Sociological Research Methods

Martin Bulmer, Martin Bulmer

• Editorial: Routledge
• Año: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781351489034
• Edición: 2
• Categoría: Social Sciences
• Categoría: Social Science Research & Methodology

A rich source of ideas about sociological research methods to assist the researcher in determining what method will provide the most reliable and useful knowledge, how to choose between different methodologies, and what constitutes the most fruitful relationship between sociological theories and research methods.

Part One

Sociological Theory in Empirical Research

1 Facts, Concepts, Theories and Problems

Martin Bulmer

Perception without conception is blind; conception without perception is empty (I. Kant).

Sociology is often a puzzle to those who come into contact with it for the first time. What are its defining characteristics? To some, particularly in Britain, sociology is identified with social investigation. Charles Booth, Seebohm Rowntree and other figures in the Pantheon, rather than Herbert Spencer or L. T. Hobhouse, are seen as having established the subject and started a distinctive indigenous tradition (cf. Bulmer [1985]). To others sociology appears primarily as a theoretical or philosophical concern dealing with highly abstract and difficult concepts and propositions, using special (often obscure) language and addressing a narrow audience of fellow-professionals.

Neither view is satisfactory not accurate. The accumulation of social facts in twentieth-century industrial society is a major undertaking. Sociography, social surveys and social arithmetic flourish, often with powerful State backing. Most of those who collect such data are (in Britain at least) not socialists, and do not regard themselves as sociologists but rather as social statisticians, demographers, social policy-makers or social researchers without a particular disciplinary adherence. Sociology on the other hand is both, at one and the same time an empirical and a theoretical discipline. Sociological work represents an attempt to bring theory and data together in a fruitful conjunction. What is meant by those who insist that sociology is both a theoretical and empirical activity at one and the same time? The theme runs through sociological writing of the past generation to a remarkable extent; C. Wright Mill’s attack on both ‘abstracted empiricism’ and ‘grand theory’ is perhaps the best known. Can the striving to study the social world empirically – to find out what is going on ‘out there’, to measure social phenomena, to get inside social situations not usually open to outsiders, to discover regularities in social affairs – be reconciled with an adequate theoretical account which seeks to understand and explain the phenomena under consideration? The materials presented in this book are intended to suggest that it can, and how it can, and to convey a sense of what theoretically informed research and inquiry involve.

As a first step the role of theory has to be clearly established. Empiricism – the doctrine that factual knowledge alone is enough for social understanding – is not enough, plausible though the claims of its proponents may be. A mode of social inquiry which produces social facts bereft of theory may be worth while in a number of respects – particularly for policy-making in government – but lacks direction. Conversely, theory alone is empty. The pitfalls of an excessive rationalism – the development of a priori mental constructs into self-contained intellectual systems without any necessary empirical reference – are that the crucial test of the usefulness and correctness of a theory which empirical data provide is lacking (Bierstedt [1949]).

As an epistemological doctrine empiricism has nowhere received the philosophic support which would justify its exclusive use in the social sciences. The ultimate logical consequences of a pure empiricism are either Berkeleian idealism or solipsism. It can be demonstrated on purely logical grounds that observation and experiment are never sufficient for the construction of generalisations, laws, and principals in any of the sciences, except in cases where the universe of data is so limited as to allow for a complete induction. . . . The more a piece of sociological investigation resembles a collection of facts, no matter how comprehensive, complete and accurate they might happen to be, the less is its scientific significance A survey or a census, no matter what its intrinsic merit or utility, does not constitute or contribute to a science expect in its function as a laboratory for testing the tools of research and as a source of data upon which to construct rational scientific theory. The Polish Peasant in Europe and America is a sociological classic not because of what it tells us about Polish immigrants but because of what it tells us about human social behaviour. Few contemporary sociologists are interested in the Polish peasant; all are interested in The Polish Peasant (Bierstedt [1949]).

Empiricism – the doctrine that empirical data alone are a sufficient condition for knowledge about society – is probably now on the defensive. Particularly powerful attacks upon it by philosophy of science have demonstrated its inadequacy, and the necessity for problems and hypotheses to be an integral part of social inquiry (Popper [1957, 1972]; Nagel [1961]; Brown [1963]). Rationalism, to the extent that it involves disinterest in or indifference to empirical evidence, probably has a wider appeal currently. The scope and generality or rationalist propositions have a seductive appeal, yet an attachment to theory divorced from empirical inquiry becomes ultimately solipsistic. As Herbert Blumer [1954] has aptly put it,

contemporary social theory shows grave shortcomings. Its divorce from the empirical world is glaring. To a preponderant extent, it is compartmentised into a world of its own, inside of which it feeds on itself. . . . For the most part it has its own literature. ... When applied to the empirical world, social theory is primarily an interpretation which orders the world into its mould, not a studious cultivation of empirical facts to see if the theory fits. In terms both of origin and use, social theory seems in general not to be geared into its empirical world.

Sociologists show little inclination to forget the founding fathers and continue to draw upon them extensively for theoretical inspiration (for three examples cf. Nisbet [1967], Giddens [1971] and Poggi [1972]). Yet the founding fathers – Marx, Weber and Durkheim in particular – were far from being committed to a non-empirical rationalism. Indeed both their own work and that of their successors has been concerned to explore particular problems by means of empirical inquiry – Marx on the structure of capitalist society, Weber on the world religions, Durkheim on suicide, for example. How can the link to the classics be continued, and yet the thrust of empirical inquiry be maintained? A variety of approaches has been adopted, including an emphasis on deductive theory-construction (Zetterberg [1965]; Stinchcombe [1968]; Dubin [1969] ); the generation of formal theory from particular case studies (Glaser and Strauss [1967]); and the continuing exploration of theoretical ideas derived from the classics. It is this last strand which is often overlooked. Contemporary sociology is still profoundly influenced, often in subtle and indirect ways, by the theoretical inheritance it carries with it; this is true of substantive empirical research and its methodology despite appearances to the contrary. For instance the influence of George Simmel on American sociology was wide-ranging and productive of a great deal of empirical research (cf. Levine et al. [1976]). Much of the effect was indirect, through graduate study and the experience of sociologists such as Robert Park who had themselves studied in Germany, but it left its mark. Traces of the ideas of Simmel and of Marx, Weber and Durkheim are particularly evident in the chapters by Goldthorpe, Benney and Hughes, Baldamus and Coser. If sociologists hesitate to forget their founders it is because their influence is still strongly felt in problem-formulation.

From Durkheim onwards, sociologists have wrestled with these difficulties. One particular influential view has enjoyed a certain vogue. The argument that sociology will progress by focusing upon ‘stepping stones into the middle distance’ or ‘theories of the middle range’ has been widely advocated, notably by T. H. Marshall [1963] and R. K. Merton [1957]. Marshall’s view, first adumbrated in 1946, was that sociology stood at a crossroads. Which way was to be taken?

I do not recommend the way to the stars; sociologists should not expend all their energies climbing in search of vast generalizations, universal laws, and a total comprehension of human society as such. They are more likely to get there in the end if they don’t try to get there now. Nor do I recommend the way into the sands of whirling facts which blow into the eyes and ears until nothing can be clearly seen or heard. But there is a middle way which runs over firm ground. It leads into a country whose features are neither Gargantuan nor Lilliputian where sociology can choose units of study of a manageable size – not society, progress, morals and civilization, but specific social structures in which the basic process and functions have determined meanings. ... The search for what I have called stepping stones in the middle distance has been pursued by many of those who have embarked upon sociological inquiry. . . . Durkheim. . . . Max Weber . . ., Karl Mannheim (Marshall [1963] pp. 22–3).

Robert Merton’s ‘theories of the middle range’ had a similar objective in view.

One major task today is to develop special theories applicable to limited ranges of data – theories, for example, of class dynamics, of conflicting group pressures, of the flow of power and the direction of interpersonal influence – rather than to seek at once the ‘integrated’ conceptual structure adequate to derive all these and other theories. The sociological theorist exclusively committed to the exploration of high abstractions runs the risk that, as with modern decor, the furniture of his mind will be sparse, bare and uncomfortable (Merton [1957] p. 9).

In Merton’s case there is the added implication that in order to become a mature science sociology has to reach beyond and forget its founding fathers in order to establish a coherent and integrated body of contemporary theory. The suggestion has several merits and has commended itself to many of those trying to bring about a meeting of the more abstract and more concrete elements in sociological inquiry, but only in certain fields – such as social psychology and organisation theory – has the advice been taken to heart.

What passes for theory in contemporary sociology takes many forms. Merton suggested [1957] that six different types of work were conflated under the term ‘theory’:

(1) general methodology and the logic of scientific procedure

(2) general sociological orientations, broad postulates indicating merely the types of variables to be taken into account.

(3) the analysis of sociological concepts

(4) post factum sociological interpretations

(5) empirical generalisations

(6) sociological theory proper.

Particular confusion attends the conflation of the third and sixth types, concepts and theories proper. Concepts are a necessary part of sociological theory, but they are not sufficient. Some aspects of social research are more susceptible to codification and formulisation than others. Selection of units of study, methods of collecting (both quantitative and qualitative) data, and means of assessing the reliability of data so produced, have all received much attention. Other aspects of research – the initial delicate stages of problem-formulation and research design, the fraught phase of writing-up – either have been neglected or treated in terms of formulae (e.g. the logic of experimental design) whose applicability to at least some types of social research is in doubt.

The realm of concepts falls clearly in the latter category. Analysis of the role of concepts in empirical social research remains to a very considerable extent underdeveloped, both a symptom and a cause of the gulf which continues to separate sociological theory from sociological research. Despite a number of important attempts to bridge the gulf, it is fair to say that in the available literature on how to do research, the awkward problems of the formation and justification of concepts are rapidly passed over to get to more tractable fields like sample design or questionnaire construction. Not that sociologists neglect the analysis of concepts. At the theoretical and meta-theoretical levels enormous effort is devoted to the dissection and explication of terms, the results of which appear in series with titles such as Key Concepts in the Social Sciences. The better measurement of variables is the separate concern of those who do empirical research, the results appearing in volumes with titles such as Key Variables in Social Research (Stacey [1969]; Gittus (ed.) [1972]; Burgess [1984b]). What is chiefly remarkable at the present time is how little one type of work informs the other.

Whatever the excesses of conceptual analysis in contemporary sociological theory the explicit use of concepts is one of the most important characteristics differentiating sociology from purely idiographic activities such as narrative history or ethnography. Concepts perform several functions in sociology. They provide a means of summarising and classifying the formless mass of social data. In Myrdal’s words, ‘Concepts are spaces into which reality is fitted by analysis’ (Myrdal [1961] p. 273). One aim of conceptual analysis is commonly to make explicit the character of phenomena subsumed under a concept. Concepts, too, provide a degree of fixity or determinateness in making observations in social science. As L. J. Henderson put it, ‘A fact is a statement about experience in terms of a conceptual scheme’ (quoted in Parsons [1970] p. 830). Put slightly differently, concepts specify routes which may be followed in analysing phenomena. ‘Concepts mark out paths by which we may move most freely in logical space. They identify nodes or junctions in the network of relationships, termini at which we can halt while preserving the maximum range of choice as to where to go next’ (Kaplan [1964] p. 52).

Concepts in themselves are not theories. They are categories for the organisation of ideas and observations. In order to form an explanatory theory, concepts must be interrelated. But concepts do act as a means of storing observations of phenomena which may at a future time be used in a theory. Similarly while concepts are distinct from observations, the formation of concepts is a spur to the development of observable indices of the phenomenon subsumed under the concept. Concepts, then, mediate between theory and data. They form an essential bridge, but one which is difficult to construct and maintain.

One of the most significant difficulties, which has much exercised philosophers of science, in the paradox of categorisation. Where do concepts come from in the first place, and what provides the justification for the use of particular concepts? ‘If my categories of thought determine what I observe, then what I observe provides no independent control over my thought. On the other hand, if my categories of thought do not determine what I observe, then what I observe must be uncategorised, that is to say, formless and nondescript – hence again incapable of providing any test of my thought. So in neither case is it possible for observation, be it what it may, to provide any independent control over thought. . . . Observation contaminated by thought yields circular tests; observation uncontaminated by thought yields no tests at all (Scheffler [1967] pp. 13–14).

It is sometimes argued that attempts to reconstruct the logic or psychology of concept-formation are wasted, by comparison with engaging in conceptual analysis through empirical research. As Lazarsfeld has observed, ‘One cannot write a handbook on “how to form fruitful theoretical concepts” in the same way as handbooks are written on sampling or questionnaire construction’ (Lazarsfeld [1972] p. 226). Systematic reflection about the task of concept formation may, however, throw light on the problem, intractable though it is. For the paradox of categorisation is a very real one, indeed it is inescapable. Concept-formation in the analysis of sociological data proceeds neither from observation to category, nor from category to observation, but in both directions at once and in interaction. The distinctive character of concepts in empirical social science derives from this dual theoretical and empirical character. The process is one in which concepts are formed and modified both in the light of empirical evidence and in the context of theory. Both theory and evidence can exercise compelling influence on what emerges. The use of concepts to analyse qualitative data is further discussed in Chapter 15.

Many of the theoretical concepts which sociologists use – social class, social cohesion, religious belief, bureaucratisation, power – are complex, intricate and rich in meaning. (For one example, ‘deprivation’, see Bulmer [1982] pp. 52–8.) They do not lend themselves easily to being reduced to their elements, specified in terms of indicators and measured; yet if social scientists are to exploit the explanatory potential of large-scale survey research, using representative sampling and quantitative techniques to investigate causal relationships, this is a necessary step along the road. Theoretical terms have to be translated into research instruments.

What happens in actual research? What are the stages of concept formation? The first stage in the development of any concept is that of imagery. The researcher has an intuitive general idea of the kind of construction which is of interest. Some disparate phenomena may have been perceived as having some underlying characteristic in common, or he may have observed some empirical regularities and be trying to explain them.

The second stage is the logical analysis of the components of the concept. If one is analysing a concept such as occupational aspiration it is necessary to sort out the different dimensions within the overall concept, decide which parts may be regarded as distinct (and which are interrelated) and reduce the number of dimensions to manageable proportions. For example, in a study of children’s job aspirations, are occupational fantasies, children’s desires and realistic aspirations for jobs three distinct components or reducible to two categories (Ford [1969] p. 52)?

The third stage is the translation of the concept into empirical operations to ‘get at’ the phenomenon in terms of which one’s research hypothesis is formulated. Thus Ford operationalised occupational aspirations by means of four questions distinguishing: (a) the job a child ‘wanted’ to do when he or she left school; (b) the job a child ‘expected’ to do when he left school; (c) the job a child expected to be doing ten years in the future; and (d) the ‘fantasy’ choice of job given a completely free situation (Ford [1969] p. 52).

The choice o...