Why do interpretivists favour unstructured interviews?

Because rapport and open questioning let respondents describe their experiences in their own words, giving the researcher verstehen and highly valid qualitative data.

What is a semi-structured interview, and why is it useful?

A semi-structured interview works from a common list of topics or questions but allows the interviewer to probe and vary the wording, so it combines comparability between interviews with depth of response.

Ethnography is the in-depth study of a group's way of life in its natural setting over a sustained period, usually built around participant observation and producing a detailed qualitative account.

State one practical drawback of ethnographic research.

It is very time-consuming and expensive, and the small number of people studied makes the findings hard to generalise.

OCR A-Level Sociology H580

Introducing Socialisation, Culture and Identity

Topic overview Culture, norms, values and cultural relativism Subculture, high culture and popular culture Global and consumer culture, cultural diversity and hybridity Primary and secondary socialisation, the family and peer group Media, religion, education and the workplace as agencies of socialisation Lifelong socialisation and the nature/nurture debate Social control, sanctions and formal agencies of control Informal agencies and theories of social control The concept of identity, ethnicity and nationality Gender, class and sexual identity Age, disability, hybrid and intersecting identities

Families and RelationshipsComponent 01

Topic overview Family types and trends in marriage, divorce and cohabitation Demographic change, family diversity and newer family types Nuclear family ideology, functionalism and the New Right Marxist, feminist and postmodern views and the diversity debate Conjugal roles and the domestic division of labour Power, the dark side of the family and theories of partner roles The child-centred family, views of childhood and its extension Parent-child power, grandparents in an ageing population and feminist views

Youth SubculturesComponent 01

Topic overview Functionalist and neo-Marxist views of youth culture Hebdige, feminist and postmodern views of youth subcultures Class, ethnic and hybrid subcultures and consensus versus conflict Delinquent, criminal, spectacular and anti-school subcultures Gangs, newer deviant subcultures and patterns in youth offending Functionalist, New Right and Marxist explanations of youth deviance Labelling, identity, gender, ethnicity and moral panics in youth deviance

MediaComponent 01

Topic overview Representations of ethnicity and nationality, symbolic annihilation and the male gaze Representations of gender, social class and young people Representations of older people and theories of media representation Direct and indirect media effects models Active audience models, deviance amplification and moral panics

Research Methods and Researching Social Inequalities

Topic overview Positivism, quantitative data and interpretivism Verstehen, qualitative data and validity Reliability, representativeness, generalisability and theory Research topics, aims, hypotheses and primary and secondary data Operationalisation, pilot studies and respondent validation Longitudinal studies, interpreting data and social policy Sampling frames, sampling techniques and choosing a sample Access, gatekeepers and research ethics Questionnaires, structured interviews, statistics, content analysis and observation Unstructured interviews, ethnography and methodological pluralism

Understanding Social Inequalities

Topic overview Stratification, class, poverty, mobility and gender inequality Ethnicity, age, work and health inequalities Functionalist and Marxist explanations of inequality Weberian, feminist and New Right explanations of inequality

Globalisation and the Digital Social World

Topic overview Globalisation, the digital revolution and media convergence Social media, social capital and theoretical views of digital communication Digital identities, the digital divide and social class Gender, age, relationships and cultural impacts of digital communication

Crime and DevianceComponent 03

Topic overview Defining crime and deviance, social control and relativity Social construction of crime and police recorded crime The Crime Survey, victim surveys and self-report studies Crime patterns by social class, gender and age Crime patterns by ethnicity, crime trends and global organised crime Glocal organised crime and green crime Functionalist, strain and subcultural theories of crime Marxist, interactionist and left realist theories of crime Right realism, New Right, feminism and explaining ethnic and age patterns Left-wing crime reduction, social crime prevention and restorative justice Situational crime prevention, zero tolerance and punitive justice

EducationComponent 03

Topic overview Functionalist, Marxist and liberal views of the role of education Social democratic, New Right and feminist views and vocational education Class and ethnic patterns in educational attainment Gender patterns, global educational inequality and intersectionality Inside-school factors: labelling, setting, triage and institutional racism Material and cultural deprivation and cultural capital Explaining gender and ethnic differences and theoretical views of achievement Types of school and education policy since 1988 Ideology, marketisation and equality of opportunity in education policy

Religion, Belief and FaithComponent 03

Topic overview Defining religion, faith and belief, churches and denominations Sects, cults, new religious and new age movements and fundamentalism Measuring religiosity and believing without belonging Functionalist and Marxist views of the role of religion Neo-Marxist, Weberian, feminist, phenomenological and postmodern views of religion Religion, social change and whether religion is positive or negative Class and gender patterns in religiosity Women's changing religiosity and ethnic and age patterns Age cohorts, global religious trends and resurgence Defining secularisation and evidence of religious decline Pro- and anti-secularisation theories Religion and social policy, the golden age critique and global patterns

Research Methods and Researching Social Inequalities

Unstructured interviews, ethnography and methodological pluralism

3 things to know
Component 02

Overview

Recall questions on unstructured and semi-structured interviews and why interpretivists favour them, ethnography and its drawbacks, which methods produce quantitative data, triangulation and methodological pluralism, and choosing methods to measure the class achievement gap or study the experience of poverty.

What you need to know

Answer each one before you reveal it.

Your recallNot started

Key term

What is an unstructured interview?

Key term

Define ethnography.

Key term

Which of the main research methods produce mainly quantitative data?

Questions from this subtopic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

1
What is an unstructured interview?
Model answer
An unstructured interview is an open-ended, conversational interview with no fixed schedule, in which the interviewer follows up whatever the respondent raises.
2
Why do interpretivists favour unstructured interviews?
Model answer
Because rapport and open questioning let respondents describe their experiences in their own words, giving the researcher verstehen and highly valid qualitative data.
3
What is a semi-structured interview, and why is it useful?
Model answer
A semi-structured interview works from a common list of topics or questions but allows the interviewer to probe and vary the wording, so it combines comparability between interviews with depth of response.
4
Define ethnography.
Model answer
Ethnography is the in-depth study of a group's way of life in its natural setting over a sustained period, usually built around participant observation and producing a detailed qualitative account.
5
State one practical drawback of ethnographic research.
Model answer
It is very time-consuming and expensive, and the small number of people studied makes the findings hard to generalise.
6
Which of the main research methods produce mainly quantitative data?
Model answer
Questionnaires with closed questions, structured interviews, official and non-official statistics, and content analysis that counts coded categories.

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Introducing Socialisation, Culture and Identity

Families and Relationships

Youth Subcultures

Media

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Murdock identified sexual, , economic and educational functions.

reproductiveemotionalpolitical

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AVictims may fear reprisal, or feel shame or economic dependence.

BAbuse in the home has historically been treated as a private matter.

CMany incidents are never reported or recorded.

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Sex refers to the biological category of male or female.

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