Research Methods-types of data and sampling Flashcards
Primary data
This refers to information collected by sociologists themselves for their own purposes.
Examples of primary data
social surveys, participant observations and experiments
Secondary data
This refers to information that has been collected for created by someone else for their own purposes, but which the sociologists can then use.
Examples of Secondary data
Official statistics(both produced by the government and other organisations such as businesses or churches) and documents such as letters,photographs, emails,diaries and newspapers.
Quantitative data
This refers to information in a numerical form such as official statistics
Qualitative data
This refers to the descriptive and conceptual finidings collected through research methods like participant observations and unstructured interviews
Examples of ethical issues
informed consent,confidentiality and privacy,harm to research participants,vulnerable groups and covert research
Examples of practical issues
time and money, requirements of funding bodies, personal skills and characteristics,subject matter and research opportunities.
Examples of theoretical issues
validity,reliability,representiveness
The sampling frame
This is the list of all the members of the population we are interested in studying.
sample
A smaller sub-group drawn from the wider group that we are interested in
Random sampling
This is the simplest technique, which involves selecting the sample purely by chance e.g, names being drawn out of a hat
Systematic sampling
This is where every nth person in the sampling frame is selected
Stratified random sampling
This is where the research stratifies the population in the sampling frame by age,class,gender etc, then the sample is created in the same proportions
Quota sampling
The
