Paper 3 Guidance (AQA A Level Sociology): Revision Note

What is examined in AQA A Level Sociology Paper 3?

• This paper focuses on crime and deviance with theory and methods, which includes:

  • crime and deviance

  • theory and methods

• The paper's duration is 2 hours

• Paper 3

  • is worth a total of 80 marks

  • represents 33.3% of the A Level

  • is made up of two parts and six questions

• You must answer all questions, as there is no choice of question on this paper

Layout of Paper 3

• The layout of Paper 3 is the same every year:

• Throughout the paper, you are expected to:

  • link your answers to the two core themes of the course, which are:

    • socialisation, culture and identity

    • social differentiation, power and stratification

  • focus on UK society today, making comparisons with other societies and referring to globalisation where relevant

  • use sociological concepts, theories, research findings and the names of sociologists, as all of these are credited by examiners

• Answers to questions worth 10 marks or more should be written in continuous prose

Crime and Deviance (Questions 01 to 04)

• This part of the paper consists of the following types of questions:

  • Two short answer questions:

    • 'Outline two...' for 4 marks

    • 'Outline three...' for 6 marks

  • One 10-mark 'Analyse two...' question

    • This must be answered using material from Item A

  • One 30-mark 'Evaluate...' essay question

    • This must be answered using material from Item B and your own knowledge

• Any area of the crime and deviance specification can be examined by any of these four question types

• The crime and deviance questions are worth 50 marks in total

  • The 30-mark essay alone is worth more than a third of the marks on the whole paper

Key concepts and theories

• The specification does not name particular studies, but you need to know the sociological explanations of all of the content listed below:

• Crime, deviance, social order and social control

  • The functionalist, strain, subcultural, Marxist, neo-Marxist, interactionist and realist explanations of crime and deviance

• The social distribution of crime and deviance by ethnicity, gender and social class

  • Recent patterns and trends in crime

• Crime in contemporary society

  • Globalisation and crime

  • The media and crime

  • Green crime

  • Human rights and state crimes

• Crime control, surveillance, prevention and punishment

  • Victims of crime

  • The role of the criminal justice system and other agencies

Theory and Methods (Questions 05 and 06)

• This part of the paper consists of the following types of questions:

  • one 10-mark 'Outline and explain two...' question, which has no Item

  • one 20-mark 'Evaluate...' essay question, which must be answered using material from Item C and your own knowledge

• Either question can be on sociological theory or on research methods

• Question 06 is not a Methods in Context question

  • You are not asked to apply a method to a particular research issue, and you do not need to link your answer to crime and deviance

  • E.g. it could ask you to evaluate the view that sociology can be a science, the usefulness of a perspective or the relationship between sociology and social policy

• The two questions need different approaches

  • There are no marks for evaluation in Question 05, so students who evaluate do not lose marks, but they do lose time

  • In Question 06, both analysis and evaluation are rewarded

• The Theory and Methods questions are worth 30 marks in total

• Theory and Methods is also examined in Paper 1, so the content below needs to be revised for both papers

Key concepts and theories

• Ensure that you know all of the research methods content listed below that is named in the specification:

  • Quantitative and qualitative methods of research and research design

  • Sources of data, including questionnaires, interviews, participant and non-participant observation, experiments, documents and official statistics

  • The distinction between primary and secondary data, and between quantitative and qualitative data

  • The relationship between positivism, interpretivism and sociological methods, and the nature of social facts

  • The theoretical, practical and ethical considerations that influence the choice of topic, the choice of method and the conduct of research

• You will also need to know the following sociological theory content that is named in the specification:

  • Consensus, conflict, structural and social action theories

  • The concepts of modernity and postmodernity in relation to sociological theory

  • The nature of science and the extent to which sociology can be regarded as scientific

  • The relationship between theory and methods

  • Debates about subjectivity, objectivity and value freedom

  • The relationship between sociology and social policy

How should I manage my time in Paper 3?

• You have 120 minutes to earn 80 marks

  • This works out at 1.5 minutes per mark

• The two essays (Questions 04 and 06) are worth 50 of the 80 marks, so they should take up around 75 minutes of your time

  • Both essays need a brief plan, which is included in the suggested times above

• Keep your answers to Questions 01 and 02 short and precise

  • State each point and develop it in a sentence or two, then move on

  • Examiners report that many students over-write these answers and then run out of time on the essays

• Do not spend more than 15 minutes on either 10-mark question

• Question 06 is the last question on the paper, so make sure that you leave a full 30 minutes for it