british educational schools

Sociology key terms

NOVEMBER 1, 2020
unit one
Mr. Ahmed Eltayeb
 British Educational Schools
IGCSE Section
Sociology

Unit One:
Key Terms:
 Bias: prejudice that distorts the truth when research is influenced by the
values of the researcher or by decisions taken about the research, such as
the sampling method used.
 Case study: a detailed in-depth study of one group or event.
 Causation: where strict link can be proved between variables in a time
sequence; such as, heating water to 100◦C causes it to boil. Causation is
hard to find in sociology.
 Comparative study: in research, looking at two or more different groups or
events in term of similarities and differences.
 Conflict: disagreement between groups with different interests.
 Consensus: basic agreement on a set of shared values.
 Content analysis: a method of studying communication and the media,
which involves classifying the content and counting the frequencies.
 Correlation: when two variables are related to each other but causation
can’t be proved; for example, ill-health is related to poverty. This is not a
causal relationship because some sick people are not poor and some poor
people are not sick.
 Covert participant observation: when the group being studied is unaware
of the research and deceived into thinking the researcher is real member of
the group.
 Ethical issues: issues that have a moral dimension, such as when harm and
distress may be caused to the participant.
 Field experiments: experiments that take place in the natural setting of the
real world rather in laboratory.
 Focus group: a group brought together to be interviewed on a particular
topic (the focus); a special type of group interview.

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 Generalisability: when the findings about a sample can be said to apply to a
larger group of people sharing their characteristics.
 Group interview: any interview involving a group interviewed together.
 Hawthorne/ observer effect: the unintended effects of the researchers’
presence on the behaviour or responses of participants.
 Historical documents: a wide range of documents from the past used as
sources of information by sociologists.
 Hypothesis: a theory or explanation at the starts of research that the
research is designed to test.
 Identity: how people see themselves, and how others see them.
 Interpretivism: approaches that start at the level of the individual, focusing
on small-scale phenomena and usually favouring qualitative data.
 Interviewer bias: intentional or un intentional effect of the way that the
interviewer asks questions or interprets answers.
 Interviewer effect: ways in which the interviewer may influence
participants’ responses, by their characteristics or appearance or by verbal
cues such as facial expressions and tone of voice.
 Laboratory experiments: experiments taking place in a laboratory, that is,
an artificial setting created for the research where external variables are
excluded as far as possible.
 Longitudinal survey: a survey taking place at intervals over long period.
 Macro/ micro approaches: macro approaches focus the largescale of whole
societies, micro approaches on small-scale social interaction.
 Non-participant observation: when the researcher observes a group but
does not participate in what it is doing.
 Objectivity: absence of bias the researchers do not allow their values or
feelings to influence the research.
 Official/non-official statistics: official statistics are produced by
government and official agencies, non-official agencies are produced by
other organisations, such as charities and think tanks.
 Open/closed/pre-coded questions: closed or pre-coded questions are
those where the researcher has set out which responses can be recorded.
In open questions the respondent can reply freely in their own words to
give their responses.

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 Overt participant observation: when the group being studied is aware that
research is taking place and of who the researcher is.
 Perspectives: ways of viewing social life from different points of view.
 Pilot study: a small-scale test of a piece of research project before the main
research.
 Positivism: an approach to sociology based on studying society in a
scientific manner.
 Postal questionnaires: self-completion questionnaires that are sent out and
returned by post.
 Primary data: information collected by the sociologist at first hand.
 Qualitative data/research: information and facts (like attitudes or kinds of
actions) that are not able to be presented in numerical form.
 Quantitative data/research: information and facts that take a numerical
form.
 Questionnaires: standardised list of questions used in social surveys.
 Reliability: when the research can be repeated and similar responses will
be obtained.
 Representativeness: the degree to which research findings about one
group can be applied to a larger group or similar groups.
 Respondent: someone who provides information to researchers, usually
used for surveys and questionnaires rather than other methods.
 Response rate: the proportion of responses obtained out of a sample.
 Sampling methods: the different ways in which samples can be created.
 Random sampling: when each person has an equal chance of being
selected.
 Snowball sampling: when one respondent puts the researcher in contact
with others.
 Quota sampling: deciding in advance how many people with what
characteristics to involve in the research and then identifying them.
 Stratified sample: when the sampling frame is divided, for example by
gender or age.
 Sampling frame: a list of members of the population from which the
sample is chosen.
 Secondary data: information collected earlier by others and used later on
by a sociologist.
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 Self-completion questionnaires: questionnaires that are completed by the
respondents on their own, with the researcher not present.
 Semi-structured interview: an interview with some standardised questions
but allowing the researcher some flexibility on what is asked in what order.
 Social surveys: the systematic collection of information from a sample,
usually involving a questionnaire or structured interviews.
 Structuralism: an approach focusing on the large-scale social structures in
which people play defined roles.
 Structured interview: an interview in which the questions are standardised
(the same questions are asked in the same order) and the replies are
codified to produce quantitative data.
 Subjectivity: lack of objectivity; the researcher’s view influences the
approach taken.
 Survey population: all those whom the findings of the study will apply and
from which a sample is chosen.
 Telephone questionnaires: when the researcher reads the questions to
respondents over the telephone and records their responses.
 Trend: a change over time in a particular direction.
 Triangulation: using two or more methods in the same research project.
 Unstructured interview: an interview without set questions that usually
involves probing into emotions and attitudes, leading to qualitative data.
 Validity: when the findings accurately reflect the reality that is intended to
be captured.