Methods of Social Investigation Exam Bank
Course Introduction
Methods of Social Investigation examines the systematic approaches used to explore, analyze, and interpret human behavior and social structures. This course introduces qualitative and quantitative research methods, including surveys, interviews, case studies, observation, and the analysis of existing data. Students will learn how to formulate research questions, design studies, collect and analyze data, and interpret findings within ethical guidelines. Emphasis is placed on developing critical thinking skills and understanding the strengths and limitations of various investigative techniques to prepare students for conducting independent research in the social sciences.
Recommended Textbook
Qualitative Research Methods for the Social Sciences 8th Edition by Bruce L. Berg
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12 Chapters
459 Verified Questions
459 Flashcards
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Page 2
Chapter 1: Introduction
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Sample Questions
Q1) A researcher examines the naturally occurring language and meanings that people give to their life experiences with a focus on emotions, motivations, symbols, and empathy. What methodology is this researcher using?
A) Qualitative research
B) Triangulation
C) Chicago School symbolic interactionism
D) Iowa School symbolic interactionism
Answer: A
Q2) Explain the basic elements of symbolic interaction.
Answer: All symbolic interactionists agree that human interaction is the center of all data and forms the source of data collection. They additionally agree that participant perspective and participant ability to feel empathy, or experience the roles of others, are crucial to symbolic interaction theory. Finally, they agree that how people in a setting define their situation determines the nature and meaning of their actions, including the meaning of the setting itself.
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Chapter 2: Designing Qualitative Research
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Sample Questions
Q1) Statements about the relationships between concepts are _______.
A) laws
B) propositions
C) theories
D) hypotheses
Answer: B
Q2) Which example is NOT a reason that concepts must be clearly defined?
A) Without clear definition, concepts are not applicable and have no meaning.
B) Interpretive research seeks to discover naturally arising meanings in populations.
C) Undefined concepts cannot fit into a body of knowledge with defined concepts.
D) Ambiguous definitions create difficulty answering research questions.
Answer: B
Q3) When creating a concept map, the connections between concepts are represented by ______.
A) nodes
B) lines
C) descriptions
D) labels
Answer: B
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Page 4
Chapter 3: Ethical Issues
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Sample Questions
Q1) What are several ways a researcher could increase success of debriefing for studies conducted over the Internet?
Answer: In Internet research, the researcher lacks the face-to-face connection that allows him/her to see when a subject is becoming upset or agitated. As such, debriefing subjects to mitigate harmful effects becomes more important. However, over the Internet, it is difficult to tell when a technical difficulty or boredom can separate the participant from the study at any point. To improve success debriefing, the researcher can obtain the respondent's e-mail address at the beginning of the study to e-mail a debriefing, or include a prominently displayed link on all pages that automatically links to a debriefing page when clicked. The researcher can also provide his/her e-mail address at the beginning of the study for questions and concerns, or direct respondents to a chat room for live debriefing after the close of the study.
Q2) Social scientists have an ethical obligation to the population they study because
A) they study human subjects
B) they use quantitative data collection methods
C) they have no influence on policy and law
D) they have no risk of inflicting physical or emotional harm to subjects
Answer: A
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Page 5
Chapter 4: A Dramaturgical Look at Interviewing
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Sample Questions
Q1) When a researcher assumes that the interview should have standard questions adapted to mirror the subjects' vocabularies and perspectives, and seeks to accommodate the varying interpretation of questions in the interview, this is a(n) _______ structure.
A) semistandardized interview
B) standardized interview
C) creative interview
D) unstandardized interview
Q2) Explain 5 of the 10 interviewer commandments.
Q3) How is the language of theatre applied to dramaturgical interviewing?
Q4) What are some of the advantages and disadvantages to conducting interviews over the Internet and email using asynchronous methods?
Q5) How can an interviewer test the interviewing instrument to make sure the wording and sequencing of questions is retrieving the type of data he/she is looking for?
Q6) Explain how to prepare a quality telephone interview.
Q7) Explain how a researcher can navigate a subject's evasion tactics during an interview.
Q8) Why is the interviewer repertoire so important?
Q9) How can a novice interviewer begin to establish an interviewer repertoire?
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Chapter 5: Focus Group Interviewing
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Sample Questions
Q1) Which technique is most effective at revealing deep level biographical experiences of a person's group?
A) Focus groups
B) Unobtrusive measures
C) Face-to-face interviewing
D) Participant observation
Q2) Historically, for what purpose have focus groups been traditionally used?
A) Psychological research
B) Social Science research
C) Advertising research
D) Marketing research
Q3) To encourage participants to speak freely, a moderator must_________________.
A) assign fake names to participants
B) provide a typed set of rules to participants
C) explain that an open, polite, and orderly environment is expected
D) ensure confidentiality through signed forms
Q4) What are some disadvantages of focus group interviewing?
Q5) What are several reasons that a focus group for complex problems should be kept to around seven participants or less?
Q6) What are some advantages of focus group interviewing?
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Chapter 6: Ethnographic Field Strategies
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Sample Questions
Q1) The worldview of the native inhabitants of a particular social environment, or insiders, is called ______________.
A) thick description
B) subjective soaking
C) emic view
D) etic view
Q2) Field research on the cultural dimensions of organizations is called ____________.
A) street ethnography
B) organizational ethnography
C) medical ethnography
D) ethnography
Q3) Conducting a study and analysis of some local or indigenous people's viewpoints, beliefs, and practices about nursing care behavior and processes as mediated by cultures is called ______.
A) new ethnography
B) macroethnography
C) microethnography
D) ethnonursing research
Q4) What are the three categories of field notes and what do they include?
Page 8
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Chapter 7: Action Research
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Sample Questions
Q1) What principle of action research can and should be applied to any research, not only action research?
A) Gathering the Information to Answer the Questions
B) Identifying the Research Question(s)
C) Analyzing and Interpreting the Information
D) Sharing the Results with the Participants
Q2) What is the role of the action researcher?
Q3) The phase of photo research in which the researcher discusses the reasons why the participant took the photo, what the image means, and what the images are supposed to depict. This is the phase in which the photographer provides his or her voice to the researcher. This is called _______.
A) selecting photographs
B) contextualizing stories
C) codifying
D) capturing photographs
Q4) What are the characteristics of action research that allow it to be utilized in classrooms, schools, hospitals, justice agencies, and community contexts?
Q5) What is photovoice, and how does it fit in with past trends in ethnography?
Q6) Explain the three phases of photovoice, and what each involves.
Page 9
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Chapter 8: Unobtrusive Measures in Research
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Q1) What aspect of research do unobtrusive measures circumvent?
A) Unethical practices
B) Researcher bias
C) Researcher reactivity
D) Unsound methods
Q2) Explain what type of unobtrusive data collection a personal letter is, and describe an example of when letters have been used in research scenarios.
Q3) An underutilized type of private archival material used in research is the ___________________.
A) letter
B) diary
C) autobiography
D) blog
Q4) Define commercial media accounts, and give an example of how they can be used as an unobtrusive data source.
Q5) What are the three types of autobiographies, and how are they used?
Q6) Define unobtrusive research, and explain how it works.
Q7) Define official documentary records, and provide an example of their use as an unobtrusive data source.
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Chapter 9: Social Historical Research and Oral Traditions
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Q1) Why are most American students not introduced to historical methods of research and analysis?
Q2) What are the goals of historical research?
Q3) A Web site that is home to the oral histories of women who served in the U.S. Army during World War II is called _______________.
A) Internet Archive
B) Slave Narratives from the Federal Writer's Project
C) What Did You Do in the War, Grandma?
D) Hogan Jazz Archive
Q4) An investigator who seeks to provide a window of understanding various symbols used in the past, such as the pink and black triangles used by Nazis to designate gay men and women, respectively, is working on what?
A) Nostalgia
B) Historical research
C) Historiography
D) History
Q5) Why are oral histories so valuable?
Q6) Define the three types of data sources that historical researchers can use.
Q7) What is an oral history?
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Chapter 10: Case Studies
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Sample Questions
Q1) What are the five researcher skills associated with conducting good case studies?
Q2) Which type of personal document requires analysis to determine why it is recorded, and then can provide a window into personal life and relationships?
A) Diary
B) Letter
C) Memo
D) Photo and video
Q3) A case study requires a deep and full examination of the case through ___________.
A) only primary sources
B) multiple methods and/or sources
C) deep detailed interviewing
D) only secondary and tertiary sources
Q4) What are several reasons that a case study to generate theory or a theory after research model can be useful?
Q5) What is a community case study, and how does it work?
Q6) Why are objectivity and generalizability to important to case studies?
Q7) Define and describe the essential elements of a case study.
Page 12
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Chapter 11: An Introduction to Content Analysis
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Q1) What is a careful, detailed, systematic examination and interpretation of a particular body of material in an effort to identify patterns, themes, biases, and meanings?
A) Content analysis
B) Interpretative approaches
C) Social anthropological approaches
D) Collaborative approaches
Q2) What is the difference between discourse analysis and content analysis?
Q3) How does negative case testing work?
Q4) What are the advantages and disadvantages of content analysis?
Q5) Which type of program has the capacity to code and retrieve while also providing special features designed to assist in developing theoretical connections between coded concepts?
A) Code-based theory builders
B) Conceptual network builders
C) Code-and-retrieve programs
D) Textbase managers
Q6) What is content analysis, and what does it seek to accomplish?
Q7) Compare narrative and nonnarrative content analysis approaches.
Q8) Explain the four guidelines to open coding.
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Chapter 12: Writing Research Papers: Sorting the Noodles from
the Soup
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Sample Questions
Q1) What is plagiarism, and what actions make up plagiarism?
Q2) Which part of a methodology section explains the way information was collected (e.g., interviews, focus groups, etc.), and how it was collected so another researcher can potentially replicate the method?
A) Analysis techniques
B) Subjects
C) Data
D) Setting
Q3) How can you avoid plagiarism?
Q4) What is the difference between a report and a peer-reviewed article?
Q5) Which is NOT a purpose of section headings in a paper?
A) Making a witty remark
B) Indicating general level of importance
C) Orienting the reader
D) Announcing major divisions of the text
Q6) What value does rewriting have in research?
Q7) A good abstract will summarize one's findings and highlight important areas of research. What are the main components that should be included?
Q8) How should sources referenced in a paper be reported? Page 14
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