Evaluation of Research (AQA GCSE Sociology)

Validity and reliability

• Sociologists may discuss their research by presenting it to their peers at conferences and by publishing their work in journals such as The British Journal of Sociology

• Experienced sociologists must review or evaluate their peers' work before it is published in order to determine how valid and reliable it is

Validity

• Sociological research is valid if it actually measures what it set out to measure

  • E.g. do police-recorded crime statistics really measure the extent of crime?

• Some research methods are considered more valid than others

  • Qualitative methods such as participant observation and in-depth interviews are considered to give us a more valid account of what it is like to be a member of a gang than quantitative methods like questionnaires

    • This is because participant observation can give the researcher deeper insight through first-hand experience

Reliability

• Research findings are reliable if the same results are obtained a second time using the same methods

• To test for reliability, another sociologist could replicate the research study to see of they get the same results

• Some research methods are more reliable than others

  • Quantitative methods like questionnaires and structured interviews are considered to produce more reliable results than qualitative methods such as unstructured interviews

    • This is because they are standardised, as all participants are asked the same questions

Representativeness

• A researcher's work may be evaluated before it is published in order to determine how representative it is

• Representativeness refers to whether the participants in a sociologists research study represent a larger group

  • E.g. if a researcher wanted to know about the effects of divorce on children, it would not be cost-effective to study every child of divorced parents, so they may only have the time and money to study 100 children

• Researchers would want to ensure that all participants in the study are a typical cross-section of the wider population so that we can use our findings to make generalisations

• Generalisations can be made if our research is valid, reliable and representative

• When sociologists use a small sample, it raises questions about how representative the data is

• Using large-scale quantitative research methods like questionnaires and sampling methods like stratified sampling can help sociologists obtain a representative sample

Ethical issues

• As part of the evaluation process, peers may review a sociologist's work to ensure that participants were safeguarded

• Sociologists must adhere to the ethical guidelines set by the British Sociological Association, which includes the following principles: