Investigating the Social World: The Process and Practice of Research - Brossura

Schutt, Russell K.

Brossura

ISBN 10: 1483350673 ISBN 13: 9781483350677

Casa editrice: Sage Pubns, 2014

Riassunto

In this exciting new Eighth Edition of his leading social research text, author Russell K. Schutt, an award-winning researcher and teacher, continues to make the field come alive through research stories that illustrate the methods presented in each chapter. Through numerous examples and hands-on exercises that help students learn by doing, Investigating the Social World helps readers understand research methods as an integrated whole. Readers will learn to appreciate the value of both qualitative and quantitative methodologies and understand the need to make ethical research decisions while also learning about research on contemporary social issues like the Internet and social relations, the police response to domestic violence, the sources of democracy, the determinants of voting, the impact of disasters, and the causes of violence.  

Contributor to the SAGE Teaching Innovations & Professional Development Award

Su questo libro

L'autore:

Russell K. Schutt, PhD, is a professor and the chair of sociology at the University of Massachusetts, Boston, and a lecturer on sociology in the Department of Psychiatry at the Harvard Medical School (Massachusetts Mental Health Center). He completed his BA, MA, and PhD (1977) at the University of Illinois at Chicago and a postdoctoral fellowship in the Sociology of Social Control Training Program at Yale University (1977–1979). His other books include Investigating the Social World: The Process and Practice of Research and Fundamentals of Social Work Research (with Ray Engel), Making Sense of the Social World (with Dan Chambliss), and Research Methods in Psychology (with Paul G. Nestor)―all with SAGE Publications, as well as Homelessness, Housing, and Mental Illness (Harvard University Press) and Social Neuroscience: Brain, Mind, and Society (coedited with Larry J. Seidman and Matcheri S. Keshavan, also Harvard University Press). Most of his peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters focus on the effect of social context on cognition, satisfaction, functioning, and recidivism, the orientations of service recipients and of service and criminal justice personnel, and the organization of health and social services. He is currently a coinvestigator for a randomized trial of peer support for homeless dually diagnosed veterans, funded by the Veterans Administration.

Contenuti:

PART I: FOUNDATIONS FOR SOCIAL RESEARCH
CHAPTER 1: SCIENCE, SOCIETY, AND SOCIAL RESEARCH
Learning About the Social World
Avoiding Errors in Reasoning About the Social World
Research in the News: Why Doesn't the Internet Reach Everyone?
Science and Social Science
Alternative Research Orientations
Strengths and Limitations of Social Research
CHAPTER 2: THE PROCESS AND PROBLEMS OF SOCIAL RESEARCH
Social Research Questions
Social Theories
Social Research Foundations
Theoretical Perspectives for Social Research
Social Research Strategies
Research in the News: Investigating Child Abuse Doesn't Reduce It
Social Research Standards
CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH ETHICS AND PHILOSOPHIES
Historical Background
Ethical Principles
The Institutional Review Board
Research in the News: What Would an IRB Say?
Social Research Proposals
Case Study: Evaluating a Public Health Program
PART II: FUNDAMENTALS OF SOCIAL RESEARCH
CHAPTER 4: CONCEPTUALIZATION AND MEASUREMENT
Concepts
Research in the News: What is Your Race?
Operationalization
Measurement
Levels of Measurement
Evaluating Measures
CHAPTER 5: SAMPLING
Sample Planning
Research in the News: What Are Best Practices for Sampling Vulnerable Populations?
Sampling Methods
Sampling Distributions
CHAPTER 6: RESEARCH DESIGN AND CAUSATION
Research Design Alternatives
Research in the News: How to Reduce Crime?
Criteria and Cautions for Nomothetic Causal Explanations
Comparing Research Designs
PART III: BASIC SOCIAL RESEARCH DESIGNS
CHAPTER 7: EXPERIMENTS
History of Experimentation
True Experiments
Research in the News: Where Did You Hear That?
Quasi-Experiments
Validity in Experiments
Ethical Issues in Experimental Research
CHAPTER 8: SURVEY RESEARCH
Survey Research in the Social Sciences
Writing Survey Questions
Combining Questions in Indexes
Designing Questionnaires
Research in the News: What Can Surveys Uncover?
Organizing Surveys
Ethical Issues in Survey Research
CHAPTER 9: QUANTITATIVE DATA ANALYSIS
Introducing Statistics
Case Study: The Likelihood of Voting
Preparing Data for Analysis
Displaying Univariate Distributions
Summarizing Univariate Distributions
Research in the News: General Social Survey Shows Infidelity on the Rise
Analyzing Data Ethically: How Not to Lie With Statistics
Cross-Tabulating Variables
Regression Analysis
Analyzing Data Ethically: How Not to Lie About Relationships
CHAPTER 10: QUALITATIVE METHODS: OBSERVING, PARTICIPATING, LISTENING
Fundamentals of Qualitative Methods
Participant Observation
Research in the News: Can Taping Interviews Capture a Trend?
Intensive (In-Depth) Interviewing
Interviewing Online
Focus Groups
Generalizability in Qualitative Research
Ethical Issues in Qualitative Research
CHAPTER 11: QUALITATIVE DATA ANALYSIS
Features of Qualitative Data Analysis
Techniques of Qualitative Data Analysis
Alternatives in Qualitative Data Analysis
Research in the News: What’s in a Message?
Visual Sociology
Systematic Observation
Participatory Action Research
Computer-Assisted Qualitative Data Analysis
Ethics in Qualitative Data Analysis
PART IV: ADVANCED SOCIAL RESEARCH DESIGNS
CHAPTER 12: EVALUATION AND POLICY RESEARCH
History of Evaluation Research
Evaluation Basics
Questions for Evaluation Research
Research in the News: What Motivates Policy Shifts?
Design Decisions
Policy Research
Ethics in Evaluation
CHAPTER 13: HISTORICAL AND COMPARATIVE RESEARCH AND CONTENT ANALYSIS
Overview of Unobtrusive Methods for Historical and Comparative Research
Historical Social Science Methods
Comparative Social Science Methods
Research in the News: Across the globe can we compare ____?
Demographic Analysis
Content Analysis
Ethical Issues in Historical and Comparative Research and Content Analysis
CHAPTER 14: SECONDARY DATA ANALYSIS AND BIG DATA
Secondary Data Sources
Research in the News: Long-term impact; how can research make the connection?
Challenges for Secondary Data Analyses
Big Data
Ethical Issues in Secondary Data Analysis and Big Data
CHAPTER 15: MIXED METHODS
History of Mixed Methods
Philosophy of Mixed Methods
Types of mixed methods
Strengths and Limitations of Mixed Methods
Ethics and Mixed Methods
Research in the News: What Came First, the Alleged Cause or the Effect?
CHAPTER 16: SUMMARIZING AND REPORTING RESEARCH
Writing Research
Displaying Research
Reporting Research
Research in the News: How Much Should Social Scientists Report?
Performing Meta-Analyses
Case Study: Broken Homes and Delinquency
Ethics, Politics, and Research Reports
Bibliography
Glossary

Su questa edizione

• Editore: Sage Pubns
• Data di pubblicazione: 2014
• ISBN 10: 1483350673
• ISBN 13: 9781483350677
• Rilegatura: Copertina flessibile
• Numero di pagine: 661