Positivism

• Positivists

  Believe it's possible to apply logical and methods of science to study society and solve it's problems

  • reality exists outside of human mind > natural word society has objective factual reality
  • reality is patterned = empirical patterns can be studied through observation and measurement
  • sociologists = discover laws determining how society works > uses inductive reasoning through research evidence
  • want to produce scientific laws about how society works to predict further events > help shape social policy (focuses on wider society)
• Positivist methods

  Believe sociology should follow example of natural science using experimental methods for research where sociologists can test hypothesis in a systematic and controlled way

  • quantitative data > measure patterns of behaviour > produce statement about relationship between facts they're looking at > discover laws of cause and effect
  • objectivity and attachment, e.g. lab experiments and official stats
• Example, Durkheim

  Study on suicide explains patterns in suicide stats as being caused by differences in levels of integration and regulation
• Evaluation of positivists

  Interpretivists argue positivists attempts to try and find macro/structural causes of social phenomena and ignoring role of individual
• Popper

  Science operates on principle of falsification rather than verification > fail to prove something wrong, science shows it's been tested

  • sociology is not scientific, it has potential if it focuses on falsification
• Kuhn

  Natural science operates with a paradigm = an accepted framework of concepts

  • If sociology gets to an agreed paradigm then it can be scientific > constant competition between theories but the scientific paradigm is rarely questioned
• Keat and Urry, realists

  Sociology fits into open systems:

  • closed systems = variables can be controlled and precise measurements can be taken
  • open systems = not all variables can be controlled