C H A P T E R 4 Three Purposesof Research .91
I Introduction
Three Purposesof Research
Exploration
Description
Explanation
Introduction
0
@ 4B Scienceis an enterprise dedicatedto "finding out."
No matter what you want to find out, though,
there will likely be a great many ways of doing it.
That's true in life generally. Supposethat you want
to find out whether a particular automobile-say,
the new Burpo-Blasto-would be a good car for
HolographitOverview you. You could, of course, buy one and find out
that way. Or you could tall<to a lot of B-B owners
A widevarietyofresearchdesignsare or to people who consideredbuying one and didn't.
You might check the classified ads to see if there
availabletosocia/scien~eresear~hers. are a lot of B-Bs being sold cheap. YOU could read
Designingastudy~ ~ V O I V ~ Sspeciljling a consumer magazine evaluation of Burpo-Blastos.
exactly whoor whatis to bestudied YOU might combine severalof these ways of hding
when,how,andfor whatpurpose.
out. A similar situation occurs in scient5c inquiry.
Ultimately, sciensc inquiry comes down to
making observationsand interpreting what you've
observed, the subjectsof Parts 3 and 4 of this book.
Beforeyou can observe and analyze, however, you
need a plan. You need to determine what you're
goingto observe and analyze:why and how. That's
what research design is all about.
Although the details vary accordingto what
you wish to study, you face two major tasks in any
research design. First, you must spec@ as clearly
as possible what it is you want to find out. Second,
you must determine the best way to do it. Interest-
ingly,if you can handle the first considerationfully,
you'll probably handle the secondin the same
process. As mathematicians say, a properly framed
question contains the answer.
Let's sayyou're interested in studying corrup-
tion in government. That's certainly a worthy and
appropriatetopic for social research. But what do
you mean by ocorruption"?Specifically,what kinds
of behavior do you have in mind? And what do you
mean by "government"? Whom do you want to
study: all public employees?elected officials? civil
servants?Finally,what is your purpose? Do you
want to find out how much corruption there is? Do
you want to learn why corruption exists? These are
the kinds of questions that need to be answered
in the course of research design.
This chapter provides a general introduction to
research design; the other chapters in Part 2 elabo-
rate on specific aspects. In practice, all these aspects
UnitsofAnalysis
Individuals
Groups
Organizations
Social Artifacts
Units of Analysis in Review
Faulty Reasoning about Units of Analysis: The
EcologicalFallacy and Reductionism
'TheTime Dimension
Cross-sectional Studies
Longitudinal Studies
Approximating Longitudinal Studies
Examples of Research Strategies
HowTo Designa ResearchProject
Getting Started
Conceptualization
Choice of Research Method
Operationalization
Population and Sampling
Observations
Data Processing
Andysis
Application
Research Design in Review
The ResearchProposal
Elements of a Research Proposal
MAIN POINTS
KEYTERMS
REVIEW QUESTIONS.AND EXERCISES
ADDITIONAL READINGS
SOCIOLOGY WEB SITE
1 INFOTRAC COLLEGE EDITION
of research design are interrelated. As you proceed
through Part 2, the interrelationships among these
parts will become clearer.
We'll start by briefly examining the three main
purposes of social research that help to d e h e what
kind of study to undertake. Then we'll consider
units of analysis-the what or whom you want
to study. Next we'll look at alternative ways of
handling time in social research, or how to study
a moving target that changes over time.
With these ideas in hand, we'll turn to how
to design a research project. This overview of the
research process serves two purposes: Besides de-
scribinghow you might go about designing a study,
it provides a map of the remainder of this book.
Finally, we'll look at the elements of research
proposals. Often the actual conduct of research
needs to be preceded by a detailing of your inten-
tions-to obtain funding for a major project or per-
haps to get your instructor's approvalfor a class
project. You'll see that the research proposal pro-
vides an excellent o p p o ~ t yfor you to consider
all aspects of your research in advance.
$
ThreePurposesof Research
Socialresearch can serve many purposes. Three
of the most common and useful purposes are ex-
ploration, description, and explanation. Although
a given study can have more than one of these pur-
poses-and most do-examining them separately
is usefulbecause each has differentimplicationsfor
other aspects of research design.
Exploration
Much of socialresearch is conducted to explore a
topic, or to start to familiarizethe researcher with
that topic. This approach typically occurs when a
researcher examines a new interest or when the
subject of study itself is relatively new.
As an example,let's suppose that widespread
taxpayer dissatisfactionwith the government erupts
into a taxpayers' revolt. People begin refusing to
Určeno pouze pro studijní účely
92 .Chapter4 ResearchDesign
pay their taxes, and they organizethemselves
around that issue.You might like to learn more
about the movement:How widespread is it? What
levels and degrees of support are there within the
community?How is the movement organized?
What kinds of people are active in it? An explor-
atory study could help you obtain at least approxi-
mate answers to some of these questions.For ex-
ample,you might check figures with tax-collecting
officials, collect and study the literature of the
movement, attend meetings, and interviewleaders.
Exploratory studies are also appropriatefor
more persistent phenomena. Supposeyou're un-
happy with your college's graduationrequirements
and want to help change them. You might study
the history of such requirements at the college and
meet with college officialsto learn the reasons for
the current standards.You could talk to several stu-
dents to get a rough idea of their sentimentson the
subject.Though this last activity would not neces-
sarilyyield a precise and accuratepicture of student
opinion, it could suggestwhat the results of a more
extensive study might be.
Sometimes exploratoryresearchispursued
through the use of focus groups, or guided small-
group discussions.This technique is frequently
used in market research; we'll examine it further
in Chapter 10.
Exploratorystudies are most typically done for
three purposes: (1)to satisfythe researcher's cu-
riosity and desire for better understanding, (2)to
test the feasibilityof undertaking a more extensive
study, and (3)to developthe methods to be em-
ployed in any subsequent study.
A while back, for example, Ibecame aware of
the growingpopularity of somethingcalled "chan-
neling," in which a person lmown as a channel or
medium enters a trance state and begins speaking
with a voice that claims it originates outside the
channel. Some of the voices say they come from
a spirit world of the dead, some saythey are from
other planets, and still others say they exist on di-
mensions of reality difficultto explain in ordinary
human terms.
The channeled voices, often referred to as "en-
tities," sometimesuse the metaphor of radio or tele-
vision for the phenomenon they represent. "When
you watch the news," one entity told me in the
course of an interview, "you don't believe Dan
Rather is really insidethe television set.The same
is true of me. I use this medium's body the way
Dan Rather uses your television set."
The idea of channelinginterestedme from sev-
eral perspectives, not the least of which was the
methodologicalquestion of how to study scientifi-
cally something that violates so much of what we
take for granted, such as space, time, causation, and
individuality.
Lacking any rigorous theory or precise expecta-
tions, I merely set out to learn more. Using some
of the techniques of field research discussed later in
this book, I began amassinginformationand form-
ing categoriesfor making sense of what I observed.
I read boolts and articles about the phenomenon
and talked to people who had attended channeling
sessions.I then attended channelingsessionsmy-
self,observingthose who attended as well as the
channel and entity.Next I conductedpersonalin-
terviewswit11numerous channels and entities.
most interviews, Ibegan by asking the hu-
man channelsquestions about how they first began
channeling, what it was like, and why they contin-
ued, as well as standardbiographical questions.The
channel would then go into a trance, whereby the
interview continuedwith the entity. "Who are
you?" I might ask. "Where do you come from?"
"Why are you doing this?" "How can I tell if you
are real or a fake?" Although I went into these in-
terview sessions with several questionsprepared in
advance, each of the interviews followed whatever
course seemed appropriate in the light of the an-
swers given.
This example of explorationillustrateswhere
social research often begins. Whereasresearchers
worlcing from deductive theories have the key vari-
ableslaid out in advance, one of my first taskswas
to identify some of the possibly relevant variables
for determiningthe ldnds of people most likelyto
participate.For example,I noted a channel's gen-
der, age, education, religiousbackground, regional
origins, and previous participationin things meta-
physical. I chose most of these variables because
they commonly affect behavior.
I also noted differencesin the circumstances of
channelingsessions.Some channels said they must
go into deeptrances, some use lighttrances, and
othersremain conscious. Most sit down while
channeling,but others stand and walk about. Some
channelsoperate under pretty ordinary conditions;
others seem to require metaphysicalprops such as
dim lights, incense, and chanting.Many of these
differencesbecame apparent to me only in the
course of my initial observations.
Regardingthe entities, Ihave been interested
in dasslfylngwhere they say they come from. Over
the course of my interviews, I've developed a set
of questions about specificaspects of "reality"in an
attempt to class* the answers they give. Similarly,
I ask each to speak about future events.
Over the course of this research, my examina-
tion of specifictopics has become increasinglyfo-
cused as I've identifiedvariables that seem worth
pursuing: gender, education, and religion, for ex-
ample.Note, however, that Ibegan with a rela-
tivelyblank slate.
Exploratorystudies are quite valuable in social
scientificresearch. They are essentialwhenever a
researcher is brealcing new ground, and they al-
most always yield new insightsinto a topic for re-
search.Exploratory studies are also a source of
grounded theory, as discussed in Chapter2.
The chief shortcomingof exploratory studies
is that they seldomprovide satisfactory answers
to research questions, though they can hint at the
answers and can suggestwhich researchmethods
could provide dehitive answers. The reason ex-
ploratory studies are seldom debitive in them-
selves has to do with representativeness; that is,
the people you studyin your exploratoryresearch
may not be typical of the larger population that
interests you. Once you understand representa-
tiveness, you'll be able to know whether a given
exploratory study actually answeredits research
problem or only pointed the way toward an an-
swer. (Representativenessis discussed at length in
Chapter 7.)
Description
Amajor purpose of many social scientific studies
is to describe situations and events. The researcher
observesand then describes what was observed.
Because scientificobservationis careful and delib-
Three Purposesof Research .93
erate, however, scientific descriptionsare typically
more accurate and precise than are casual ones.
The U.S. Censusis an excellent example of de-
scriptivesocialresearch. The goal of the census is
to describeaccuratelyand precisely a wide variety
of characteristics of the U.S. population, as well as
the populations of smaller areas such as states and
counties. Other examples of descriptivestudies are
the computationof age-genderprofiles of popula-
tions done by demographers, the computation
of crime rates forWerent cities, and a product-
marketingsurvey that desaibes the people who
use, or would use, a particularproduct. A re-
searcherwho carefully chroniclesthe events that
take place on a labor union picket line has, or at
least serves, a descriptivepurpose. A researcher
who computes and reports the number of timesin-
dividual legislatorsvoted for or against organized
labor also fulfills a descriptive purpose.
Many qualitativestudiesaim primarily at de-
scription.An anthropologicalethnography,for ex-
ample, may try to detail the particularculture of
some preliterate society. At the same time, such
s h i e s are seldomlimited to a merely descriptive
purpose. Researchers usually go on to examine why
the observed patterns exist and what these patterns
imply.
Explanation
The third general puIpose of socialscientific re-
searchis to explain things. Descriptive studies an-
swer questions of what, where, when, and how;
explanatory questions, of why. So, when William
Sanders (1994) set about describing the varieties of
gang violence, he also wanted to reconstructthe
process that brought about violent episodes among
the gangs of different ethnic groups.
Reportingthe frequency of church attendance
is a descriptive activity,but reportingwhy some
people attend and others don't is explanatory. Re-
porting the crime rates of differentcities is a case of
description; identrfylngvariables that explain why
some cities have higher crime rates than others in-
volves explanation.A researcherwho sets out to
discoverwhy an antiabortiondemonstration ended
in a violent confrontation with police, as opposed
Určeno pouze pro studijní účely
94 .Chapter4: Research Design
to simply describing what happened, has an ex-
planatorypurpose.
In a similarvein,a survey of attitudestoward le-
galizingmarijuana might servethe worthwhile de-
scriptivepurpose of simply reportingthe attitudesof
varioussegments of the population. Or a researcher
might set out to discoverwhat factors shapepeople's
attitudesonthisissue-a why question ("Why
dopeople have the attitudesthey do about mari-
juana?"). An explanatoryanalysisof 1993General
Social Survey (GSS)data indicatesthat 28percent
of men and 15percent of women saidmarijuana
shouldbe legalized:While strongmajoritiesof both
genders opposelegalization, men were nearlytwice
as supportive aswere women. Thus, gender seems
to be oneinfluencein attitudestoward marjjuana.
Not surprisingly,political orientationsalso cor-
relatedwith attitudesabout marijuana legalization.
Among liberals, 37 percent saidmarijuana should
be legalized, compared with 15percent each of
moderates and conservatives.In terms of political
party, 39 percent of the Demoaats, 18percent of
Independents, and 15percent of Republicans sup-
ported legalization.
Although it's useful to distinguishthe three
purposes of research, it bears repeating that most
studieswill have elements of all three. Suppose, for
example, that you have set out to evaluate the ef-
fectiveness of a new form of psychotherapy.Your
study will have exploratory aspects, as you explore
possibly relevant variables and map out the impacts
of the therapy.You willwant to describe suchthings
as recovery rates. And you will undoubtedly seek
to explain why the therapy works better for some
types of people than for others, or why it works
more for some types of people (orproblems)than
do other formsof therapy.
You will seethese severalpurposes at work in
the followingdiscussionsof other aspects of research
design.Let's turnnow to a considerationof whom
or what you want to explore, describe,and explain.
Unitsof Analysis
In social scientific research, there is virtually no
limit to what or whom can be studied, or the
units of analysis.This topic is relevant to all forms
of social research, although its implications are
dearest in the case of nomothetic, quantitative
studies.
The idea for units of analysis may seem slippery
at first,because research-especially nomothetic
research-often studieslarge collections of people
or things, or aggregates.It's important to distinguish
between the unit of analysis and the aggregates
that we generalizeabout.For instance, a researcher
may study a class of people, such as Democrats, col-
lege undergraduates,African-Americanwomen
under 30, or some other collection. But if the re-
searcheris interestedin exploring, describing, or
explaininghow different groups of individualsbe-
have as individuals,the unit of analysis is the indi-
vidual, not the group. Thisis so even though the
researcher then proceeds to generalizeabout ag-
gregates of individuals,as in saying that more
Demoaats than Republicans favorlegalizingmari-
juana. Think of it this way: Having an attitude
about marijuana is somethingthat can only be an
attribute of an individual,not a group;that is, there
is no one group "mind"that can have an attitude.
So evenwhen we generalize about Demoaats,
we're generalizing about an attributethey possess
as individuals.
In contrast, we may sometimeswant to study
groups,consideredas individual "actors" or entities
that have attributes asgroups. For instance,we
might want to compare the characteristicsof differ-
ent types of sueet gangs. In that case our unit of
analysiswould be gangs (notmembers of gangs),
and we might proceed to make generalizations
about different types of gangs.
Social scientistsperhaps most typically choose
individualpeople as their units of analysis. Re-
searcherscan note the characteristicsof individual
people-gender, age, region of birth, attitudes, and
so forth. They can then combinethese descriptions
to provide a compositepicture of the group the in-
dividualsrepresent, whether a street-corner gang
or a whole society.
Por example,you may note the age and gender
of each student enrolledin Political Science 110
and then characterizethe group of students de-
scriptivelyas being 53percent men and 47 percent
women and as having a mean age of 18.6years. Al-
though the finaldescriptionwould be of the class
as a whole, the descriptionis based on characteris-
tics that members of the classhave as individuals.
The same distinctionbetween units of analysis
and aggregations occursin explanatorystudies.
Supposeyou wished to discover whether students
with good study habits receivedbetter gradesin
Political Science 110than did students with poor
study habits. You would operationalizethe variable
stcidy habits and measure this variable, perhaps in
terms of hours of study per week. You might then
aggregate students with good study habits and
those with poor study habits and seewhich group
receivedthe best gradesin the course. The purpose
of the studywould be to explain why some groups
of studentsdo better in the course than do others,
but the unit of analysis is stillindividual students.
Units of analysis in a study are usually also the
units of observation.Thus, to study successin a po-
liticalscience course, we would observe individual
students.Sometimes, however, we "observe" our
units of analysis indirectly.For example, suppose
we want to find out whether disagreements about
the death penalty tend to cause divorce.In this
case, we might "observe"individual husbands and
wives by asking them about their attitudesabout
capitalpunishment, in order to distinguish couples
who agree and disagree on this issue. In this case,
our units of observationare individual wives and
husbands, but our units of analysis (thethings we
want to study) are couples.
Units of analysis, then, are those thingswe
examinein orderto create summary descriptions
of allsuchunits and to explain differencesamong
them. In most research projects,the unit of analysis
willprobablybe clear to you. When the unit of
analysisisnot so clear, however, it's essentialto
determinewhat it is; otherwise, you cannot deter-
mine what observations are to be made about
whom or what.
Some studiestry to describe or explain more
than one unit of analysis.In these cases, the re-
searchermust anticipatewhat conclusionsshe or
he wishes to draw with regard to which units of
analysis.For example, we may want to discover
what kinds of college students (individuals)are
most successfulin their careers; we may also want
to learn what kinds of colleges (organizations)pro-
duce the most successfulgraduates.
Units of Analysis .95
To make this discussion more concrete, let's
consider several commonunits of analysis in social
science.
Individuals
As we've just seen, individualhuman beings are
perhaps the most typical ~ t sof analysis for social
scient5c research. Researchers tend to describe and
explain socialgroups and interactionsby aggregat-
ing and analyzingthe descriptions of individuals.
Any type of individualmay be the unit of
analysis for socialscientificresearch, and research
generally deals with spedc types or classes of indi-
viduals. This point is more important than it may
seem at kst reading. Inasmuch as social science
seeks to understandhuman behavior in general,
it would seem that scientificfindings are most
valuable when they apply to all kinds of people.
In practice, however, socialscientists seldom study
all kinds of people. At the very least, their studies
are typically limited to the people living in a single
&untry, though some comparativestudies stretch
acrossnational boundaries. Often, though, studies
are quite circumscribed.
Examples of classes ofindividualsthat might be
chosenfor study include college students, gays and
lesbians, auto workers, U.S. voters, singleparents,
and churchgoers.Notice that each of these terms
implies some population of individualpersons. De-
scriptive studieswith individualsas their units of
an$ysis typically aimto describe the population
that comprisesthose individuals, whereas explana-
tory studies aimto discover the socialdynamics op-
erating within that population.
As the units of analysis, uldividualsmay be
characterizedin terms of their membershipin social
groupings.Thus, an individual may be describedas
belonging to a rich family or to a poor one, or as
having a college-educated mother or not. We might
examine in a research project whether people with
college-educatedmothers are more likely to attend
college than those with non-college-educated
mothers or whether high schoolgraduates in rich
families are more likely to attend collegethan those
in poor families.In each case, the unit of analysis-
the "thing"whose characteristicswe are seekingto
Určeno pouze pro studijní účely
96 .Chapter4: ResearchDesign
describeor explain-is the individual.We then ag-
Other units of analysis at the group level could
gregate these individuals and make generalizations
be friendshipcliques,married couples, census
about the population they belong to.
blocks, cities, or geographicregions. As withindi-
viduals, each of these terms implies somepopula--
tion. Street gangsimply a population that includes
all street gangs, perhaps in a given city. YOUmight
Groups
Socialgroups can alsobe units of analysis in social
scientificresearch.That is, we may be interested in
characteristicsthat belong to one group, considered
as a single entity.If you were to study criminalsby
looking at the members of a c r w a l gang,the indi-
vidual (thecriminal)would be the unit of analysis.
But if you studiedallthe gangs in a city to learn the
differences,saV,between big gangs and small ones,
-- - - -
then describe this population by generalizingfrom
your iindings about individualgangs. For instance,
you might describethe geographicaldistributionof
gangsthroughout a city, In an explanatory study
of street gangs, you might discover whether large
gangs are more likelythan small ones to engage in
intergangwarfare.Thus, you would arrive at con-
clusions about the population of gangsby using in-
dividualgroups as your unit of analysis.
------- ,
between "uptown" and "downtown" gangs, and so
forth,you would be interested in gangs rather than
their individualmembers. ~nthis case,the unit of Orqanizations
analysiswould be the gang, a socialgroup.
Here's another example. Suppose YOU were in-
terested in the question of accessto computersin
different segmentsof society.You might describe
familiesinterms of total annualincome and accord-
ingto whether or not they had computers.You
couldthen aggregatefamiliesand describethe mean
income of families and the percentage of families
who have computers.You would then be in a posi-
tion to determine whether familieswith higher in-
comeswere more likely to have computersthan
those with lower incomes.In this case, the unit of
analysis would be families.
As with other units of analysis,we can derive
the characteristicsof socialgroups from those of
their individualmembers. Thus, we might describe
a f d y in terms of the age, race, or education
of its head. In a descriptivestudy, we might find
the uercentage of allfarmliesthat have a college-
-
Formal social organizationsmay alsobe the units of
analysisin social scientificresearch. For example, a
researchermight study corporations,by which he
or she implies a population of all corporations.Indi-
vidual corporations might be characterizedin terms
of number of employees,net annual profits, gross
assets, number of defense contracts, percentage of
employeesfrom racial or ethnic minority groups,
and so forth.We might determine whether large
corporationshire a larger or smaller percentage of
minority group employeesthan do small corpora-
tions. Other examples of formal socialorganiza-
tions suitable as units of analysis include church
congregations,colleges,army divisions, academic
deparments, and supermarlcets.
Figure 4-1 provides a graphicillustrationof
some differentunits of analysis and the statements
that might be made about them.
---
educatedhead of family.In an explanatory study,
-
we might determine whether such families have,
on average,more or fewer childrenthan do fami- SocialArtifacts
lies headed by people who have not graduated
-
from college.In each of these examples, the family
is the unit of analysis.Incontrast,had we aslred
whether college-educatedindividuals have more or
fewer childrenthan do their less educated counter-
parts, then the individualperson would have been
the unit of analysis.
Another unit of analysisis the socialartifact,or
any product of socialbeings or their behavior. One
class of artifactsincludes concrete objects such as
books, poems, paintings, automobiles,buildings,
songs,pottery, jokes, student excuses for missing
exams, and scienac discoveries.In tile Robin
Wagner-PacSci(1995) examination of the Philadel-
phia police attack on MOVE describedin Chapter 3,
officialpronouncements were the units of analysis.
Just as people or social groups imply popula-
tions, each social object implies a set of all objects of
the same class: all books, all novels, all biographies,
all introductory sociologytextbooks, all cookbooks.
In a study using books as the units of analysis,an
individualbook might be characterizedby its size,
weight, length, price, content, number of pictures,
number sold, or description of its author. Then the
population of all books or of a particular kind of
book could be analyzedfor the purpose of descrip-
tion or explanation:what ldnds of books sellbest
and why, for example.
Similarly,a social scientist could analyze
whether paintings by Russian, Chinese, or U.S.
artists showedthe greatest degree of working-class
consciousness,taking paintings as the units of
analysis and describingeach, in part, by the nation-
ality of its creator. Or you might examine a news-
paper's editorialsregarding a local university for
the purpose of describing,or perhaps explaining,
changesin the newspaper's editorialposition on
the university over time. In this example, individ-
ual editorialswould be the units of analysis.
Socialinteractionsform another class of social
artifactssuitable for social scientificresearch.For
example, we might characterizeweddings as ra-
cially or religiously mixed or not, as religious or
secularin ceremony, as resulting in divorce or not,
or by descriptions of one or both of the marriage
partners (such as, "previouslymarried," "Oakland
Raider fan," "wanted by the FBI").When a re-
searcherreports that weddings between partners of
differentreligions are more likely to be performed
by secular authorities than are those between part-
ners of the same religion, weddings are the units of
analysis, not the individuals involved.
Other socialinteractions that might be units
of analysis include friendship choices, court cases,
t r a c accidents,divorces, fis~ghts,shiplaunchings,
airline hijackings, race riots, final exams, student
demonstrations, and congressionalhearings. Con-
gressional hearings, for instance, couldbe charac-
terized by whether or not they occurred during an
election campaign, whether the committee chairs
UnitsofAnalysis .97
were running for a higher office, whether they had
received campaignscontributionsfrom interested
parties, and so on. Notice that even if we character-
ized and comparedthe hearings in terms of the
committee chairs, the hearings themselves-not
the individual chairpersons-would be our units of
analysis.
UnitsofAnalysisin Review
The examplesin this section should suggest the
nearly infinitevariety of possible units of analysis
in social scientificresearch.Although individual
human beings are typical objects of study, many
research questions can be answered more appropri-
ately through the examination of other units of
analysis. Indeed, social scientistscan studyjust
about anything that bears on sociallife.
Moreover,the types of units of analysis named
in this section don't begin to exhaust the possibili-
ties. Morris Rosenberg (1968:234-48), for ex-
ample, speaks of individual, group, organizational,
5
institutional, spatial, cultural, and societalunits of
analysis. John and Lyn Lofland (1995:103-1 3 )
speak of practices, episodes, encounters, roles, rela-
tionships, groups, organizations,settlements, social
worlds, lifestyles, and subculturesas suitableunits
of study. The important thing here is to grasp the
logic of units of analysis.Once you do, the possibili-
ties for fruitfulresearch are limited only by your
imagination.
Categorizingpossible units of analysismay
make the concept seem more complicatedthan it
needs to be. What you call a given unit of analy-
sis-a group, a formal organization, or a socialar-
tifact-is irrelevant.The key is to be clear about
what your unit of analysis is. When you embark
on a researchproject, you must decide whether
you are studyingmarriages or marriage partners,
crimes or criminals, corporations or corporate exec-
utives. Otherwise, you run the risk of drawing
invalid conclusionsbecause your assertions about
one unit of analysis are actuallybased on the ex-
amination of another. We'll see an example of this
issue as we look at the ecologicalfallacy in the next
section.
Určeno pouze pro studijní účely
FIGURE 4-1
Illustrationsof Units ofAnalysis
Units of Analysis
Individuals
Families
Sample Statements
60% of the sample are women
10%of the sample are wearing an eye patch
10%of the sample have pigtails
20% of the families havea single parent
50% of the families havetwo children
20% of the famillies haveno children
The mean number of children per family is 1.3
Units of Analysis Sample Statements
Households
20%by moreof thethanhouseholdsone familyare occupied
30% of the households haveholes
in their roofs
10%of the households are occupied
by aliens
Noticealso that 33% of the families live
in multiple-familyhouseholdswith family
as the unit of analysis
Určeno pouze pro studijní účely
100 .Chapter4: ResearchDesign
Faulty Reasoningabout Unitsofllnalysis:
TheEcologicalFallacyandReductionism
At this point, it's appropriateto introduce two types
of faulty reasoningthat you should be aware of: the
ecologicalfallacy and reductionism.Each repre-
sents a potentialpitfall regardingunits of analysis,
either of which can occur in doingresearch and
drawing conclusionsfrom the results.
TheEcologicalFallacy
In this context, "ecological" refers to groups or
sets or systems: somethinglarger than individuals.
The ecologicalfallacy is the assumptionthat
somethinglearned about an ecologicalunit says
something about the individuals making up that
unit. Let's consider a hypotheticalillustration of this
fallacy.
Supposewe are interestedin learning about the
nature of electoralsupport received by a femalepo-
litical candidateina recent citywide election.Let's
assumethat we have the vote tally for each precinct
sothat we can tell which precincts gave her the
greatestsupport and which the least. Assume also
that we have census data describing some charac-
teristicsof these precincts. Our analysis of such data
might showthat precincts with relatively young
voters gave the female candidate a greaterpropor-
tion of their votes than did precincts with older vot-
ers. We might be tempted to conclude from these
findingsthat youngvoters are more likely to vote
for female candidatesthan are older voters-in
other words, that age affects support for women in
politics.In reachingsuch a conclusion,we run the
risk of committingthe ecologicalfallacybecause it
may have been the older voters in those "yo~~lg"
precinctswho voted for the woman. Our problem
is that we have examinedprecincts as our units of
analysisbut wish to draw conclusionsabout voters.
The sameproblem would arise if we discovered
that crimerates were higher in cities having large
African-Americanpopulationsthan in those with
few African Americans.We would not know if the
crimeswere actually committedby African Ameri-
cans. Or if we found suiciderates higher in Protes-
tant countriesthan in Catholic ones, we stillcould
not know for sure that more Protestants than
Catholics committedsuicide.
In spite of these hazards, socialscientists very
often have little choicebut to address a particular
research question through an ecological analysis.
Perhapsthe most appropriatedata are simply not
available.For example, the precinct vote tallies and
the precinct characteristicsmentioned in our initial
example might be easy to obtain, but we may not
'
have the resourcesto conduct a postelection survey
of individualvoters. In such cases, we may reach a
tentative conclusion, recognizing and noting the
risk of an ecologicalfallacy.
While you shouldbe carefulnot to committhe
ecological fallacy, don't let these warnings lead you
into committingwhat we might callthe individual-
isticfallacy. Somepeople who approachsocialre-
search forthe first time have trouble reconciling
general patterns of attitudesand actionswith indi-
vidual exceptions.As we discussedin Chapter 2,
generalizationsand probabilistic statementsare not
invalidatedby individual exceptions.Your knowing
a rich Democrat, for example, doesn't deny the fact
that most rich people vote Republican-as a gen-
eral pattern. Similarly, if you know someonewho
has gotten rich without any formal education,that
doesn't deny the generalpattern of higher educa-
tion relatingto higher income.
The ecologicalfallacy dealswith somethingelse
altogether-confusing units of analysis in such a
way that we draw conclusions about individuals
based solelyon the observationof groups. Although
the patterns observedbetween variables at the level
of groupsmay be genuine,the danger lies in rea-
soning from the observed attributesof groupsto
the attributesof the individualswho made up
those groupswhen we have not actually observed
individuals.
Reductionism
A secondtype of potentially faulty reasoningre-
latedto units of analysis is reductionism. Reduc-
tionismmeans seeingand explaining complexphe-
nomena in terms of a single,narrow concept or set
of concepts. Thus, we "reduce" what in reality is
complexto a simple explanation.
For instance, scientists from different disciplines
tend to look at differenttypes of answers and ig-
nore the others. Sociologists tend to consider only
sociologicalvariables (suchas values, norms, and
roles),economistsonly economicvariables (suchas
supply and demand, marginal value), and psychol-
ogists only psychologicalvariables (suchas person-
ality types, traumas).Explainingall or most human
behavior in terms of economicfactorsis called eco-
nomic reductionism; explaining all or most human
behavior in terms of psychological factorsis called
psychologicalreductionism; and so forth. Notice
how this issue relates to the discussion of theoreti-
calparadigmsin Chapter2.
In another example, supposewe ask what
causedthe AmericanRevolution.Was it a shared
commitment to the value of individual liberty?
The economicplight of the colonies in relation to
Britain?The megalomania of the founding fathers?
As soon as we inquire about the single cause, we
run the rislc of reductionism.
Reductionismof any type tends to suggestthat
particular units of analysis or variables are more
relevant than others.If we were to regard shared
values as the cause of the American Revolution,
our unit of analysiswould be the individual colo-
nist. An economist,though, might choose the
13colonies as units of analysis and examine the
economicorganizationsand conditions of each.
Apsychologistmight choose individual leaders as
the units of analysis for purposes of examining
their personalities.
Like the ecologicalfallacy,reductionism can
occur when we use inappropriateunits of analysis.
The appropriateunit of analysis for a given re-
search question, however, is not always clear. So-
cial scientists, especially across disciplinarybound-
aries, often debatethis issue.
The Time Dimension
Sofar in this chapter, we have regarded research
design as a process for deciding what aspects we
shall observe, of whom, and for what purpose.
Now we must consider a set of time-relatedoptions
TheTimeDimension .101
that cuts across each of these earlier considerations.
We can cllooseto make observationsmore or less
at one time or over a longperiod.
Time plays many roles in the design and execu-
tion of research, quite aside from the time it takes
to do research. Chapter 3 noted that the time se-
quence of events and situationsis critical to deter-
mining causation (apoint we'll return to in Part 4).
Time also affectsthe generalizabilityof research
hdings. Do the descriptions and explanations re-
sultingfrom a particular study accuratelyrepresent
the situation of ten years ago, ten years from now,
or only the present?Researchers have two princi-
pal optionsavailable to deal with the issue of time
in the design of their research: cross-sectionalstud-
ies and longitudinal studies.
Cross-SectionalStudies
A cross-sectionalstudyinvolves observationsof
a sample, or cross section, of a population or phe-
nomenon that are made at one point in time. Ex-
pioratory and descriptive studies are often cross-
sectional.A single U.S. Census, for instance,is a
study aimed at describingthe U.S. population at a
given time.
Many explanatorystudies are also cross-
sectional.A researcher conducting a large-scale
nationalsurvey to examinethe sources of racial
and religiousprejudice would, in alllikelihood,be
dealing with a singletime frame-taking a snap-
shot, so to speak, ofthe sources ofprejudice at a
particular point in history.
Explanatory cross-sectionalstudieshave an in-
herent problem.Although their conclusionsare
based on observationsmade at only one time, typi-
cally they aim at understandingcausal processes
that occur over time.This problemis somewhat
akin to that of determiningthe speed of a moving
object on the basis of a high-speed,stillphotograph
that freezesthe movement of the object.
Yanjie Bian, for example, conducteda survey of
workers in Tianjin, China, forthe purpose of study-
ing stratificationin contemporary,urban Chinese
society. In undertaking the surveyin 1988, how-
ever, he was conscious ofthe important changes
Určeno pouze pro studijní účely
114 .Chapter4: Research Design
you'll reach them. Will it be appropriate to select a
sample?If so, how will you do that? If there is any
possibility that your research will affectthose you
study, how will you insure that the research does
not harm them?
Measurement
What are the lceyvariables inyour study? How will
you d e h e and measure them? Do your demtions
and measurement methods duplicate or differfrom
those of previous research on this topic? Ifyou
have already developedyour measurement device
(a questiomaire, for example) or willbe using
sometlling previously developedby others, it might
be appropriateto include a copy in an appendix to
your proposal.
Data-Collection Methods
How willyou actually collect the data for your
study? Willyou conduct an experiment or a sur-
vey? W i you undertalcefield research or will you
focus on the reanalysis of statistics already created
by others? Perhapsyou will use more than one
method.
Analysis
Indicate the kind of analysisyou plan to conduct.
Spell out the purpose and logic of your analysis.
Are you interested in precise description? Do you
intend to explainwhy things are the way they are?
Do you plan to account for variations in some qual-
ity: for example,why some students are more lib-
eralthan others? What possible explanatoryvari-
ables will your analysis consider, and how willyou
know if you've explainedvariationsadequately?
Schedule
It is oftenappropriate to provide a schedulefor the
various stages of research. Even if you don't do this
for the proposal, do it foryourself. Unlessyou have
a timeline for accomplishingthe several stages of
research and keeping in touch with how you're do-
ing, you may end up in trouble.
Budget
When you ask someone to cover the costs of your
research, you need to provide a budget that speci-
fieswhere the money will go. Large, expensive
projects include budgetary categoriessuch asper-
sonnel, equipment, supplies,telephones, and
postage. Even for a project you pay for your-
self,it's a good idea to spend sometime anticipat-
ing expenses: office supplies,photocopying, com-
puter disks,telephone calls, fransportation, and
SO on.
As you can see,if you were interested in con-
ducting a social scienceresearchproject, it would
be a good idea to prepare a researchproposalfor
your own purposes, even if you weren't required
to do soby your instructor or a funding agency.If
you're going to invest your time and energy in such
a project,you should do what you can to insure a
return on that investment.
Now that you've had abroad overview of social
research, let's move on to the remaining chapters
in thisboolc and learn exactlyhow to design and
execute each specificstep.If you've found a re-
searchtopic that really interestsyou, you'll want to
keep it in mind as you see how you might go about
studyingit.
M A I N POINTS
e The principalpurposes of socialresearch in-
clude exploration,description, and explanation.
Research studies often combine more than one
purpose.
B) Exploration is the attempt to develop an initial,
rough understanding of somephenomenon.
e Descriptionis the precise reporting andlor
measurement of the characteristics of some
population or phenomenon under study.
Explanationis the discovery and reporting of
relationships among different aspects of the
phenomenon under study.Whereas descrip-
tive studies answer the question "What's so?"
explanatory ones tend to answer the ques-
tion "Why?"
Units of analysisare the people or things whose
characteristicssocialresearchers observe, de-
scribe, and explain. Typically,the unit of analy-
sisin socialresearchis the individualperson, but
it may also be a social group, a formal organi-
zation,a socialartifact, or some otherphenome-
non such as lifestyles or socialinteractions.
The ecologicalfallacyinvolves conclusions
drawn from the analysis of the attributes of
groups (e.g.,neighborhoods) that are then as-
sumedto apply to individuals (e.g.,specific res-
idents of different neighborhoods).
Reductionismis the attempt to understand
a complexphenomenon in terms of a narrow
set of concepts, such as attempting to explain
the American Revolution solely in terms of
economics (orpolitical idealismor psychology).
Researchinto processes that occur over time
presents social challenges that can be addressed
through cross-sectionalstudies or longitudinal
studies.
Cross-sectionalstudies are based on observa-
tions made at one time. Although such studies
are limited by this characteristic, researchers
can sometimesmake inferences about pro-
cesses that occur over time.
In longitudinal studies, observations are made
at many times. Such observationsmay be made
of samples drawn from generalpopulations
(trendstudies),samples drawn from more
specificsubpopulations (cohort studies),or
the same sample of people each time (panel
studies).
Research design starts with an initialinterest,
idea, or theoretical expectationand proceeds
through a series of interrelated steps to narrow
the focus of the study so that concepts, meth-
ods, and procedures are well defined.A good
research plan accountsfor all these steps in
advance.
At the outset, a researcher specifies the mean-
ing of the concepts or variablesto be studied
(conceptualization),chooses a research method
or methods (e.g.,experiments versus surveys),
and specifiesthe population to be studiedand,
if applicable, how it will be sampled.
Review Questions and Exercises .115
s The researcher operationalizesthe concepts to
be studied by stating precisely how variables in
the study will be measured. Researchthen pro-
ceeds through observation,processingthe data,
analysis, and application,such as reporting the
results and assessingtheir implications.
e A research proposal provides a preview of why
a study willbe undertalcen and how it will be
conducted.A researchproject is often required
to get permission or necessaryresources.Even
when not required, a proposalis a useful de-
vice for planning.
KEY TERMS
units of analysis longitudinal study
socialartifact trend study
ecologicalfallacy cohort study
reductionism panel study
cross-sectionalstudy
L: REVIEW QUESTIONS AND EXERCISES
1. Using InfoTrac or the library, select a research re-
port that illustratesexploration,description,or ex-
planation. Identifywhich of these three purposes
the report illustratesand brieflyjustify yourjudg-
ment in that regard.
2. Here are some examples of real research topics.
For each one, name the unit of analysis. (Thean-
swersare at the end of this chapter.)
a. Women watch TV more than men because
they are likelyto worlcfewer hours outside
the home than men. ...Black people watch
an average of approximatelythree-quartersof
an hour more television per day than white
people. (Hughes1980:290)
b. Of the 130incorporatedU.S. cities with more
than 100,000inhabitantsin 1960, 126had at
least two short-termnonproprietarygeneral
hospitals accreditedby the American Hospital
Association. (Turk 1980:317)
c. The earlyTM [transcendentalmeditation]
organizationswere small and informal.The
LosAngeles group,begun in June 1959,met
at a member's house where, incidentally,
Maharishi was living. (Johnston1980:337)
Určeno pouze pro studijní účely
116 .Chapter4: Research Design
d. However, it appears that the nursing staffs
exercisestronginfluence over. ..a decision
to change the nursing care system. ...Con-
versely, among those decisionsdominatedby
the administrationand the medical staffs ...
(Comstock 1980:77)
e. Though 667,000 out of 2 millon farmersin
the United Statesare women, women histori-
cally have not been viewed as farmers,but
rather, as the farmer's wife. (Votaw 1979:8)
f. The analysisof community opposition
to group homes for the mentallyhandi-
capped ...indicatesthat deteriorating neigh-
borhoods are most likelyto organizein
opposition,but that upper-middleclass neigh-
bbrhoods are most likely to enjoyprivate ac-
cess to local officials. (Grahamand Hogan
1990:513)
g. Some analysts during the 1960spredicted
that the rise of economicambitionand po-
liticalmilitancy among blacks would foster
discontentwith the "otherworldly"black
mainline churches. (Ellisonand Sherkat
1990:551)
h. This analysisexploreswhether propositions
and empirical mdings of contemporarytheo-
ries of organizationsdirectlyapplyto both pri-
vate prod~~ctproducing organizations (PPOs)
and publichuman serviceorganizations
(PSOs).(Schitlettand Zey 1990:569)
i. Thispaper examinesvariationsinjob title
structuresacross work roles. Analyzing
3,173job titles in the California civil service
systemin 1985,we investigatehow and why
lines of work vary in the proliferation of job
categoriesthat differentiate ranks, functions,
or particular organizationallocations. (Strang
and Baron 1990:479)
3. Look through a n academic researchjournal until
you find examples of at leastthree differentunits
of analysis. 1den.Qeach and present quotations
from thejournal to justify your conclusions.
4. Make up a research example-different from
those discussed in the text-that illustratesa re-
searcher faUing into the trap of the ecologicalfal-
lacy. Then modify the exampleto avoid this trap.
5. Drop in at the Russell SageFoundation
(m)and look at their
publications. Select one that illustratesa cross-
sectional,trend, cohort, or panel study design.
Justify your choice.
ADDITIONAL READINGS
Bart, Pauline, and Linda Frankel. 1986. TheStudent
Sociologist'sHandbook. Morristown, NJ: General
LearningPress.A handy little reference book to
help you get started on a researchproject. Written
from the standpoint of a student term paper, this
volume offers a particularly good guide to the pe-
riodical literatureof the social sciencesavailable in
a good library.
Casley,D. J., andD. A. Lury.1987.Data Collectionin
Deve1opi)zg Coulitries. Oxford: ClarendonPress. This
boolc discussesthe specialproblems of researchin
the developingworld.
Cooper,HarrisM. 1989.Integrating Research:A Guide
for Literature Reviews. Newbury Park, CA: Sage.The
author leads you through each stepin the litera-
ture reviewprocess.
Hunt, Morton. 1985.Profilesof SocialResearch: The Sci-
entifcStudy ofHuman Interactions. New York: Basic
Books. An engagingand informative seriesof
project biographies: James Coleman's smdyof
segregated schoolsis presented, as well as several
other major projects that illustrate the elements
of socialresearch in practice.
Iversen, GudmundR. 1991.Contextual Analysis. New-
bury Park, CA: Sage. Contextual analysis exarn-
ines the impact of socioenvironmentalfactors
on individualbehavior. Durkheim's study of sui-
cide offers a good example of this, identifying
socialcontexts that affect the likelihood of self-
destruction.
Maxwell, Joseph A. 1996.Qtlalitative Research Deshn:
An Interactive Approaclz. Newbury Park, CA: Sage.
Maxwell covers many of the sametopicsthat this
chapter doesbut with attention devoted specifi-
cally to qualitativeresearch projects.
Menard, Scott. 1991.Longitudinal Research. Newbury
Park, CA: Sage. Beginningby explainingwhy re-
searchersconductlongitudinal research,the au-
thor goes on to detail a variety of study designs as
well as suggestions for the analysis of longitudinal
data.
Miller, Delbert. 1991.Handbook of Research Design and
Social Measurement. Newbury Park, CA: Sage. A
usefulreference for introducingor reviewing nu-
merousissues involved in design and measure-
ment. In addition, the book containsa wealth of
practical informationrelating to foundations,
journals, andprofessionalassociations.
ANSWERS TO REVIEW QUEST10NS
AND EXERCISES, ITEM 2
a. Men and women, black and white people
(individuals)
b. Incorporated U.S. cities (groups)
C. Transcendentalmeditation organizations (groups)
d. Nursing staffs (groups)
e. Farmers (individuals)
f. Neighborhoods (groups)
g. Blacks (individuals)
h. Serviceand productionorganizations (formal
organizations)
i. Job titles (artifacts)
SOCIOLOGY WEB SITE
See the Wadsworth SociologyResource Center,
4 8 a A .s ~ . vVutual Society, for additionallinks,hternet ex-
ercisesby chapter, quizzes by chapter, and Microcase-
related materials:
Answers to Review Questionsand Exercises, Item 2 .117
lNFOTRAC COLLEGE EDITION
SEARCH WORD SUMMARY
Go to the Wadsworth SociologyResource Cen-
@ ter, Virtual Society,to find a list of searchwords
for each chapter. Using the search words, go to Wo-
Trac College Edition, an online library of over 900
journals where you can do onlineresearch and find
readings related to your studies. To aid in your search
and to gain useful tips, see the Student Guide to Info-
Trac College Edition on the Virtual SocietyWeb site:
Určeno pouze pro studijní účely