A Critical Introduction to Social Research

Matt Henn, Mark Weinstein, Nick Foard

• Publisher: SAGE Publications Ltd
• Year: 2009
• Print ISBN: 9781848601796, 9781848601789
• eBook ISBN: 9781446241080
• Edition: 2
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Social Science Research & Methodology
• Index: Social Sciences

A Critical Introduction to Social Research is the new, updated and improved edition of A Short Introduction to Social Research. This book introduces students and researchers to the key ideas and issues that inform research practice. In it, Henn, Weinstein and Foard provide a clear and easy-to-understand route-map to help the reader plan their research project from beginning to end.

A Critical Introduction is perfect for use on introductory methods courses and is also an invaluable guide for the first time researcher embarking on their own small-scale research project.

This new second edition now features updated chapters which reflect recent debates and developments in the field, including:

- New coverage of emancipatory and feminist approaches;

- Comparative research methods, evaluation research, and action research;

- Online research;

- Glossary of key terms;

- Revised further reading sections at the end of each chapter which include peer-reviewed research articles.

This book aims to prepare students and new researchers for their research project. Brilliantly written throughout, this is your essential guide to the theory of research, the practice of research and the best ways to plan and manage your research.

ONE

What is Social Research?

• To introduce readers to alternative definitions of social research and key terms
• To place social research within the context of a pursuit of knowledge
• To introduce readers to two traditionally opposed approaches to the pursuit of knowledge: positivism and interpretivism
• To introduce readers to the main features of qualitative and quantitative approaches to research
• To highlight the distinctions between qualitative and quantitative approaches
• To discuss the potential for combining qualitative and quantitative approaches

• Introduction
• Problems of knowledge
• Combining methods
• Reflection
• Summary
• Chapter research task
• Recommended reading

Introduction

Social research may be carried out for a variety of reasons. For students and university academics, social research is conducted in order to extend our knowledge about some aspect of social life that we are interested in – whether our field is in business studies, humanities or one of the social sciences. Typically, we are interested in either testing the appropriateness of existing theories which seek to account for the behaviour we are studying, or in developing new insights – constructing new theories – to help build up our understanding of the processes behind this behaviour. We may, for instance, ask why certain people become addicted to gambling, in order to contribute to our more general understanding about psychological compulsion. Or, as part of a study into the broader phenomenon of New Politics, we might examine why it is that anti-roads protestors take part in direct action to pursue their environmental concerns, rather than in more conventional forms of political activity, such as writing to a member of parliament.

For research practitioners, social research is usually carried out in order to inform decisions about which policies or initiatives might be most usefully implemented to solve everyday issues and problems, or to evaluate the effectiveness of such policies in meeting the objectives of those who originally instigated them. An example of such applied research may include an investigation into the feasibility of introducing CCTV (closed-circuit television) cameras into a shoppers’ car-parking area in which there has recently been a spate of car break-ins and thefts. What do the police think about the proposed measures as a means of tackling crime? How much confidence do users of the car park have in the initiative for improving general security and safety? How much demand is there for such an initiative from local shopkeepers and traders? And how will local residents, who may have concerns about the invasion of their privacy that the surveillance equipment represents, view the introduction of CCTV? And what about the effectiveness of the introduction of CCTV? Research can be conducted to evaluate the impact of the surveillance system on car crime, to measure changes in car park users’ ‘fear of crime’, and to assess the impact on the financial well-being of the local shopkeepers.

For action researchers, social research studies are likely to be initiated in order to solve an ongoing problem within an organisational setting or a particular workplace. For example, what can account for persistently high levels of absenteeism within a particular organisation? To what extent is occupational stress associated with the issue (and, indeed, what might be the source(s) of this problem)? And what measures might be introduced to alleviate the problem? Or the research may be based at a particular school in which there have been high rates of indiscipline and exclusions – what steps might the school leadership take to overcome these problems?

All of these styles of research have something that binds them together – they are all based upon the pursuit of information-gathering to answer questions about some aspect of social life.

Defining social research

But what does social research actually entail? This is not an easy question to answer. At one level, it is social, and as such the focus of the research is upon human behaviour. Whether we are investigating juvenile crime, why men choose to father children, the political loyalties of first-time voters, an organisation’s decision to pursue a particular marketing strategy, or the experiences of the ‘old–elderly’ in residential care, we are examining human behaviour and the relationships with other human beings, groups, (sub)cultures and organisations.

As such, social research can be contrasted with the natural sciences – physics, chemistry and biology. The distinction is not always obvious, however, and it is possible to find areas of research that straddle both the social world and the natural sciences. For instance, much experimental psychology that is concerned with animal behaviour is also biological in nature. Nonetheless, it is generally accepted that when it comes to the focus of research, the activities of social researchers differ from those working within the natural sciences.

However, the difference between the social sciences and the natural sciences is not so clear when it comes to the question of how we actually conduct our research. This is the subject of considerable debate, and some of this centres on the question of methodology (see Definition 1.1). On the one hand, there are social researchers who would argue that when undertaking research projects, we should borrow approaches, designs and methods that are commonly used within the natural sciences – such as experiments and measurement. Others would argue that the social world is different from the natural world, and if it is to be investigated effectively social research needs to design its own approaches, designs and methods, which are more relevant and fit for purpose. This is a debate that we shall return to presently in this chapter.

Definition 1.1 Method and methodology

It is important to note the distinction between method and methodology. Method refers to the range of techniques that are available to us to collect evidence about the social world. Methodology, however, concerns the research strategy as a whole, including, as Seale (1998, p.3) notes, ‘the political, theoretical and philosophical implications of making choices of method when doing research’. To this we might add the need to consider the ethical implications and consequences of our research, negotiating access to the field, and the role of values – both those of the author and those who have the power to impose some control over the research agenda, such as sponsors of research.

While it is difficult to define precisely what social research actually is, there are certain aspects of the notion ‘research’ upon which we can largely agree. The first of these is that research is not an arbitrary activity, but follows certain rules and procedures. There are many types of research method available; some of those in common usage include, for instance, social surveys, experiments, observations and in-depth interviews. Furthermore, we are interested in generating information of sorts, either to develop further insights into an area – to explain or explore a particular phenomenon – or to solve a problem, perhaps at work or in our local community. Research therefore consists of a means – method – and an end – knowledge.

Two important aspects of research that are not so readily agreed upon, however, are:

• what counts as valid knowledge; and
• how should we acquire that knowledge?

Problems of knowledge

There are two broadly divergent views about the nature of knowledge, or what we call competing paradigms (see Definition 1.2), which we can group as:

• a positivist paradigm (most often associated with quantitative research strategies); and
• an interpretive paradigm (usually associated with qualitative research strategies).

The distinction between positivism and interpretivism as two polar opposites is somewhat artificial, and you will come across a great many other ‘-isms’ which fall somewhere within the spectrum which spans the two: empiricism, realism, relativism, social constructionism, idealism, postmodernism – the list is extensive. The positivist and interpretivist paradigms can, however, be said to have been enormously influential in the development of quantitative and qualitative approaches to social research.

Definition 1.2 Paradigm

According to Bryman (1988, p.4), a paradigm is ‘a cluster of beliefs and dictates which for scientists in a particular discipline influence what should be studied, how research should be done, how results should be interpreted, and so on’. Essentially, then, a paradigm is a set of assumptions about how the issue of concern to the researcher should be studied.

There are different styles of research (which are linked to different philosophical or world views that we hold) as well as different actual methods and techniques for collecting information (or data). For some of us, the method(s) and technique(s) we choose will largely be determined by our understanding of what constitutes acceptable knowledge, or what is termed our epistemological position (Definition 1.3). As Bryman (1989, p.248) states, the study of society:

exhibits contrasting paradigms about the nature of social reality and about what is acceptable knowledge concerning that reality. In this way, the distinction between quantitative and qualitative research is not simply a matter of different approaches to the research process, each with its own cluster of research methods … but it concerns antagonistic views about more fundamental issues to do with the nature of one’s subject matter.

Definition 1.3 Epistemology

Epistemology is a crucial philosophical concept for social scientists, which considers questions to do with the theory of knowledge. Essentially, the two positions of positivism and interpretivism that are outlined here and in the following pages hold contrasting epistemologies. They differ in terms of their views about the status of different claims to knowledge and about how to judge knowledge claims.

The positivist approach

Very broadly speaking, there is one particular view of how research should be conducted that suggests that we should carry out research in the social sciences in ways that are similar to the methods within the natural sciences (physics, chemistry and biology). This is often called the positivist or ‘scientific’ approach. A consideration of the historical roots of positivism takes us back to the Enlightenment period of the eighteenth century. Up to this point, faith in God had provided the generally accepted reasoning behind our existence and the way the world was. The world in which we lived was a matter of divine creation, and many explanations rested on a notion that things occurred because of God’s will. Industrial development led to a shift in the relative position between humans and the natural world: industrialisation gave us the means to exert control over the natural world. This gave rise to the emergence of science, which challenged previous, theologically based explanations of the social order. Rather, science sought to explain the world by developing general laws. The natural world came to be understood by studying what could be observed as facts. As such, metaphysical notions of explanation were disregarded. This idea, as applied to the social world, can be traced back to the work of nineteenth-century philosopher August Comte (1798–1857), in his work The Positive Philosophy (Comte 1974). While the development of positivism has travelled a long and winding path, much of its essence can still be found in Comte’s original writings.

Comte was very much concerned with progress in terms of finding the ‘truth’ about the social world. He regarded the scientific world as having achieved this goal in its application of natural laws based on observable facts. Such an approach to knowledge had superseded previous theological and metaphysical attempts at explanation: science was not concerned with divine or abstract explanations, but concrete facts based on empirical observations. These ideas were developed in the early part of the twentieth century, in particular through the work of a group of philosophers known as the Vienna Circle, in what was to become known as logical positivism.

Logical positivism took a stance which entirely rejected the metaphysical. Indeed, metaphysics should be:

written off as nonsense. The term ‘nonsense’ was used here not merely to express strong disagreement or disapproval, but as an exact description of metaphysical statements, something that followed from a ‘logical analysis of language’. It was thought that all genuine questions must be capable of scientific treatment, and all genuine knowledge part of a single system of science. (Hanfling 1981, p.2)

This suggestion that questions should be open to investigation through scientific treatment necessitated the development of demarcation criteria. These criteria enabled science and non-science (i.e. metaphysics) to be distinguished, thereby laying down rules as to what could and what could not contribute to valid knowledge. Phenomena that could be directly observed, and articulated, would lead to the advancement of social knowledge; abstract phenomena, such as inner-meanings, had no place in a scientific treatment of the social world. Logical positivism also took on an inductive approach – that is, phenomena are first observed, and from these observations, theories are developed. Logical positivism, then, continues by a process of verification: more observations are made of similar phenomena in order to develop the theory further so it eventually becomes a law which can be applied to all similar social phenomena.

This approach found its critics, most notably Karl Popper (1902–94). For Popper (1959, 1972), the inductive, verificationalist approach of logical positivism was fundamentally flawed, since in seeking to continually verify established theories, he felt that knowledge would not progress. He also saw the possibility that there would always be another situation, yet to be witnessed, that does not work according to the corresponding law,...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• 1 What is Social Research?
• 2 Critical Social Research
• 3 Getting Started in Research: The Research Process
• 4 Ethics in Social Research
• 5 Documentary Sources, Official Statistics and Secondary Data
• 6 Quantitative Approaches in Social Science Research
• 7 Qualitative Approaches in Social Research
• 8 The Analysis of Data
• 9 Writing Up and Presenting Research Results
• 10 Designing a Research Proposal
• Glossary
• Bibliography
• Index