UNOBTRUSIVE RESEARCH Sociological Research Methods Experiments and surveys Involve intrusions on subjects lives [Obtrusive]: intrude by imposing one s opinions on others Can conduct research without intruding on another s life Content analysis Existing statistics of survey data 1. Content Analysis The study of recorded human communications Select any social artifact Social artifact: anything that is created by humans which provide information about the culture of its creator and users. Books, Web sites, paintings, legal documents, objects Analyze the content within the artifact What does the artifact tell you about social life? How was it used? Who used it? What does it mean? 1
Inductive and Deductive Process Other methods have been mainly deductive Starting with general and moving toward specific Content analysis usually as inductive process Grounded theory Start with specifics of the social artifact Move toward the general Content analysis as deductive process Develop hypotheses Choose a social artifact that will allow test Goals of content analysis Classify the social artifact according to a coding scheme Coding: data within the social artifact are transformed into standardized format Researcher develops the codes Attempting to put the social artifact into different categories Ways of categorizing Code manifest content Keep track of specific terms contained within a social artifact How many times does a particular word appear? Code latent content Look to identify the underlying meaning within an artifact Does phrase evoke liberal or conservative ideology? 2
Example: analyzing UNCF documents United Negro College Fund: American minority education organization How were ideals regarding the higher education of blacks presented prior to racial integration? Relied on social artifacts United Negro College Fund brochures Read through the brochures Developed a list of codes to capture latent and manifest content Leadership: black college graduates are leaders of the black community one thinks first of the training of those professional leaders needed by our 16,000,000 Negro citizens 22% of the document Citizen: black people are citizens of the United States Thirteen million Negroes are American citizens 7% of the document 3
2. Existing statistics Use information that has been collected for another purpose Court documents Census data Study societal patterns Organizational data Study worker behavior Study student behavior Typically a deductive process Develop constructs, variables, relationships between variables (hypotheses) Figure out what data is available Searching for data that will allow test of hypotheses Example: education degrees and nonteaching occupations Most college educated blacks once majored in teaching One of the few professions they could obtain work Black colleges granted majority of degrees in education How did this change over time As non-teaching professions opened to blacks As % of blacks working in non-teaching professions increases, % of education degrees granted by black colleges should decrease 4
23/11/16 Using existing data Data on earned degrees Colleges and universities keep track of how many education degrees were granted Data on occupations The census keeps tracks of occupations People report their occupations The U.S. Census U.S. Census Bureau U.S. Census (every 10 years) Bureau collects data on communities and businesses in more frequent intervals American Community Survey (yearly, random sample) Economic Census (every five years) Useful for research projects and papers 5
3. of survey data Use survey data from some other researcher s project Data was collected for research purposes Deductive process Start with general and move to specific What characteristics are related to drug use? Conceptualize factors related to drug use in Age Gender Income Determine what surveys exist Do the surveys have the variables you need? How were the variables measured? Who was included in the survey? Does the sample match your population of interest? National Household Survey on Drug Abuse u Information is provided on the use of illicit drugs, alcohol, tobacco, and nonmedical use of prescription drugs u Members of United States households aged 12 and older u Questions include age at first use, as well as lifetime, annual, and past-month usage for the following drug classes v cannabis, cocaine, hallucinogens, heroin, inhalants, alcohol, tobacco, nonmedical use of prescription drugs u Respondents were also asked about their knowledge of drugs, perceptions of the risks involved u Demographic data include v gender, race, age, ethnicity, marital status, educational level, job status, income level, and household composition 6
Benefits: work is already done Don t have to develop questions Don t have to conduct survey Data has been processed Drawbacks: limited by the focus of the previous research May not have asked exactly the same questions you would have May not have included same people you would have Commonly used surveys General social survey (GSS) http://www.norc.org/gss+website/ Income, education, political beliefs NLSY (National Longitudinal Survey of Youth) PSID (Panel Study of Income Dynamics) Publicly available data Easily downloaded Useful for class projects IN TURKEY: TURKSTAT (Turkish Statistical Institute) Another commonly used survey Could use World Values Survey http://www.worldvaluessurvey.org/ Religious values and beliefs Publicly available data Easily downloaded Useful for class projects 7
Possibilities limited by the topics other researchers have studied Almost limitless Don t have to intrude on the lives of others Can continue to use the data to learn new things Unobtrusive methods How reliable are unobtrusive methods? How accurate is the data? Existing statistics & secondary analysis of surveys Don t know have to trust whoever made the observations How valid are unobtrusive methods? How do we know that data measure the concept we want to study? Content analysis, existing statistics, & secondary analysis of surveys In all cases, difficult to determine if data accurately reflect concepts 8