edition Page(s) 606,607
    Author: rikazzz Comment
    Self-administered questionnaires
    Which of the following is not a disadvantage of self-completion questionnaires compared to structured interviews?
    Here we are dealing with the limitations of the self-completion questionnaire. It is true that ‘eliminating’ the interviewer eliminates interviewer bias but it is also true that no follow-up questions can be asked. It is equally true that respondents are very likely to read through the whole questionnaire before answering the first question (although web-based questionnaires can reduce this effect), which might tend to produce other responses than might have been given spontaneously. Partly because of this pre-reading, respondents may not answer all the questions, causing a coding problem later. However, far from being a disadvantage, researchers are encouraged to set closed-ended questions in this type of questionnaire because open-ended questions may cause problems of interpretation as well as proving too tedious to complete.
    Reference: Bryman: Social Research Methods: 5th Edition Page(s) 223,224
    Author: rikazzz Comment
    Focus groups
    How have focus groups been used in media and cultural studies?
    Groups will, and do, form in social contexts to work out individual and group objectives. A focus group is an artificial construction of a group for a specific research purpose. Group members could be those with ‘expert’ knowledge of a topic and it might be interesting to hear their discussion. However, in social science research, the tendency is to try to understand what ‘ordinary’ people think. Thus, focus groups in media and cultural studies typically ask regular consumers of mass media to discuss their reception of mass media communications. Bryman cites (p502) Morley’s (1980) research on the British news programme Nationwide. Focus groups of specific categories of people discussed the programme after watching recordings of it and it became clear that reception varied significantly among the groups, “implying that meaning does not reside solely in the programmes but also in the ways in which they are watched” (p502).
    Reference: Bryman: Social Research Methods: 5th Edition Page(s) 502
    Author: rikazzz Comment
    Using existing data
    Why has the secondary analysis of official statistics been seen as an “unobtrusive” method?
    The term “unobtrusive method” stems from the work of Webb et al (1966, cited on page 324), who pointed to the value of methods that do not involve the researcher being immersed in the field or interacting with participants. This can be said to reduce the “reactive effect”, whereby people change their behaviour because they know they are being studied. Key concept 14.3 (pages 324) shows four main types of unobtrusive measures, including “archive materials”, which, as Bryman points out, perfectly includes “official statistics”.
    Reference: Bryman: Social Research Methods: 5th Edition Page(s) 325,326
    Author: rikazzz Comment
    Sampling in qualitative research
    What is involved in “purposive sampling” for grounded theory?
    Qualitative researchers often use purposive samples rather than random, probability samples, in order to develop a grounded theory. This typically involves selecting additional participants on the basis of the ideas and concepts that emerge as the project progresses, and it ensures that the researcher gathers data that is relevant to their research questions. Consequently, it is better to start out by choosing members of a sample “purposely”, deliberately, in other words, rather than randomly.
    Reference: Bryman: Social Research Methods: 5th Edition Page(s) 410-412
    Author: rikazzz Comment
    Research designs
    What is a cross-sectional design?
    This is often called a survey design because researchers using this method may produce questionnaires to be filled in by many respondents in the same time period. The search is for variation within a social group, or between social groups, in attitudes or orientation to specific variables. Since no manipulation of variables is possible, co-relationships between variables is all that can be discovered. Answer (d) suggests experimentation; answer (a) thinks of respondents instead of the design; and answer (b) must be wrong because researchers are always cheerful and bright. Always!
    Reference: Bryman: Social Research Methods: 5th Edition Page(s) 53, Key concept 3.6
    Author: rikazzz Comment
    Ethnography and participant observation
    What are the two main types of data that can be used in visual ethnography?
    Visual ethnography can be based on extant materials, which already exist (such as people’s private collections of photographs or newspaper clippings) or research-driven materials, which are either created by the researcher or at the researcher’s request (such as photographs taken for the purpose of later analysis). Since it is possible to ask respondents to discuss photographs in one-to-one interviews, this method is clearly not restricted to ethnography. However, since the method is appropriate to many kinds of ethnographic studies, the expression ‘visual ethnography’ has been popularized.
    Reference: Bryman: Social Research Methods: 5th Edition Page(s) 451-459
    Author: rikazzz Comment
    Using existing data
    Which of the following is not an advantage of secondary analysis?
    Apart from the advantages of reduced cost and time discussed in the previous question, secondary analysis also offers advantages of access to high-quality data, opportunities of studying social trends over extended time periods and unobtrusiveness, among others. However, of its very nature, it does not allow the researcher to witness events at first hand. The researcher is cast in a more reflective mode because they are not confronting their field of enquiry directly.
    Reference: Bryman: Social Research Methods: 5th Edition Page(s) 310-312
    Author: rikazzz Comment
    Social research strategies: quantitative research and qualitative research
    Which of the following is an example of value-free research?
    “Values reflect either the personal beliefs or the feelings of a researcher.” (Bryman, p39) Clearly, since answers (a) and (b) are indicative of values they cannot be correct. Unstructured interviewing is a research method, typically used in qualitative research strategies. But a method by itself cannot be regarded as value-free or value-laden, so it must also be incorrect, making answer (d) the correct answer by default. Can there be such a thing as ‘value-free’ research might have been a more pertinent question, considering the tone of some of the earlier questions for this chapter. Modern thinking suggests it is an impossibility, prompting a new approach of identifying our values and declaring them as part of our research report, so that readers can interpret our findings in the light of our biases.
    Reference: Bryman: Social Research Methods: 5th Edition Page(s) 34-36
    Author: rikazzz Comment
    Sampling in quantitative research
    The standard error is a statistical measure of:
    The standard error is that which can be calculated as the difference between the population average and the sample average. Once the sample has been selected randomly, we can determine the probable difference between the sample and the population as a whole, as a range. We usually express our results, therefore, with a high degree of confidence (but not total) that our results apply to the entire population, plus or minus a little. It sounds more tentative than we might like but it cannot be more accurate than that. It should be pointed out that stratification of a sample can reduce the standard error.
    Reference: Bryman: Social Research Methods: 5th Edition Page(s) 182,183
    Author: rikazzz Comment