quantitative methods

Examples of quantitative methods in the following topics:

• Determining the Research Design

  • Another distinction can be made between quantitative methods and qualitative methods.
  • Quantitative methods are generally useful when a researcher seeks to study large-scale patterns of behavior, while qualitative methods are often more effective when dealing with interactions and relationships in detail .
  • Quantitative methods of sociological research approach social phenomena from the perspective that they can be measured and quantified.
  • While quantitative methods involve experiments, surveys, secondary data analysis, and statistical analysis, qualitatively oriented sociologists tend to employ different methods of data collection and hypothesis testing, including participant observation, interviews, focus groups, content analysis, and historical comparison .
  • These two researchers are debating the relative merits of using qualitative or quantitative methods to study social phenomena such as the learning processes of children.

• Correlation and Causation

  • In the scientific pursuit of quantitative prediction and explanation, two relationships between variables are often confused: correlation and causation.
  • While these terms are rarely used in qualitative science, they lie at the heart of quantitative methods, and thus constitute a cornerstone of scientific practice.
  • Employing the quantitative method outlined above, the reader should immediately question this relationship and attempt to discover an explanation.
  • Clearly understanding the relationship between variables is an important element of the quantitative scientific process.

• Quantitative and Qualitative

  • Like the distinction drawn between positivist sociology and Verstehen sociology, there is - as noted above in the elaboration of general scientific methods - often a distinction drawn between two types of sociological investigation: quantitative and qualitative.
  • Quantitative methods of sociological research approach social phenomena from the perspective that they can be measured and/or quantified.
  • Quantitative sociologists tend to use specific methods of data collection and hypothesis testing, including: experimental designs, surveys, secondary data analysis, and statistical analysis.
  • Qualitative methods of sociological research tend to approach social phenomena from the Verstehen perspective.
  • For example, quantitative methods could describe large or general patterns in society while qualitative approaches could help to explain how individuals understand those patterns.

• Tradition vs. Science

  • Quantitative and qualitative methods can be complementary: often, quantitative methods are used to describe large or general patterns in society while qualitative approaches are used to help explain how individuals understand those patterns.
  • For example, a sociologist might use quantitative survey methods to find that, on average, single mothers are more likely to receive welfare even if they could earn more working.
  • A common sense explanation of the quantitative findings might be that welfare recipients are lazy and prefer not to work, but using qualitative methods and the sociological imagination, the investigator could find that women strategically choose not to work because the cost of childcare would mean less net income.
  • Sociology embodies several tensions, such as those between quantitative and qualitative methods, between positivist and interpretive orientations, and between objective and critical approaches.
  • The positivist approach to social science seeks to explain and predict social phenomena, often employing a quantitative approach.

• Use of Existing Sources

  • Direct research methods such as interviews would have been impossible, since many of the events she analyzed, such as the French Revolution, took place hundreds of years in the past.
  • Common sources of secondary data for social science include censuses, organizational records, field notes, semi-structured and structured interviews, and other forms of data collected through quantitative methods or qualitative research.
  • These methods are considered non-reactive, because the people do not know they are involved in a study.
  • In the case of quantitative data, secondary analysis provides larger and higher-quality databases that would be unfeasible for any individual researcher to collect on his own.

• Sociology Today

  • Contemporary sociology does not have a single overarching foundation—it has varying methods, both qualitative and quantitative.
  • Social researchers draw upon a variety of qualitative and quantitative techniques.

• The Scientific Method

  • The method is commonly taken as the underlying logic of scientific practice.
  • The essential elements of a scientific method are iterations and recursions of the following four steps:
  • A scientific method depends upon a careful characterization of the subject of the investigation.
  • Thus, while the true experiment is ideally suited for the performance of quantitative science, especially because it is the best quantitative method for deriving causal relationships, other methods of hypothesis testing are commonly employed in the social sciences, and qualitative methods of critique and analysis are utilized to fact check the assumptions and theories created upon the basis of "controlled" (rather than natural) circumstances.
  • The reproducibility or replication of quantitative scientific observations, while usually described as being very important in a scientific method, is actually seldom reported, and is in reality often not done.

• Defining the Sample and Collecting Data

  • Defining the sample and collecting data are key parts of all empirical research, both qualitative and quantitative.
  • Social scientists employ a range of methods in order to analyze a vast breadth of social phenomena.
  • Many empirical forms of sociological research follow the scientific method .
  • The choice of method often depends largely on what the researcher intends to investigate.
  • Sampling can be used in both quantitative and qualitative research.

• Preparing the Research Report

  • Quantitative research papers are usually highly formulaic, with a clear introduction (including presentation of the problem and literature review); sampling and methods; results; discussion and conclusion.
  • In striving to be as objective as possible in order to reduce biased interpretations of results, sociological esearch papers follow the scientific method .
  • Without assurance that the research is based on sound methods, readers cannot countenance any conclusions the researcher proposes.
  • In the methodology section, be sure to include: the population, sample frame, sample method, sample size, data collection method, and data processing and analysis.
  • The scientific method is a body of techniques for investigating phenomena, acquiring new knowledge, or correcting and integrating previous knowledge.

• Sociology and Science

  • Early sociological studies were thought to be similar to the natural sciences due to their use of empiricism and the scientific method.
  • The effect of employing the scientific method and stressing empiricism was the distinction of sociology from theology, philosophy, and metaphysics.
  • Arriving at a verstehen-like understanding of society thus involves not only quantitative approaches, but more interpretive, qualitative approaches.
  • Quantitative sociology is generally a numerical approach to understanding human behavior.
  • Drawing a hard and fast distinction between quantitative and qualitative sociology is a bit misleading, however.