Designing and Conducting Your First Interview Project E-Book

Bruce K. Friesen

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Fachliteratur
• Serie: Research Methods for the Social Sciences
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 446

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2010

Beschreibung

Designing and Conducting Your First Interview Project Using a clear, easily followed approach, Designing and Conducting Your First Interview Project helps anyone new to the process develop the skills to conduct the most essential part of social research data collection: the interview. The book also shows how to organize, analyze, and interpret the data. This workbook provides a step-by-step template for a collaborative class experience in social science. Organized according to the steps of the deductive scientific method, it includes essential activities to take place during class after the appropriate chapter has been read. The book begins with the process of choosing a topic and proceeds through hypothesis development, interview data collection, data entry using SPSS, and elementary data analysis. The final chapter includes the formal assignment and instructions to students on how to write about their experiences in a way that will produce an excellent final paper. By selecting the hypothesis, gathering the data, and analyzing the results, students will gain an appreciation for the strengths and potential weaknesses of "knowing" things through doing quantitative social science.

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

Title Page

Copyright Page

Table of Figures

Dedication

PREFACE

DEVELOPMENT

ORGANIZATION

FEATURES

NOTE TO INSTRUCTORS

NOTE TO STUDENTS

Acknowledgements

THE AUTHOR

Chapter 1 - Choosing a Topic

HOW SOCIAL SCIENTISTS CHOOSE A TOPIC TO STUDY

PURSUING YOUR OWN INTERESTS

THINGS TO CONSIDER AS YOUR CLASS CHOOSES A TOPIC

Chapter 2 - Literature Review

AN OPPORTUNITY FOR YOU TO HELP HUMANKIND

SEARCHING FOR JOURNAL ARTICLES

CONDUCTING YOUR LITERATURE REVIEW

Chapter 3 - Refining Your Study

FROM CONCEPT TO RELATIONSHIP

THE CAUSAL MODEL

BEING SPECIFIC: TURNING A RELATIONSHIP INTO A HYPOTHESIS

TYING YOUR HYPOTHESIS BACK TO YOUR LITERATURE REVIEW

Chapter 4 - Developing Your Theory

THINKING SOCIOLOGICALLY

AN EXAMPLE

LOGIC: A TOOL OF THE TRADE

ASSUMPTIONS OF SCIENCE

COMBINING SOCIOLOGICAL THINKING WITH LOGIC: THEORIZING

DEVELOPING A THEORY FOR YOUR CLASS PROJECT

Chapter 5 - Research Design 1

VALIDITY AND RELIABILITY

STEPS IN RESEARCH DESIGN

Chapter 6 - Research Design 2

STEP THREE: CHOOSE A DATA COLLECTION METHOD

STEP FOUR: IDENTIFY YOUR POPULATION AND SAMPLING METHOD

Chapter 7 - The Interview Schedule

OPERATIONALIZING VARIABLES

THE PROCESS OF OPERATIONALIZATION

THE INTERVIEW SCHEDULE

Chapter 8 - Conducting Ethical Interviews

YOUR OWN ETHICAL CHALLENGE

ETHICAL ABUSES IN RESEARCH

THE DEVELOPMENT OF STANDARDS

Chapter 9 - How to Be a Good Interviewer

FIRST PREP: AN ATTITUDE OF INQUIRY

A NOTE ABOUT INTERVIEWS

CRITICAL ISSUES: VALIDITY AND RELIABILITY REVISITED

HOW TO COLLECT UNRELIABLE DATA

HOW TO CONDUCT A GREAT INTERVIEW

REFLECTING ON INTERVIEWS

Chapter 10 - Entering Your Data into the Computer

USING SPSS

CODEBOOKS

PRECODING INTERVIEWS AND SURVEYS

PREPARING FOR DATA ENTRY

ENTERING DATA: USING SPSS

Chapter 11 - Data Analysis 1

DATA ANALYSIS BEGINS WITH ASKING QUESTIONS

CHECKING YOUR WORK

Chapter 12 - Data Analysis 2

INDICES AND SCALES

CREATING CROSS-TABULATION TABLES

PRODUCING TABLES TO TEST YOUR CLASS HYPOTHESIS

Chapter 13 - Interpreting Your Results

READING A CROSS-TABULATION TABLE

CONTROLLING FOR A THIRD VARIABLE

CONTROLLING FOR A THIRD VARIABLE USING SPSS

Chapter 14 - Writing Up Your Assignment

DOING IT RIGHT THE FIRST TIME

HINTS ON ANSWERING QUESTIONS

FORMATTING YOUR PAPER

THE LARGER BENEFITS OF SOCIAL SCIENCE

GLOSSARY

BIBLIOGRAPHY

INDEX

Table of Figures

Figure 2.1 . Types of Studies Emphasizing Breadth of Cases Versus Depth of Information.

Figure 3.1 . The Causal Model.

Figure 3.2 . A Causal Model Exercise.

Figure 3.3 . The Causal Model Using the Language of Science.

Figure 3.4 . Causal Model Depicting Proposed Effects of Drug War.

Figure 4.1 . Eliminating Mystification in Science.

Figure 5.1 . Concept Definition: From General to Specific.

Figure 10.1 . “What would you like to do?” Dialogue Box.

Figure 10.2 . Data View.

Figure 10.3 . Variable View.

Figure 10.4 . Open → Data (from File Menu).

Figure 10.5 . Sample Data File with Variable Names.

Figure 10.6 . Data in Variable View.

Figure 11.1 . Analyze → Descriptive Statistics → Frequencies ... Menu.

Figure 11.2 . Frequencies Dialog Box.

Figure 11.3 . Recode into Different Variables Dialog Box.

Figure 11.4 . Recode into Different Variables Dialog Box, with Region Moved to Box on Right.

Figure 11.5 . Old Value and New Value Dialog Box.

Figure 11.6 . Old Value and New Value Dialog Box, with “1” Added in Both Columns.

Figure 11.7 . Two Recode Statements.

Figure 11.8 . Four Recode Statements.

Figure 11.9 . Data View Showing New Variable Regionc.

Figure 11.10 . Variable View with Regionc Created But Undefined.

Figure 11.11 . Values Label Dialog Box with New East and West Values.

Figure 11.12 . Recode into Different Variables Dialog Box with Completed Information for Collapsing Relig2.

Figure 11.13 . Recoded Information for Religiosity.

Figure 12.1 . Count Command Dialog Box with Three Variables Selected and Information Completed for Target Variable and Target Label.

Figure 12.2 . Variable View Screen of Gunfav.

Figure 12.3 . Completed Old and New Values Dialog Box for the Variable Hom2.

Figure 12.4 . Completed Numeric Expression for Homtol Scale.

Figure 12.5 . Crosstab Dialog Box with Sex and Relig2c Variables Selected.

Figure 12.6 . Column Selected in Crosstabs: Cell Display Dialog Box.

Figure 13.1 . Cross-Tabulation Box with Sex, Religiosity, and Age in Boxes.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Friesen, Bruce K., date.

Designing and conducting your first interview project/Bruce K. Friesen.

p. cm.

For Brittany and Justin

PREFACE

This book aims, above all, to teach excitement through the joy of discovery. It is my contention that students learn more from doing than from listening or reading alone. Whether in a class of eight or eight hundred, students need to be given opportunities to kinetically explore the craft of sociology. Activity, accompanied by guided reflection and positive affect, stimulates engagement, internalization, inquisitiveness, and the search for answers. Through this semester-long project, students will taste what it feels like to do deductive social science. They’ll search the peer-reviewed literature, form a class hypothesis, and develop the project from conceptualization to operationalization. They’ll perform a handful of interviews, enter data into computers, and produce and analyze the results. They’ll walk out of your class with a semester full of experiences on which to reflect.

This book is a part of the paradigmatic shift taking place in how college courses are being taught. A burgeoning interdisciplinary, empirically based literature on the science of college teaching has been revolutionizing the traditional college course (see, for example, Bain, 2004; Brookfield, 1995; Fink, 2003; Finkel, 2000; McKeachie, 2005; McKinney, 2007; and Weimar 2002). Lecture-based courses are being modified to include more group discussion, case studies, student presentations, peer-to-peer instruction, dialogue, and active learning projects. Radical new perspectives, defining teaching as a form of scholarship (Boyer, 1997), have been adopted by institutions of higher education and are being integrated into the institutional reward structures for the professoriate. Full- and part-time instructors are shifting focus from a science of teaching to a science of learning. There is good reason for this sea change: active learning strategies produce a more sustained, substantial, and positive impact on how students think, act, and feel. (I am indebted to Bain, 2004, for this definition of learning.)

DEVELOPMENT

This project has gone through several iterations, having been used consistently with Introduction to Sociology classes over the past twenty years. It’s been refined though use with classes as small as twelve students and as large as 330. When executed well, the project teaches the joy of discovery through deductive social science. Students are presented with the notion that their perceptions of the social world are not always what they seem to be, which invokes a teachable moment that challenges students to ask themselves questions related to knowing. Asking questions is the first step in developing the mind of a scientist. An enhanced version of this project has also been used with success in Research Methods classes for the past four years. Chapters Eleven and Twelve contain information specifically for use in upper-division classes. These chapters empower students to perform computer-assisted data analysis, thus familiarizing them with decisions affecting validity and reliability that must be made at every step of the process. Motivated to work through the problems in order to test their hypotheses and complete the project, students gain mastery in the logic and technique of computer data entry and analysis. That these are marketable skills goes without saying.

In addition to twenty years of use and revision, the development of the book form of this project was tested successfully with a group of Introductory to Sociology students in the summer of 2009. Five reviewers also gave invaluable input. The version you hold in your hands is much improved as a result.

ORGANIZATION

The book is organized according to the steps of the deductive scientific method. Essential to the success of this project are a few activities that take place during class after the appropriate chapter has been read. Further suggestions for course organization are available in the instructor’s resources on the book’s website. The first chapter introduces students to the process of choosing a topic, after which the class collectively decides on a topic to research. Chapter Two teaches students how to conduct a small literature review and how to distinguish empirical articles from others in peer-reviewed journals. Chapters Three and Four give students some practice in thinking about issues of conceptualization, theory development, and articulation of a hypothesis.

Chapters Five, Six, and Seven expose students to critical issues in research design, applying it to the class interview project yet to come. Chapters Eight and Nine are what amounts to interviewer training for the students, teaching them to be as systematic and as ethical as possible. Instructors will want to review these concepts in class the day they hand out the blank interview forms to students. It is the instructor who ultimately creates a brief, one-page, two-sided interview schedule to distribute to students. Students in turn interview enough of their peers so that the class as a whole completes at least two hundred interviews. Incidentally, many universities and colleges do not require full approval by an institutional review board for pedagogical projects of this nature. Be sure to check the policies at your own institution.

Chapter Ten instructs students on how to enter their interview data into a computer using SPSS. After cleaning the data, students submit their files in electronic form to the instructor, who in turn compiles all of the data into a master data file. Having students enter data greatly enhances their knowledge of the research process and decreases the amount of work an instructor would otherwise do. If desired, though, instructors can instead choose to enter the class interviews on their own and have students skip this chapter.

Chapters Eleven and Twelve are best used only with students enrolled in upper-division classes such as Research Methods. The chapters contain instructions on how to collapse variables, create simple composite variables using the Count or Compute command, and produce frequency and cross-tabulation tables using SPSS.

Chapter Thirteen informs students how to interpret a cross-tabulation table so they can decide whether or not the data support their class hypothesis. The chapter also covers the logic of controlling for a third variable and how to interpret tables produced through table elaboration. Included in the chapter are instructions on how to produce partial-order tables in SPSS for students in advanced courses. Introduction to Sociology students are fully capable of understanding the logic of controlling for a third variable, but only students in advanced courses should be expected to produce such output.

Chapter Fourteen is the final one; it includes the formal assignment and instructions on how to write about their experiences in a way that produces an excellent final paper. The assignment consists of a series of questions. Students demonstrate their knowledge of the research process by responding fully to all the questions.

In a concluding attempt to increase the quality of final papers, instructors are encouraged to have students perform peer reviews of one another’s papers on the date they are due in class. This gives them specific feedback as to the grade they would receive if they were to hand in the paper in its present form. A detailed rubric created specifically for the peer review exercise is available on the companion website for this book. Students grade one another’s papers on this day, using the prepared rubric. Instead of handing in the assignment, students are instead given an additional week to make further improvements, armed with the comments of a peer and the detailed rubric. This greatly improves the quality of the papers and, with the detailed rubric, makes grading simple.

FEATURES

Compared to other supplemental sociology texts, this book is unique. It assumes no prior knowledge of the scientific method or familiarity with SPSS on the part of the student or the instructor; all of this information is provided. It fosters an experiential-based learning opportunity that students build on over the semester. Instructors will find all they need in the instructor’s resources online to familiarize themselves with the logic of the deductive method or with using SPSS.

Affect is as important a characteristic in classes as content, particularly in lower-division classes. Positive emotional states and contextualization of activities within the large questions of life give most students enough intrinsic motivation to be involved and aim for excellence (Bain, 2004). The text therefore includes examples and explanations designed to produce this affective relevance. Students who understand that their training has important implications for themselves and others are inclined to be motivated and happy.

The text also addresses the dearth of pedagogical materials needed to build quantitative literacy—a need formally identified by the American Sociological Association (ASA, 2006). To do this, the research project has been simplified to aid comprehension at the first-year level. Students need consult only three journal articles in their literature review. Tests of reliability are not conducted on indices or scales used, though individual instructors are welcome to do so on their own. Instructors have the choice of involving students in operationalizing variables, entering, analyzing, and producing tables. Opting out of these possibilities, this book leads students through the bare bones of a research project designed to teach one thing above all else: the joy of discovery.

The project is framed within the classic deductive method of social science, but this choice is in no way meant to suggest that deductive science is more valid or valuable than an inductive or qualitative approach to doing sociology. Development of a qualitative sociology has greatly strengthened the discipline and enriched our understanding of the complexity of human behavior. This project is simply an opportunity for students to become familiar with the deductive logic of science so they can knowledgeably evaluate for themselves its potential and its shortcomings. Sociology majors continue to graduate with an education deficit in quantitative sociology (ASA, 2006); once familiar with the process, students can be challenged to consider alternative ways of knowing, including a qualitative approach.

NOTE TO INSTRUCTORS

Instructors with varying levels of familiarity with quantitative sociology will feel comfortable adopting this text and course project. It assumes little prior knowledge of the process on the part of either the student or the instructor. Helpful resources are available on the companion website, for any instructor adopting the text. Concepts and procedures are clearly explained in the subsequent chapters. Instructors can modify the project to meet a variety of pedagogical goals. This assignment can be added to any existing course with minimal adaptation.

It is strongly advised, however, that instructors make use of the resources available on the companion website (www.josseybass.com/go/friesen). Important material describing the optimal way to integrate the project into a class is available, along with lecture materials, rubrics, and more. At a minimum, expect to dedicate approximately one hour of class time to select a research topic for the project, a second hour to review the interview schedule with students and conduct interviewer training, and a third hour for students to evaluate one another’s papers. Demonstrating SPSS data entry in a class session is also helpful. Instructors of lower-division courses will want to produce and distribute tables for the class, to complete the final assignment.

If students are expected to enter the data from their own interviews, they will either need access to SPSS in computer labs or an opportunity to purchase the student version of SPSS to install on their own computers. Other options for course integration are shared on the website.

NOTE TO STUDENTS

Congratulations! You’re embarking on a project that could change your life. This statement may sound like a bit of an exaggeration to you right now, but it’s not meant as a joke. There are times in our lives when we discover something useful that applies to many parts of our lives. It’s empowering. Some types of knowledge help us make better sense of our lives. Others help us gain control or make better decisions. You’ll eventually decide on the kind of impact the knowledge contained in this book will have on you.

The new knowledge you’ll gain through this class exercise is awareness of the methods by which people claim to “know” things. Think about it. How do you know that the world is round? Have you ever walked around the world, or otherwise circumnavigated the globe? Not many of us have. Have you ever seen the curvature of the earth? If not, how do you know it is round and not flat? You might suggest that you know it is round because you’ve seen pictures of earth that were taken from the moon or somewhere in space. But how do you know those photos were not fabricated? At some point many of us make a choice: to either trust or not trust the photos or information presented to us in books and online.

This is just the point: trust. In what ways of knowing do you put your trust? Suppose you read something in a textbook that contradicts something your parents told you. Which source is more trustworthy, in your eyes? Perhaps it depends in part on the question you are trying to answer. If you want to know whether you have, say, a brain aneurysm, you might trust a brain surgeon more than your parents for an accurate diagnosis. Which would you rather use to measure the speed of an automobile: a radar camera like those operated by the police, or a thermometer? “Don’t be ridiculous!” you might exclaim. “You can’t use a thermometer to measure speed!” This is, of course, precisely the point. Some ways of knowing are better than others, depending on what it is you want to find out.

Science is a way of knowing, a way to find things out about the world. When it comes to finding things out about the natural world, science has been an incredibly powerful tool in giving human beings the ability to control their environment. Today we can build massive dams (more than 60 percent of Holland would be under water if it were not for their expansive system of dikes), towering skyscrapers, and bridges. We know what it takes to increase human longevity and quality of life. Space travel has become so routine that even private companies now offer rides into space. We’ve also discovered incredible power in the form of nuclear fission that generates electricity for many homes and cities—but also has the ability to level entire cities in the form of a nuclear weapon.

How good is science as a way of knowing about our social world? That is the topic of this book. As you work your way through this project, you’ll be exposed to the deductive logic of the scientific method and will use it to gather information about our social world. After the project is finished, you’ll be in a better place to evaluate the use of science as a method to investigate the social world. Perhaps your respect for science will increase as you become more familiar with the logic and rigor inherent in the process. Who knows? It might even change your life.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I’m grateful to a number of individuals who helped make this book a reality. Jossey-Bass Senior Editor Andrew Pasternack and Associate Editor Seth Schwartz were both simply invaluable. Their insight, patience, support, and commitment made completion of this project inevitable. Five reviewers offered comments on the entire manuscript, all offering suggestions that added clarity and sophistication to the final product. Their contributions are much appreciated. They are Dr. James Frideres of the University of Calgary, Dr. Howard Lune of Hunter College, Dr. Ryan Cragun and Dr. Jeff Skowronek of the University of Tampa, and Dr. Jessica Maguire, an applied sociologist in private practice in Austin, Texas.

I’d be remiss not to mention the hundreds of students who have enrolled in classes over the years in which this project was used. Their feedback and performance on the completed assignment yielded valuable information used to refine the project. I’m particularly indebted to the students in my summer 2009 Introduction to Sociology course at the University of Tampa, who were the first to use a draft of this text. The high class interest and extensive dialogue about the science of society, a result of the enriched material in the book chapters, actually surprised me. I appreciate their excitement for the book and helpful feedback.

Finally, this book was produced during a time of personal challenge. The ongoing encouragement and support of family and friends helped see this project through to completion. Particular thanks go to my partner, Cheryl Lucas; colleagues Dr. Jeff Skowronek, Dr. James Woodson, and Dr. Connie Rynder; extended family members Ruth Nickel, Dr. John W. Friesen, and Dr. Virginia Friesen; and my children, Brittany and Justin. There are others; you know who you are.

Though the content of this book has been enhanced by the contributions of many, I alone am responsible for its content. If it inspires others to imagine new possibilities as to how the world might be improved through sociology, my goal will have been achieved.

Bruce K. Friesen

April 2010

Tampa, Florida

THE AUTHOR

Bruce K. Friesen is associate professor of sociology at the University of Tampa in Florida. He received his Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Calgary (Canada) in 1993 and is the coauthor of Perceptions of the Amish Way and several articles and book chapters on topics ranging from heavy metal music to the quality of child day care. Friesen is the recipient of numerous teaching awards and commendations. Among his favorite courses to teach are Research Methods and Sociological Analysis. Friesen takes great pleasure in introducing students to the joy of discovery through social scientific inquiry.

1

Choosing a Topic

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

• Discover how social scientists go about choosing a topic to study.

• Be able to identify a sociological problem.

• Prepare for the discussion in which a topic of study will be selected by the class.

The first step in conducting a scientific study is to select a topic you would like to investigate. Your instructor will dedicate some class time for you and your fellow students to list possible topics for your research and agree together on one hypothesis that you will investigate as a class. The purpose of this chapter is to help prepare you for that discussion. First, we review how social scientists come to identify topics that they eventually do research on. Next, we help you think through some issues that will help your class choose a topic appropriate for this particular exercise.

HOW SOCIAL SCIENTISTS CHOOSE A TOPIC TO STUDY

Have you ever considered entering a vocation that involves discovering things people don’t know? Many people who conduct research today do so, in part, because it is an essential part of their jobs. Social scientists who engage in research are often professors in colleges and universities around the world. For them, conducting research is a benefit of the job because a passion for the joy of discovery is what led many into their vocations in the first place. In some large research universities, one’s ability to do quality research is even more important than the ability to teach. The ability to conduct research is, for many professors, the most important component by which they are evaluated.

Your own professor likely has job requirements that include conducting research and publishing the results. These expectations differ with the educational institution. Instructors in community colleges or technical institutes typically have a heavy teaching load and few requirements to conduct regular research. The same is true for part-time or adjunct faculty at large universities. They are hired primarily to teach. If adjunct faculty hope to get permanent positions as professors (rather than being hired year-to-year, often for low pay), they need to find time to do research and publish, in addition to spending many hours every week in the front of the classroom.

Faculty at private colleges are also rewarded by conducting research, though the expectations are usually somewhat less than for faculty in large public universities. This is because a primary mission of most private colleges is quality teaching. Still, few faculty get tenured without a reasonable record of publication. Articles published in peer-reviewed academic journals are still those that garner the greatest respect in science-based disciplines. Virtually all professors in the social sciences are expected to do research as a requirement of the job.

Other professionals paid to conduct research are people with a graduate degree (that is, a master’s or Ph.D.) who are hired by government or research firms to investigate certain phenomena. Ph.D. graduates can secure a postdoctorate, a one- or two-year university position that involves doing research. For these and many other positions, conducting research and publishing the results are integral parts of the job. They do little or no teaching so they can focus almost exclusively on their research. Imagine what an opportunity it is to work full-time making new discoveries.

For professionals with a full-time research job, the topic they investigate is often predetermined by the company or expert they work for, the government department in which they are employed, or the client they are serving. Professionals employed at major polling firms, for example, typically enjoy a large salary and perquisites, not to mention many excellent resources to help collect good-quality data. For some, though, disadvantages of the job are having someone else dictate the research topic and having little time to more fully explore interesting relationships and patterns in the data than what was asked for by the client.

PURSUING YOUR OWN INTERESTS

A major joy of being a professor is that the selection of a research topic is often determined by one’s own interests and passions. Think about it! What would you like to find out more about in life? What do you feel passionate about? Good-quality information is often a critical part of solving any social problem. If you want to reduce crime, for example, you first need to know what the crime rate is, what motivates people to engage in criminal activity, and whether or not there are patterns to certain types of crime. You’ll also want to know whether any attempts to solve social problems are effective, or whether they’re just wasting people’s time and money. Collecting good-quality information on a topic about which you are passionately interested is one of the most rewarding aspects of a professor’s job.

I’ll share a personal example to illustrate. Growing up in the 1970s, I was keenly aware of controversy surrounding heavy metal music, which many deemed harmful or even evil. Many of my friends, though, closely identified with the music. For my master’s thesis, I chose to conduct a qualitative investigation into the heavy metal subculture. At the time, heavy metal music was seen as the most deviant style of music around. I spent a year in the scene, with people who consumed and produced the music. I analyzed the lyrics of almost three hundred heavy metal songs. I even played in a hard rock band as a drummer for a few months to get a feel for what it’s like to create the music.

Through this experience, I found that the values promulgated in the subculture weren’t all that different from those of mainstream society, and especially other leisure-based subcultures. The symbols used to express these values, however, were different. For example, to express male dominance and aggression, male “headbangers” might wear a studded leather wristband or a leather dog collar around the neck, complete with eight-inch spikes. Mainstream society’s negative reaction toward such symbols created most of the anger and animosity directed at those involved in the subculture (Friesen, 1990; Friesen and Epstein, 1994).

I concluded the study by suggesting that there exists a reciprocal relationship between society and subcultures labeled as deviant. Society benefits from this situation; for example, creators of and listeners to heavy metal music become identifiable groups that are easy to label as deviant, reinforcing the line between acceptable and unacceptable behavior and increasing the feeling of moral solidarity and superiority on the part of “normals.” In return, heavy metal creators and listeners (overwhelmingly adolescent at the time) achieved a certain amount of power through fear. Others in society usually avoided eye contact or physical proximity in the streets and malls where headbangers would congregate. This type of personal power felt good to young people who were otherwise controlled by parents, schools, and societal constraints that restricted their freedom of movement, and even their voting and driving privileges.

It should be obvious that the selection of my research topic was something both deeply personal and intellectually interesting. I wanted to know what the heavy metal phenomenon was really all about. It was satisfying to thoroughly research the topic and come to an understanding of the phenomena in a way that made sense, both to me and to the broader academic community. Somewhat surprisingly, most of the heavy metal listeners I spoke with were also very pleased with my finished product. They felt that my research helped their voices be heard and added some reason and legitimacy to their activities. Giving otherwise disenfranchised people a voice is, incidentally, one of the goals of qualitative research (Ragin, 1994).

It should be noted that governments (federal, state, municipal) influence the research process by making research money (called “grants”) available for people who investigate a subject about which government officials want more information. Government agencies advertise a grant competition and take applications from individuals or firms who design a study and offer to conduct the research. Over time, the various actors in this process compile a body of documented research literature on a specific topic, and what we know about a particular topic grows thereby. Most researchers end up specializing in a particular area of research and become well acquainted with other experts in the field and what questions remain unanswered through science.

THINGS TO CONSIDER AS YOUR CLASSCHOOSES A TOPIC

For the class project outlined in this book, your class has the luxury of choosing a topic in which everyone is potentially interested! This is your chance to think big. What questions about human behavior would you like to answer? Is there a topic about which you feel passionate, or curious? Perhaps you’ve recently engaged in an argument of sorts with friends or loved ones. What was the topic? Is it possible to gather information that would help resolve the dispute?

If you review the table of contents in a typical Introduction to Sociology textbook, you’ll get an idea of what kinds of topics sociologists study. Those topics fit the aims of this particular course. The discussion at the end of this chapter helps ensure that the topic selected will be sociologically relevant and researchable in the context of your class.

THINKING SOCIOLOGICALLY

The topic you choose to research for this class will obviously be one that is sociologically interesting. This can be tricky. To choose such a topic, you first need to think like a sociologist. You don’t necessarily have to choose sociology as a career or even a major, but getting practice in thinking sociologically exposes you to possible explanations of human behavior that you may not have thought of before. If you can think sociologically, it will make you more of an asset in almost any chosen profession, because you’ll be able to add new perspectives when trying to solve problems.

In truth, thinking sociologically is something you already do. Do you hold opinions, for example, that attitudes or actions differ among groups according to age, or sex, or culture ? Do you believe that children who are spanked will generally grow up to be different people from those who are not spanked? Perhaps you have an attitude on the impact of growing up in a wealthy home, compared to a middle-class or even an impoverished one. Human beings regularly form opinions on the impact that shared social experiences have on behaviors or beliefs. That’s thinking sociologically.

Let me illustrate with a hypothetical example from the workplace. Let’s say you’ve noticed that workers in your glass-blowing company are overly nervous and anxious at work. Work is interrupted or slowed down as a result, because the workers have to take time to manage their anxiety or cool down. If you poll most of the foremen and managers in the plant, they might suggest bringing in an expert who can teach the workers stress management techniques. This individual focus would have workers taken out of their work stations for a time to be trained in how to breathe or meditate, in an effort to keep their anxiety at a level that doesn’t negatively affect their productivity.

With sociological training, one of the first things to focus on is the social environment in which these people are working. What rules govern how they work? Rules are part of the social environment because they are constructed by social actors to structure activity in a given situation. In this situation, you learn that the workers are expected to work ten hours a day, produce a large number of glass products, and have no breakage. If they do break an item, management insists on deducting the cost of the item from the pay of the worker responsible.

Thinking sociologically, might you suggest solutions to the employee stress problem other than stress management workshops? Can you think of things in the social environment that might be causing a higher stress level for the workers? A sociologist would likely recommend revising the rules of the workplace, such as decreeing shorter work days or longer breaks during the day. Changing the rules about who pays for broken glass would also decrease worker stress because they would not be as worried about breaking and paying for the products they are creating. Permitting a few broken items per week might reduce the stress level among the workers and increase their productivity.

The important point to take from this example is that the problem of productivity may not be something intrinsic to the employees. Employees are indeed experiencing stress, but not because of who they are. The problem is a consequence of their work environment ; stress is experienced because the environment includes a variety of factors that induce stress. Understanding the influence of the social environment on the individual is part of the sociological perspective.

Social Problems and Sociological Problems

If you don’t have much practice in thinking sociologically, you might first think of a topic that is considered by most to be a social problem. A social problem is something about society that we would like to change, something that causes people problems but whose roots are based in social, rather than individual, conditions. Poverty, for example, is something most people consider to be a social problem. Most members of society would like to see poverty completely eliminated, though people disagree as to how to go about it. Homelessness (a related problem) becomes a social problem if we as a society ask, “What can we do to eliminate homelessness in the United States?”

Can you think of other social problems that you could conduct research on in your class? Social problems are such that their causes or solutions are social in nature. Raising the legal minimum wage would have the effect of reducing the number of people living in poverty. Thus poverty is a social problem in that it can be reduced by changing the laws or rules of society. Racism, sexism, violence, terrorism, war, and the effects of social stratification are examples of other social problems addressed by sociologists.

As you think sociologically, you might think of a topic that is sociologically interesting but not exactly defined as a social problem. We call this group of topics sociological problems. All social problems are sociological problems, but not all sociological problems are social problems. For example, have you ever wondered what kinds of things influenced other students in your class to choose to attend your particular college or university? Was it conveniently located? Was it the lower tuition cost compared to other institutions? Perhaps it was the reputation of the school or of a particular program. Is your reason for attending this school similar to or different from those of your classmates?

This is a question that is sociologically interesting. That is, there are likely shared reasons students chose your particular school. We wouldn’t call these reasons, or the decision to attend the school, a social “problem.” Quite the opposite; we value people’s decision to further their education. The question as to whether there are common reasons for people to choose a particular college or university is thus sociologically interesting. Answering this question is a sociological problem in that it is theoretically interesting to attempt to answer it. It is not a social problem in that it is not something we necessarily want to change.

Beliefs and Behavior

Whether you’re formulating research questions that are sociological problems or social problems, thinking sociologically involves first considering social influences. Social influences are forces that exist outside of an individual that lead to changes in the individual. Beliefs are one type of social influence or social reality. Beliefs are attitudes held by individuals, but they can be social in being shared by others and reinforced through social interaction. It is generally the case that members of religious organizations hold common beliefs. Children raised in these organizations are taught the beliefs through a process known as socialization. Adults who decide to join these organizations are likewise taught the beliefs of the group, often in formal classes but sometimes in informal conversation or through sermons or other public lectures (also known as secondary socialization). These children or adult converts eventually internalize the beliefs of the organization; that is, they come to believe them for themselves. But where did the belief originate? It first existed in the social group that the individual joined. Thus shared beliefs are a component of the culture of a group.

Beliefs that are shared by many can be a major influence on behavior. People hold common attitudes or beliefs about almost everything in our everyday world: what people should wear, and how they should talk, walk, or even think. People hold attitudes regarding who should be president, or what should be done so that there is less poverty. People usually believe that one kind of family form is better than others, and they form beliefs dictating their positions regarding homosexuality (or heterosexuality) as a choice or innate disposition. Understanding what people believe is of interest to sociologists. Are there any beliefs, particularly those held by college students, that you would like to investigate? Perhaps you would like to choose one belief to study as a topic.

A second social facet that can be measured through social research is actions or behavior. That is, groups of people hold certain beliefs in common, but they may also exhibit similar behaviors. People acting in concert can wield great power. They can do great harm to others by way of violence, lynching, murder, or beatings. They can also give aid to others by helping them in times of trouble. Thousands of volunteers helped to clean up the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina. Frequently attending church services or movie theatres would be other examples of behavior.

Are there specific behaviors you might like to focus on as the topic of your class study? In particular, do students engage in behaviors you would like to investigate? The amount of time spent studying, perhaps? how often people attend class? how many hours students spend at work outside of class? All of these are examples of researchable behavior.

ENSURING THE RESEARCHABILITY OF YOUR TOPIC

While you’re deciding on the topic you would like to investigate at your college or university, it is important to note that some topics, though perfectly legitimate and sociologically interesting for other studies, are not appropriate for the purposes of this class exercise. In most studies, the topic selected determines the kinds of people from whom information should be collected. Not so for this project. Because the investigation is limited to using students who attend your school, a topic of relevance to this group needs to be chosen.

Collecting Information from Students

The decision to gather data only from your fellow students is made for several reasons. First, they are easily accessible to you. Trying to interview, say, a random sample of people in your town or city would require considerable resources and time in compiling a list of everyone who lives in the city, drawing a random sample, and then taking the time to contact these people (by phone or in person) and interviewing them. Second, applications for research projects carried out on human subjects at universities and colleges in the United States must first be submitted and approved by a human subjects review board at that institution. This too is time-consuming and effort-intensive. At many institutions this step can be avoided if (1) the research is for pedagogical or training purposes, (2) the data will not be published, and (3) the director or professor leading the research project uses common sense and does not design the project in such a way that would potentially harm or embarrass the people who take part in the project. (Your instructor will complete this review board application for the class if it is required at your institution.)

Your project will meet these criteria as long as it avoids questions that are overly revealing, embarrassing, or potentially harmful. Asking someone the number of sexual partners he or she has ever had, for example, or about involvement in illegal activities such as drug and alcohol use would be inappropriate. Asking about attitudes toward premarital sex or drug or alcohol use, however, may be acceptable for the project, depending on how the question is worded.

Ensuring Variation

Finally, the topic chosen for your class project must ensure that there is sufficient variation at your school to secure a variety of responses for each question asked during the interviews. Variation is important in social research because making comparisons is a crucial part of any science. For example, if your class chose to study the relationship of sex to drinking behavior but interviewed only males, no appraisal could be made of the drinking behavior of males compared to females. Variation is needed in every question that will eventually be included in the analysis.

Because of this, it is important to select a topic in which one can anticipate a variety of responses from the people from whom information will be collected. Let’s say you are interested in studying the effects of a college education on voting behavior, for example. This would be an inappropriate topic for the purposes of our study. Why? If we were to use college education as a topic of study at your school, you would collect information only from people who are college-educated (or in the process of becoming so). Who would they be compared with? It would be essential to collect information from people who have not gone to college, but this is beyond the scope of our project; we already know that we will gather information only from people at your school.

Thus the topic you choose must support the possibility of variation—a variety of responses to every question. But a little variation only is not enough in small studies. For example, you might want to compare responses by the race or ethnicity of people at your school. Do you know the percentage of your school’s population belonging to a group other than non-Hispanic Caucasian? It is ideal to have as much variation as possible for every topic of interest. If you identified only two categories for race (non-Hispanic whites, nonwhites), you would want 50 percent of the students to be in one category and 50 percent in the other. If you identified, say, four groups (non-Hispanic whites, Hispanic whites, Asians, and African Americans), it would be ideal to have 25 percent of all the students (or cases) in each category. This is maximum variation. Maximum variation is not as important in a study where information is collected from thousands of people in the general population, because it is likely that a critical number of responses will be gathered in each category of interest. It is essential, though, to anticipate a considerable degree of variation of responses when collecting information from a few hundred people, as is the case with this class project.

Therefore if the minority population at your school is quite small, selecting race or ethnicity as a topic would not be wise. This is because it is essentially a constant with little variation. When the data for this project are analyzed, responses for each question will be collapsed into two categories or attributes (for race or ethnicity, you would likely compare non-Hispanic whites to all others). The farther away the split in the two groups from 50-50, the less useful the question. This is especially true in studies like ours with a small sample size.

YOUR TURN: IDENTIFY SOME TOPICS!

With the previous discussion in mind, you’re now ready to identify some topics you’d like to investigate further. This is the first step in the research project for this class. Once the class has selected a suitable topic to research, we’ll develop it into a hypothesis and collect some data by performing interviews with other students who are enrolled at your school. Are you ready to put your own ideas to the test?

Keep the limitations of the study in mind in identifying topics that interest you. The topic your class chooses will need to be one that is not embarrassing or otherwise damaging to the students you interview. It should be an appropriate topic for college students, and one that we know will elicit a good deal of variation in your school population.

Have at least three appropriate topic suggestions ready for the day your research topic is discussed in class.