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Designing Social Research
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Designing Social Research
A Guide for the Bewildered



April 2011 | 224 pages | SAGE Publications Ltd
Designing Social Research aims to guide students and new researchers using everyday non-jargonised language through the jungle of setting up their own research study. Ian Greener provides readers an accessible combination of guidance on how to practically plan one's research and understand the underpinning methodological principles that should inform the decisions we make about the methods we plan to use.

This is the perfect starter book for anyone looking to design their own research project and make sense of and justify the many decisions that go into the research design process. The goal throughout is to enable students and researchers to assess the appropriateness of a range of methods and to get understanding of the strengths and limitations of different approaches to research.

Greener highlights key debates in the field - both philosophical and practical - and presents them in such a way that they remain constantly relevant to research practice of his readers. Coverage includes:

- Framing an effective research question/problem;

- Examining the jargon of social research;

- The links between theory, methodology and method;

- The role of literature reviewing in research design;

- Managing and planning the research process;

- Sampling;

- Qualitative designs;

- Quantitative designs;

- Mixed methods designs;

- Data analysis.

Designing Social Research will be ideal first reading for M-level students and undergraduates planning significant research projects for their dissertations. It will also be invaluable to first year PhD students considering how they will go about their research projects.

 
Introduction to Social Research Design - Or What Are You Talking About?
 
Introduction
 
Defining terms
 
Some general points about research questions
 
Some other general guidelines
 
Some practical examples of how questions, methods and philosophy combine
 
What's the problem, and how are you going to research it? A logic of appropriateness
 
Conclusion
 
Five things to remember about this chapter
 
Reviewing What Other People Have Said - Or How Can I Tell If Others' Research is Any Good?
 
Introduction
 
Nuts and bolts
 
The hierarchy of evidence
 
Reading efficiently and critically, and taking notes
 
So is the study any good?
 
Writing a review
 
Conclusion
 
Five things to remember about this chapter
 
Example - 'Qualitative research and the evidence base of policy'
 
Surveys and Questionnaires - Or How Can I Conduct Research With People at a Distance?
 
Introduction
 
The use of questionnaires - the best (and worst) of quantitative (and qualitative) social research
 
Surveys and questionnaires
 
Perspectives on questionnaires
 
Designing questionnaires
 
Open and closed responses
 
Getting questions really clear
 
Common response forms
 
Questionnaire design
 
Analysing and reporting questionnaire responses
 
Reflexivity and questionnaires
 
Contentious issues
 
Conclusion - working with the good and bad of questionnaires
 
Five things to remember about this chapter
 
Example - The Paradox of Choice
 
Elements of Quantitative Design: Sampling and Statistics - Or What Can I Do With Numbers?
 
Introduction
 
Numbers and their importance
 
What are numbers good for?
 
The philosophy of quantitative research
 
Sampling
 
Some issues in quantitative analysis - basic descriptive statistics
 
Conclusion
 
Five things to remember about this chapter
 
Example - Super Crunchers
 
Ethnography as a Research Approach - Or What Do I Gain from Watching People and Talking to Them?
 
Introduction
 
What is ethnography?
 
When would I want to use an ethnography?
 
What does it mean to conduct an ethnography?
 
Philosophical debates around ethnography
 
What do the differences in approach mean for the resulting ethnography?
 
What kind of research does an ethnographic research project produce?
 
How can you increase the chance of doing good ethnographic research?
 
Conclusion - getting close or producing useless knowledge?
 
Five things to remember about this chapter
 
Example - Reading Ethnographic Research
 
Dealing with Qualitative Data - Or What Should I Do With All These Words?
 
Introduction
 
The aims of qualitative research
 
Grounded theory, coding and generalisation
 
The mechanics of grounded theory
 
Discourse analysis and its variants
 
Quantitative approaches to textual analysis
 
Analysing documents
 
What are the criteria for a good qualitative analysis?
 
Truth in social research
 
Conclusion - finding appropriate methods for dealing with your data
 
Five things to remember about this chapter
 
Example - The Body Multiple
 
Causality in your research - or how deep should ontology go?
 
Introduction
 
Ontology and depth
 
Science, method and causality
 
Constant conjunction
 
The world is flat
 
Going deeper
 
Levels of analysis
 
Conclusion - how deep do you need to go?
 
Five things to remember about this chapter
 
Example - Rogue Traders and financial losses
 
Dealing With Time and Control - Or What Time Period Suits My Research, and How Do I Stop the World from Interfering in It?
 
Introduction
 
How does Social research deal with time?
 
Phenomenology and process philosophy - researching the present
 
History and political science - researching the past
 
What time frame fits your research, and how does time affect what you can say?
 
The openness (and closedness) of systems
 
A way around the problem of the experimental method - scale and sampling
 
What are case studies for - an aid to generalisation or an analysis of power and expertise?
 
Conclusion - time and control in social research
 
Five things to remember about this chapter
 
Example - accounts of the financial crisis
 
Ethics - Or What Practices are Appropriate in my Research? 142
 
Introduction
 
The importance of ethics in research
 
The official line - what bodies such as the ESRC have to say
 
Questioning the official line - or is it even possible to follow all these ethical principles?
 
The importance of balance and appropriateness in ethics
 
Different perspectives on ethics
 
Conclusion - doing what's right and doing what's ethical
 
Five things to remember about this chapter
 
Example - 'Teenagers telling sectarian stories'
 
Writing Up Your Research - Or What Can I Say I've Found?
 
Introduction
 
The differences between description, analysis and argument
 
Making an argument - what have you found out?
 
The bases of good arguments
 
Supporting a conclusion
 
Other concerns with arguments
 
Deductive and inductive arguments
 
Structuring a piece of writing to bring out your argument
 
Conclusion - writing up research so that it is clear to you (and to everyone else)
 
Five things to remember about this chapter
 
Writing up reviews and putting together proposals - or can you provide some examples of all of this?
 
Introduction
 
Putting together a literature review
 
The role of the literature review
 
Doing a literature review
 
Exclusion and systematic review
 
Exclusion and realist review
 
Putting together a research proposal
 
Conclusion - the skills of being a practising researcher
 
Five things to remember about this chapter
 
Conclusion - Or Getting on with Social Research
 
Introduction
 
Others' claims as a basis for your own work
 
Defining the job at hand
 
Designing research that is appropriate for the job at hand
 
Mixing methods
 
Being careful with data and with ethics
 
Writing it all up
 
Conclusion - doing research well
 
Example - Ladbroke Grove

very good - very popular with our students who like the clear 'no-nonsense' writing style.

Dr Pete Allison
Moray House School of Education, Edinburgh University
July 4, 2012

The lay out of this book is different as it uses a more discursive approach. This makes reading the book quite tiring as there is no pictures or many breaks in the text . However the content is excellent and if the reader can overcome to need to read in bit sized chunks then this is a book that teaches as well as making you think. A rare feat in a research methods text book!

Dr Margaret Hanson
Occupational therapy, Oxford Brookes University
June 19, 2012

Excellent for its clarity and simplicity of explanation and engaging style. This will be a highly recommended text on my course rather than essential because the students are from various social and health care programmes and the relevance of the exemplar methods to students from these backgrounds is variable.

Dr Sally Richards
School of Health & Social Care, Oxford Brookes University
June 18, 2012

An invaluable resource for advanced undergraduate and graduate students planning their own research.

Miss Frances Jackson
Public Services, Peterborough Regional College
April 4, 2012

Greener deals with some of the concepts that students struggle with in Research Methods in a clear and comprehensible manner. This is a useful book as a general introduction to Research Methods.

Dr Mairin Hennebry
School of Education, The University of Edinburgh
March 21, 2012

This book was very helpful in explaining a great deal of the terminology used in research. For the first time researcher having this to hand helps other texts to become accessible. In addition it provides thoughtful insights into different methodologies and procedures allowing readers to make informed choices.

Mrs Marion Hobbs
Education, Edge Hill University
January 12, 2012

A good starter book for those new to research. Useful glossary at the end. Found the pages on mixed methods useful as a resource. Overall, a good book to reach for when first trying to frame ideas and approach. Will give students confidence.

Mrs Nicola Sowe
NBS Consultancy and Training, NBS Consultancy and Training (Teaching and Learning)
December 19, 2011

What this text does, it does very well. It is an excellent introduction to research practice covering a great deal of ground in a rather short space. Its pace stops the text from dragging, which can be a danger of books on method in particular, and the fact that it covers both complex philosophical issues as well as very practical matters like writing grant applications and literature reviews means that it has something to offer any student, from UG through to doctoral.

In some places, the book necessarily lacks detail that one might have preferred and in order to convey complex ideas simply some violence is sometimes done to them (I am not, for example, convinced of all the claims Ian makes about Actor-Network Theory). However, this is to be expected in such a brief text and I think to have made adjustments to accomodate these concerns would likely have undermined the value of the book.

In summary, very good introductory text, hence essential reading.

Mr William Craige
School of Applied Social Sciences, Durham University
December 16, 2011

I wanted to find a text that did not overwhelm students with its weight, price and jargon, and this text seems to be the right one; I will use it next semester and know better if my hypothesis is confirmed. I also appreciate any academic text on Methods that includes the word "bewildered" as I believe it will help overcome the trepidation many students face when enrolling in the course.

Dr Michelle Ronda
Social Science Div, Marymount Manhattan College
November 21, 2011

This is a well structured book that flows in a logical sequence providing an expansive summary into the different aspects of conducting research. The language is clear and easy to follow which would make this guide best for novice researchers and undergraduates.

Miss Katie Davies
Ctr for Criminal Justice & Criminology, University of Wales, Swansea
November 8, 2011

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Chapter 1


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