STUDY GUIDE FOR SOC 317 (RESEARCH METHODS)
A. Select/choose any 4 questions
out of the following.
- Discuss research and research methods clearly and
adequately. Why research? Why use scientific methods in research?
- Compare and contrast deductive and inductive
approaches to scientific inquiry.
Where or under what kind of research problem do you use each? Which one do you prefer to use, given that kind of problem? Explain.
- Why are research ethics important? Discuss at least three ethical considerations in research. Did Devah Pager violate any ethic in her study of people with criminal records? Why or why not?
- What is sampling? How do you insure that your sample represents the population where it comes from? Explain at least three
important factors why sampling is done.
- Think of a research problem and identify the two
types of variables it covers in terms of “causes” (independent variable)
and “effects” (dependent variable). Then explain and give concrete
examples of how you conceptualize
and measure these variables.
- Suppose you want to test the reliability and validity of the Machiavellian scale/index. How exactly do you carry this out? If all but one of the ten items does not correlate with the rest of the items, what is the implication for scale/index development? Explain.
B. You are required to answer these two questions, below. These are take home exams, typewritten results of not more than 8
pages to be submitted on May 15, 2004
(Saturday)
.
- Briefly outline and provide explanations about
the methodology of conducting a sound social experiment. Make sure that you start out with a problem
statement or a hypothesis
for this experiment. You may use Devah Pager’s research as a model for
this experimentation (or you may think of a quasi-experiment to illustrate
your case)
- Suppose you want to test the idea that religion
(e.g., Durkheim’s concept of integration comparing Protestants vs.
Catholics - the former are more consensually integrated) has some positive
effect on people’s lives (e.g., an integrated society is associated with
higher lifespan of females and males, or female/male literacy). State your hypothesis or specific
problem to be tested, then perform a statistical analysis and interpret
your results. Use the SPSS dataset
“World Population 1995” to calculate the mean (average) lifespan/literacy
for males and females in selected countries.