Positivism

• Define 'patterns':

  Recurring trends in social behaviour that can be observed
• Define 'trends':

  Long-term shift in social behehaviour
• What is reliability?

  The extent to which the results will be the same if research is repeated.
• What does representativeness mean?

  How well the ppl/data studied reflects the wider pop. being researched
• What does quantitative data mean?

  Data expressed in numbers to find patterns/trends through analysis
• T/F: Positivists do not use statistical data.

  FALSE
• Who identified social facts?

  Emilé Durkheim
• What are social facts?

  Social forces in our environment that influence us but we can't control them
• Name an example of a social fact:

  S. class
• What is meant by correlation?


  Relationship between 2 variables where they appear to change together
• What does it mean when research is rigorous?

  When is its carried out meticulously, systematically, and accurately.
• What is the hypothetico-deductive model?

  Scientific method to gain knowledge
• What are the steps of the hypothetico-deductive model?

  1. Propose the hypothesis
  2. Performing experiments to gain data
  3. Data can prove/disprove your hypo
• What is meant by value freedom?

  When a researcher keeps their personal beliefs + opinions out of the research process so their biases don't affect the data
• What is objectivity?

  When research is uninfluenced by biases