Questionnaires

Question 1

Practical advantage

Answer 1

Cheap, quick way to collect lots of data

Data is easy to quantify

Question 2

Practical disadvantages

Answer 2

Limited, superficial data

May have to provide incentives to get people to complete it

Question 3

Ethical advantage

Answer 3

The researcher doesn’t have to be there which lowers the risk of participants feeling unsafe

Question 4

Ethical disadvantage

Answer 4

Sensitive topics may cause emotional distress and reduce the no. completed questionnaires

Question 5

Theoretical advantages

Answer 5

Positivists: representative data which can be generalised (gives a greater understanding of society)
Reliable and objective

Question 6

Theoretical disadvantage and example

Answer 6

Validity issues because participants may lie, forget or misunderstand

e.g. Schofield’s research on teenage sexuality- likely to lie about when they lost their virginity which reduces the validity of data