Questionnaires

• One advantage of Questionnaires is that it can be used for reaching larger samples, meaning it is consequently more representative since the questionnaire can be simply handed or posted to hundreds of people
• One advantage of Questionnaires is that they ensure that the sociologists has minimum contact the respondent. Therefore, the researcher will not be directly there to influence the results being presented when the respondent fills them in
• One disadvantage of Questionnaires is that many people cannot be bothered to reply, meaning it suffers from low response rates or even non-responses. Meaning if the response rates are less than 50 per cent, it can undermine the validity of the research because the results are un-likely to represent the population, therefore the results can not be generalisable, reducing the validity
• One disadvantage of Questionnaires is that Questionnaire’s produce data that is low in validity because they argue that real life is too complex to categorise in closed questions and response. Therefore questionnaire’s may not be suitable for findings of why people behave the way they do

Triangulation- Involves combining different research methods in a single piece of research primarily in order to check the validity of the data collected. E.g Sociologists might give people questionnaires to check the validity of what they observed, as questionnaires would allows people to fully understand what they are observing

• Can check the validity of the data
• One method can be used to overcome the limitation of another method- enhances validity of the study
• A broader range of research questions can be explored as the researcher is not limited to asking only ‘what’, ‘how many’, but can also explore ‘why’ and ‘how’ issues
• Tends to be costly in time, resources and money
• The researcher must ensure that the methods will complement each other, which often makes the research design process very demanding
• Careful and skilful data analysis is needed, particularly if the methods produce conflicting results
  

Methodological Pluralism- Involves combining different research methods in a single piece of research primarily in order to build up a fuller picture of whatever is being studied.

• Individuals are studied over extended periods of time of months or even years- draw in-depth data about people's behaviours or feelings and how they change over time- comparisons and patterns and trends can be drawn- Realists would favour this approach
• Due to gaining in depth information about a particular topic, allows social policy to be influenced
• Participants are aware that they are being studied so have given consent so ethical study
  
  
  

• Researcher team may get too friendly with members of group- objectivity undermined, researcher imposition
• Practical issues- Respondents may drop out or researchers may lose track of them so high attrition rates, undermines representativeness of original sample- unable to be generalisable to the population- - Practical issues of cost as extremely costly to take conduct
• Low in relibaility because they cannot be checked by another reasercher

• Allows increased reliability of data because has been checked by the respondent to see if conclusions drawn are accurate so it is a true reflection of what the researcher sad about a particular topic
• Interpretivists favour this method as they can validate what respondents are saying by building a rapport with them
  
  
  

• Bryman argues that respondent validation can be problematic because the research sample might not be able to validate the research findings because they misunderstand it or they might be unwilling to validate it because they misinterpret it as critical of their actions
• Positivists do not like

Aims to be descriptive- For example, some sociologists are dedicated to describing the extent of inequality by examining facts and figures relating to wealth, income and poverty- Functionalists see the state as serving the interests of society as a whole, to produce and implement rational social policies for the good of all- The role of sociology therefore, is to provide the state with the objective, scientific information needed to base their social policies on and to implement social policy effectively

Allows sociologists to find out about how societies and social institutions work and how individual interact and interpret ones and other's behaviour- For example, sociologists are interested in divorce as a social problem because it can have negative effects for individuals and society but they are just as interested in marriage as a sociological problem and ask questions such as ‘Why is it important? or What makes a happy marriage?- increased knowledge of how society works and to explain why social institutions as well as social groups and individuals tend to behave in patterned and predictable ways. Such research may have side-effects in that it might too encourage politicians and social policy-makers to adjust or change existing laws and policies

Research allows sociologists to understand social problems in society such as crime, domestic violence and income- Townsend and the Breadline Britain surveys of Mack and Lansley on 1990 influenced the social policies of Labour governments about the benefit system and child poverty respectively- central to social policy because it can provide governments with crucial data about the extent of a problem while sociological explanations can help shape the social policy response

• Researcher bias because the researcher must decide what to publish and focus on and therefore what to ignore as insignificant- challenge the validity of the reaserch

The extent to which the study can be appolied byoung the reaserch popylation to other groups

The extent to which a different sociologist can repeat the same piece of reaserch

• One advantage of statistics is that they are extremely easy and cheap to access due to being widely available via the internet and involve little effort on behalf of the sociologist
• One advantage of statistics is that Statistical relationships can be identified by comparing official statistics from regularly conducted surveys such as the Census. For example, by examining groups of statistics, sociologists might see a relationship between poverty and mortality
• One disadvantage of official statistics is that they are open to political abuse, as stats can be manipulated by the government for political advantage.
• One disadvantage of statistics is that they are socially constructed, they do not just appear or happen. They are the end result of someone making a decision or judgment that a particular set of activities needs recording and the stats need collecting, as they are decisions are sometimes selective and bias
  

Content analysis

• One advantage of Content analysis is that it is very cheap, all they need to do is buy magazines or newspapers or watch television programmes
• One advantage of Content analysis is that it is a comparative method in that it allows the sociologist to compare media reports and content over a period of time.
• One disadvantage of it can be very time consuming because media products might need to be checked over a long period of time
• One disadvantage of it can be subjective, the categories largely depend on what the researcher interprets as important