Chapter 1 Flashcards
(22 cards)
Adherence to authority
Given because we believe that the authority, the person making the claim, does have the knowledge.
Community-based participatory research
A type of research in which the researcher involves some community and/or organizational members as active participants throughout the study
Constructivism
A perspective that emphasizes how different stakeholders in social settings construct their beliefs.
Critical theory
A research focus on examining structures, patterns of behavior, and meanings but rests on the premise that power differences, often manifested by discrimination and oppression, have shaped these structures and patterns.
Descriptive research
Research in which social phenomena are defined and described. Ex.: Who is the homeless? What are the needs of homeless people? How many people are homeless?
Evaluation research
Research that describes or identifies the impact of social programs and policies. Ex.: Should housing or treatment come first for the homeless population?
Explanatory research
Seeks to identify causes and effects of social phenomena and to predict how one phenomenon will change or vary in response to variation in some other phenomenon. Ex.: What community-level factors cause homelessness?
Exploratory research
Seeks to find out how people get along in the setting under question, what meanings they give to their actions, and what issues concern them. Ex.: How do the homeless adapt to shelter life?
Feminist research
Research with a focus on women’s lives and often including an orientation to personal experience, subjective orientations, and the researcher’s standpoint.
Illogical reasoning
Occurs when we prematurely jump to conclusions or argue on the basis of invalid assumptions.
Inaccurate observation
Observations based on faulty perceptions of empirical reality.
Interpretivism
The belief that reality is socially constructed and that the goal of social scientists is to understand what meanings people give to that reality.
Intersubjective agreement
Agreement between social work researchers about the nature of reality; often upheld as a more reasonable goal of science than certainty about an objective reality.
Mixed methods
The use of both qualitative and quantitative methods in a research study.
Overgeneralization
Occurs when we unjustifiably conclude that what is true for some cases is true for all cases.
Positivism
The belief that there is a reality that exists quite apart from our own perception of it, that it can be understood through observation and that it follows general laws.
Postpositivism
The belief that there is an empirical reality, but that our understanding of it is limited by its complexity and by the biases and other limitations of researchers.
Qualitative methods
Methods such as participant observation, intensive interviewing, and focus groups that are designed to capture social life as participants experience it rather than in categories predetermined by the researcher. These methods typically involve exploratory research questions, inductive reasoning, an orientation to social context, human objectivity, and the meanings attached by participants to events.
Quantitative methods
Methods such as surveys and experiments that record variation in social life in terms of categories that vary in amount. Data that are treated as quantitative are either numbers or attributes that can be ordered in terms of magnitude.
Resistance to change
The reluctance to change our ideas in light of new information.
Selective observation
Choosing to look only at things that are in line with our preferences or beliefs.
Social science
The use of scientific methods to investigate individuals, groups, communities, organizations, societies, and social processes; the knowledge produced by these investigations.
