1.
Making Sense of Social Life
(01:20)
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Can sociologists provide a clearer, objective view of social life?
2.
Theory & Method
(01:25)
Theories help guide research and provides the framework around which facts can be organized.
3.
Scientific Method
(01:25)
Science has proven to be the most effective way to prove or disprove theories.
4.
Classical Sociology
(02:34)
Early sociologists used statistics to try to uncover general laws of social development.
5.
Modern Sociologists
(01:22)
Contemporary sociologists tend to focus on correlations between aspects of society rather than general laws.
6.
Positivism
(02:56)
Auguste Comte argued that the methods of the social sciences were no different from those of the natural sciences.
7.
Survey Method
(02:44)
The problem with using the survey method is that different interpretations of the questions occur.
8.
Interpretivism
(02:44)
Interpretive approaches rely heavily on naturalistic methods such as interviewing and observation.
9.
Case Study - Suicide
(01:45)
Using suicide as a case study provides an illustration of how positivist and interpretivist approaches lead researchers to ask very different questions.
10.
The Positivist Approach to Suicide
(01:40)
The positivist approach looks at the social causes of suicide such as social isolation, status loss, and unemployment.
11.
The Interpretivist Approach to Suicide
(02:32)
The interpretivist approach to suicide is to look at the social construction of suicide data.
12.
Neutral Observer?
(01:38)
The positivist approach creates an 'imposition problem' referring to the risk that the researcher, when asking questions, might be imposing their own views on the subjects being researched.
13.
Interpretivists - Imposing?
(02:18)
Interpretivists use open ended questions and unstructured interviews; however, there is still imposition problem to this approach as well.
14.
Values and Preferences
(01:20)
Sociologists are influenced by their own values and preferences.
15.
Realist Approach to Sociology
(02:02)
Realists are concerned with the interplay between individuals and social structures.
16.
Comparing Theories on Suicide
(02:30)
Realists believe that using mixed methods to test theories against each other provides more scientific analysis.
17.
Objectivity in Sociology?
(02:09)
Opponents of the scientific model for sociological onquiry often argue that objectivity (in attitude, method, or outcome) is either unobtainable or inappropriate in sociology.
18.
Sociology - Subjective View of Society
(02:28)
The elimination of the subjective element in social analysis should be a goal sociologists should be aspiring to achieve.
19.
Answering Questions in Theory and Methods
(04:26)
Chief examiner gives advice on how to answer exam questions in theory and methodology.