People Behaviour
Christopher Lochai
03/11/2012
Sociology
Question: - Can questionnaires really capture the truth about people behaviour? Illustrate using examples from actual research.
Methodology is concern with both the detail research methods through with data is collected, and the more general philosophies upon which the collection and analysis of data are based. In methodology there are two types of research methods in which researchers can depend on when researching. These are “Quantitative” and “Qualitative” research. Quantitative research deals with a term which August Comte came up with, “Positivism.” This quantitative research deals with more scientific research than based on theory, it focuses on scientific methods of study. Despite the considerable influence of the ‘scientific’ approaches to sociological methodology, an alternative series of interpretive or qualitative approaches has long existed within sociology. Qualitative research often collects subjective data such as information about people’s emotions, feelings and values and also isn’t structure like quantitative research. Between both the ‘Quantitative and Qualitative research’, quantitative uses questionnaire to gather data. A questionnaire is a number of preset questions that can contain open-ended, fixed choice or combination of both types of questions. In this essay it would be shown that questionnaires cannot be used to capture the truth about people’s behaviour, but to an extent.
In questionnaire research the same questions are usually given to respondents in the same order so that the same information can be collected from every member of the sample. There are many methods on how to distribute questionnaires. The first method would be the postal questionnaire, as the name suggests it is mailed to the respondents with a stamped address envelope for return to the researcher. Postal questionnaires are rather inexpensive, time consuming and has little less than
03/11/2012
Sociology
Question: - Can questionnaires really capture the truth about people behaviour? Illustrate using examples from actual research.
Methodology is concern with both the detail research methods through with data is collected, and the more general philosophies upon which the collection and analysis of data are based. In methodology there are two types of research methods in which researchers can depend on when researching. These are “Quantitative” and “Qualitative” research. Quantitative research deals with a term which August Comte came up with, “Positivism.” This quantitative research deals with more scientific research than based on theory, it focuses on scientific methods of study. Despite the considerable influence of the ‘scientific’ approaches to sociological methodology, an alternative series of interpretive or qualitative approaches has long existed within sociology. Qualitative research often collects subjective data such as information about people’s emotions, feelings and values and also isn’t structure like quantitative research. Between both the ‘Quantitative and Qualitative research’, quantitative uses questionnaire to gather data. A questionnaire is a number of preset questions that can contain open-ended, fixed choice or combination of both types of questions. In this essay it would be shown that questionnaires cannot be used to capture the truth about people’s behaviour, but to an extent.
In questionnaire research the same questions are usually given to respondents in the same order so that the same information can be collected from every member of the sample. There are many methods on how to distribute questionnaires. The first method would be the postal questionnaire, as the name suggests it is mailed to the respondents with a stamped address envelope for return to the researcher. Postal questionnaires are rather inexpensive, time consuming and has little less than