methods-ex2022 (2)

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Sociology

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Feb 20, 2024

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SOCIAL RESEARCH METHODS EXERCISE (value – 2%) By Gurnoor Hundal and Mohamed Al-amry Read independently the Research Methods chapter (2) in the 9 th edition of the text (pages 31-45) and complete the case study exercise below. This is a writing-for-learning exercise and students will earn the full 2 percent only if they fully answer all of the questions. Complete sentence point form is acceptable. A Toronto-based Ryerson university researcher decides to study the relationship between violent video game usage and adolescent aggression. Based on existing theories, she hypothesizes that exposure to violent video games is positively correlated with participation in aggressive acts. She is drawn to this topic after seeing first hand the effect being addicted to gaming has had on her own adolescent son and her developed anti- technological values. In conjunction with the Child Studies and Sociology departments at Ryerson she sets out to investigate this phenomenon utilizing a variety of different research techniques. 1. What has influenced her topic selection? Read pp. 31-32 - She has been influenced by her own values and expectations. These values and expectations have influenced her as what her son is experiencing goes against those values and expectations. From having anti-technological values and her son being addicted to gaming it has caused her to question the behaviour of her son and wonder whether it is good or bad. 2. What does she have to be attentive to when conducting her research? Read pp. 32-33 - She needs to be attentive to her bias when conducting the research as including her own personal values and thoughts could skew the results of that research and make it more likely to have flaws and errors. 3. How can bias be minimized in her study? Read pp. 32-33 - Bias can be minimized by going through a training process as many scientists do. As science must be free of errors and mistakes in evidence, reasoning, and observation it is crucial that the researcher eliminates her personal biases before conducting the research. 4a. What is a hypothesis? Read p. 39

- A hypothesis is a assumption made to draw and test any logical or empirical conclusions or a unverifiable but testable knowledge claim. 4b. What is the hypothesis in this study? - The hypothesis in this case is the correlation or tie between playing violent video games and that having a positive correlation with acts of aggression. 4c. A necessary criterion for a scientific hypothesis is that it must be falsifiable. Explain the concept of falsification. Read p. 34 - According to Sir Karl Popper it is more important to observe ideas that refute the argument as opposed to things in favour. As h states “science does not start by gathering facts. It starts with a question or hunch” what this tells us is that it is always important to consider every perspective of an argument or point of view because you never know how it will end up benefiting your argument. 5. What is the most important difference between social science and natural science? Read pp. 34-35 - The major difference between the two is the idea of meaningful action. Studying meaningful action shows us that one side has the ability to breathe, think, act, reason, and make decisions whilst the other has no knowledge on any of these and is just existing. Essentially social science allows the ability to study people’s behaviour and action while naturals science does not. 6. “Correlation does not prove causation” (Guppy, 2011: 483). It is much harder to prove causality than to establish correlations. For causality to be posited, four criteria must be met: i/ the 2 variables must be correlated, ii/ the independent variable (the ‘cause’) must occur before the dependent variable (the effect) in time, iii/ the original association must not disappear once the effects of other independent variables on the dependent variable are introduced, and iv/ there must be causal mechanisms that can explain the association (see Guppy: 484).While many researchers argue/find that playing video games and teen violence are causally connected, others suggest that this is more a case of a spurious relationship. Provide points for why this association might illustrate a spurious rather than causal connection. Read p. 35 - This may be a spurious connection because the participation of teen violence can be associated with and caused by plenty of other things/factors that are not playing violent video games. One such being that the child is being raised in a violent household or community or is watching movies that have moments of aggression in them. There is no clear relation specifically between video games and teen violence which makes it a spurious relationship.

7. What is the independent and dependent variable in the study being conducted? Read p. 39 - The independent variable here is playing violent video games and the dependable variable is it having a positive correlation with acts of aggression. 8. Identify the basic principles of the experimental method. Show how the relationship between video game usage and aggressive behaviour among youth can be investigated utilizing the experimental method. Read pp. 38-40 - The experimental method is an approach that is used to observe a study the causes and affects of variables. Some ways that the relationship between video games and aggression amounts the youth can be investigated is by: - Increasing the independent variable which could cause a change in the dependant variable. This could be selecting which video games the youth can play (some more violent and some less) or increase exposure in general to see how it can impact the final result. - There can be a base group established that has regular exposure to video games and the other group would be exposed to more violent games. This can help see if there is a correlation between the two. 9. What are the limitations to using an experimental design (N.B. Make sure to include a definition of external validity in your response)? Read pp. 38-40 Experimental design, a cornerstone of scientific research, aims to uncover causal relationships in a controlled setting. However, it faces a key limitation: external validity. Simply put, external validity is about how well the findings from a study can be applied to real-world situations, different people, and varied environments. There's a balancing act between internal validity (ensuring the experiment itself is sound and the results are due to the factors being tested, not external ones) and external validity. Too much control in an experiment, while good for internal validity, might make the results less applicable outside the lab. Additionally, the people who participate in the study might not represent the broader population, impacting population validity. And ecological validity is affected when the experimental conditions don't mirror real-life scenarios. 10. What are the advantages of the experimental method (N.B. Make sure to include a definition of reliability in your response)? Read pp. 38-40

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The advantages of the experimental method are being able to conduct research and tests to gain a more accurate and reliable results. Reliability is the consistency of research results over a long period of time. Advantages of experimental methods are being able to isolate and control variables, being able to replicate them over again, and the precision and accuracy of the experiments. 11. How can one overcome the external validity constraints in lab experiments? Read pp. 38-40 To overcome external validity lab experiments should conduct various methods such as random sampling so there's a decrease in selection bias to overcome external validity. Next, they should make sure theirs diversity in the population so they can get varied responses instead of ones affected by sampling bias with a population less diverse. Lastly, they should ensure that they repeat the experiment multiple times so if there is a trend they know that it is a valid test and the results are true. These are great to overcome external validity. 12. What is the Hawthorne effect? Read p. 40 The Hawthorne affect is when people change their behaviour because they are aware of them being studied. It demonstrated that people tend to work harder when the research team was studying them. 13. What is the social survey and what steps might you adopt when using this technique to obtain data on this topic? Read pp. 40-43 Social surveys are a key tool for gathering information and evidence for social science research to gather data on a wide range of topics such as attitudes, behaviour and belief through interviews and questionnaires. When using social surveys 14. What are the advantages of using this method? Read pp. 40-43 Using social surveys allows for large scale data collection. Also they are efficient and cost effective, they allow rearchers to collect quantitative data which is used to analyze patterns and trends, using social surveys researchers can cover a wide variety of social topics.. With the proper techniques they can generate results for a target population. These are advantages of using social surveys for collecting data.

15. Define measurement validity. What validity constraints should you be aware of when using the survey method? Read pp. 40-43 Measurement Validity is how well a survey instrument conducts its desired idea accurately. Some validity constraints would be content validity which is making sure that the content is being displayed. Construct validity which measures how well the survey is conducting its content. Lastly response bias which is addressing different factors that might affect the persons responses.. 16. What is entailed in using participant observation methodology? Read pp. 43-45 Participation Observation is when researchers involve themselves in the social activities and environments of the people they are observing. This helps them get an understanding of the behaviour and attitudes and cultural norms within the group or community. During this time researchers need to be immersed in the community and observe, participate and take notes of verbal and non-verbal communications so they get a deep understanding of the community. 17. What are the merits of utilizing participant observation? Read pp. 43-45 The merits of utilizing participation observation are the good quality data you can obtain from it. - Immersion in the social process: Since the researcher involved themselves in the community, they get a better understanding of the social norms and behaviour from the community. - Building trust: Being incorporated in the community helps them build trust with them and provides more reliable and trustworthy data. - More Validity and less Bias: participant observation allows for more credible data being in the community allows for more firsthand evidence in the social process. This will decrease the of bias, and misinterpretation. 18. Describe some of the difficulties that social scientists face when doing participant observation research.

Read pp. 43-45 Some difficulties that social scientist face ethical issues concerning being able to balance being a participant and observer at the same time. Also, while being involved in the communities many problems and ethical dilemmas may occur. While participating in the community over a long period of time. It may be mentally taxing, very time consuming and researchers may get to attached and even have an identification problem. This could demonstrate bias and could potentially ruin all the valuable data they may have obtained.

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methods-ex2022 (2)

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