November 6, 2018 Soci 217 Non-Reactive Research Intro · Non-Reactive research definition: Methods of studying social behaviour without affecting it. . Hawthorne Effect · Three types of non-reactive research: Analysis of existing statistics o Content analysis o Historical and comparative research . Non-reactive research measures can be either qualitative or quantitative · Qualitative o Content analysis o Historical and comparative research · Quantitative o Analyzing existing stats o Historical and comparative research · Ex. Statistics from 1910 · Unobtrusive measures can be qualitative or quantitative Use of Existing Statistics · Problems o Units of analysis - often not individuals, but aggregates . Remember the ecological fallacy! o Validity - The existing data may not measure exactly what we need o Reliability - Depends on the quality of the statistics: are they accurate? · Solutions o Logical reasoning o Replication . Researcher uses data or statistical inferences carried out by someone else ... · Collecting these data may have previously been obtrusive . There are many sources of existing data sets. o Statistics Canada: Statistics Canada's Learning Resources page at · www.statcan.gc.ca/edu/index-eng.htm Some examples: o United Nations Demographic Yearbook (can readily be accessed via a search engine) o Library and Archives Canada: www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/electroniccollection UK National Statistics Publication Hub: www.statistics.gov.uk · Why might we want to do this ?? O Inexpensive o Relatively easy o To provide context
November 6, 2018 Soci 217 · A supplemental source of data in both quantitative/ qualitative research Content Analysis · A social research method appropriate for studying human communications, such as books, magazines, newspapers, websites, songs, poems, or paintings · Uses objective and systematic recording procedures to produce a description of the symbolic content in a text · Looking at social artifacts . A researcher can use this to compare content across many texts · Process: o Decide what to observe Select your two variables Operationalize the two variables Record the observations o Analyze the data o Summarize your findings and link to theory if appropriate Sampling . Content analysis is useful for dealing with large amounts of text > Use sampling ... . Make use of any conventional sampling technique: random, systematic, stratified ... · What is your unit of analysis/observation ?... . Select the population to be sampled from and design your sampling frame o E.g. which TV stations, what time period? . Ex. If you want to study the way that sex is represented in music in 1990-1999 . Pick the top 40 songs of each of the years o Coding · Coding: transforming raw data into a standardized form ... . Coding system: A set of instructions or rules for how to systematically convert the symbolic content from the text into data . Characteristics of text that can be coded: 1. Frequency - How often does it occur? (how often the indicators pop up) 2. Direction - The direction of messages along some continuum (e.g. positive/negative) 3. Intensity - The strength or power of a message 4. Space - The amount