Week 3 Methods and Theories for Studying Families

 Scientific sociological study  Objectivity  Sociological research of the family  Survey research  Survey: Research instruments designed to obtain information from individuals who belong to a larger group, organization, or society.  Information gathered is used to describe, explain and predict attitudes, behaviors, aspirations.  Political polls, opinion surveys, Census

 Population: The entire membership of a country, organization, group or category of people to be surveyed.  Sample: Some portion of the population chosen to represent the population.

 Cross-sectional vs Longitudinal study  Longitudinal  Repeated cross-sectional  Panel  Cohort

 Sampling methods  Random sample  Stratified random sample  Convenience sample  Sample size  Response rate

 Generalizability  Confidence  Validity  Reliability

 Nominal (categorical) data  Ordinal data  Interval data  Ratio data

 Dependent and independent variables  Measures of central tendency  Mean  Mode  Median  Outliers

 Cause and effect relation  Time order  Correlation  Nonspuriousness

 Experiments  Field experiments  Participant observation  Content analysis  Secondary analysis  Qualitative interviews

 Theories provide us with a basic understanding of how to see the larger social picture in our personal lives.  Theories are sets of interrelated concepts used to describe, explain and predict how society and its parts are related to each other.

 Cumming and Henry’s theory on aging.  Elderly people realize the inevitability of death and begin to systematically disengage from their previous youthfull roles, while at the same time the society disengages from them.  How did their theory test against research?

 Macro theories  Functional, conflict  Micro theories  Symbolic interactionism, social exchange

 Grand theory  Deals with universal aspects of social processes or problems and is based on abstract ideas and concepts rather than case specific evidence.  Middle-range theory  Derived from specific scientific findings and focuses on the interrelation of two or more concepts applied to a specific social process or problem.