4. Practical Issues
• Time and Money
• How much time will it take?
• Lots of researchers will mean less time
• One researcher is cheaper but will take much longer
• So time and money are interlinked
5. Practical Issues
• Funding bodies
• Funding bodies may have specific requirements
• If the company/department etc. funding the research needs a
particular type of results
• If the government needs statistics then it influences the type of
research done
6. Practical Issues
• Personal skills and characteristics
• Different personal skills will make certain research styles easier
• How might participant observation be difficult for certain people?
• What kind of researcher would be good at depth interviews
7. Practical Issues
• Subject Matter
• The subject or social group being studied may influence the type of
study carried out
• For example a male researcher may not be able to carry out
participant observation in a female group
8. Practical Issues
• Research Opportunity
• Sometime there is not time to used structured research methods
• For example if a group offered you the opportunity to join them and
spend time with them, you may not have much time to organise
and design the research
• Other times there may be plenty of time
10. Ethical Issues
• Use the text book page 165 and make some notes on the
ethical considerations of research design.
• Informed Consent
• Confidentiality
• Effects on participants
• Vulnerable groups
• Covert Research
11. Rosenthal and Jacobson 1968
• Using page 104.
• Consider the practical and ethical considerations of this
research.
• Why did they use the methods they used?
• How ethical was this experiment?
14. Theoretical Issues
• A true picture of what
something is like.
• Gets as close to the
truth as possible.
• Replicability.
• Can be repeated and
the same results will
be found.
15. Theoretical Issues
•Reliability
• A true picture of what
something is like.
• Gets as close to the
truth as possible.
•Validity
• Replicability.
• Can be repeated and
the same results will
be found.
