Research Methods: Research Design (AQA GCSE Sociology): Exam Questions

What term is commonly used by sociologists to describe information that is presented in numerical form?

Item B

Merton was interested in how different people had different opportunities to fulfil their ambitions. Merton called these ‘success goals’ by which he meant things like earning money, having a good job or having a comfortable lifestyle. Merton believed that these goals were shared by most of society, but not all people had the opportunity to achieve these success goals. Merton said that there were five ways in which individuals could respond to the success goals in society, which were conformity, ritualism, innovation, retreatism and rebellion.

An individual’s response to success goals was often determined by their opportunity to achieve them.

Source: Robert K. Merton, Social Theory and Social Structure.

Identify one ethical issue you would need to consider when investigating youth crime and explain how you would deal with this issue in your investigation.

Item C

Predicted life expectancy at birth for selected regions in England

Source: Office for National Statistics, 2021.

Identify and explain one advantage of using a pilot study to investigate life chances.

Item D

Davis and Moore believed that social stratification was vital in any human society – they said it was a ‘universal necessity’. In order for the society to function effectively, all roles needed to be filled by those best able to do them. Those in the roles must be trained effectively, and they must perform their role conscientiously.

Davis and Moore argued that in order for this to happen there needed to be a system of unequal rewards given to different positions in society.

Source: K Davis and W E Moore, Some Principles of Stratification.

Identify and explain one practical issue sociologists may encounter when researching the reasons for inequality in society.

Item C

Becky Francis studied the ways in which gender affects students learning in school. Her research involved three different London secondary schools. The schools were all mixed-sex, with a large majority of working-class pupils. Francis used observation to record classroom interaction and student behaviour during GCSE lessons. She also carried out individual interviews.

Francis observed two top set lessons and two lower set lessons in both English and Maths in each school. She was unable to accurately record all the interaction because of the sheer noise levels in some of the classes. This limited the classroom observation.

In the majority of the lessons observed, boys dominated the classroom interaction. They were louder, and more disruptive than the girls and took up more of the teachers’ attention.

Source: Francis, B, The Impact of Gender Constructions on Pupils’ Learning and Educational Choices, 2005.

From Item C, examine one weakness of the research.

Item D

In 1981 sociologist Stephen Ball undertook a case study of a comprehensive school and examined the way it was organised. The school used a banding system. Students were placed into one of three bands (similar to streaming). Band 1 contained the most able students and Band 3 contained the least able students. Ball compared the experiences of those students in Band 1 with those placed in Bands 2 and 3.

Ball noted that each band was taught differently and followed different educational routes. Only students in Band 1 were encouraged to have high aspirations and to study academic courses. During his observations, Ball noticed that students’ behaviour changed as a result of the bands that they were placed in. Ball linked this to the teacher expectations of each band. For example, Band 1 was expected to be hardworking and well behaved, while Band 2 students were expected to be difficult and uncooperative. This led to negative changes in the behaviour of Band 2 students.

Source: Ball, S. J, Beachside Comprehensive. A Case Study of Secondary Schooling, 1981.

Identify and explain one disadvantage of using snowball sampling to investigate the effects of streaming on students’ experience of school.

What term is commonly used by sociologists to describe data that accurately reflects the wider population being studied?

Item A

In 1974, Ann Oakley collected information from 40 married women who had one child or more under the age of 5. All of the women were British or Irish born and aged between 20 and 30 years old. Half of her sample were working class and half were middle class. All of the women lived in the London area.

Oakley found greater equality in terms of the allocation of domestic tasks between married couples in the middle class than in the working class. However, in both social classes, she found little evidence of their husbands sharing the housework. Only 15% had a husband who shared domestic work to a significant level.

Source: Oakley, A, The Sociology of Housework (1974)

From Item A, examine one weakness of the research.

Item A

In 1974, Ann Oakley collected information from 40 married women who had one child or more under the age of 5. All of the women were British or Irish born and aged between 20 and 30 years old. Half of her sample were working class and half were middle class. All of the women lived in the London area.

Oakley found greater equality in terms of the allocation of domestic tasks between married couples in the middle class than in the working class. However, in both social classes, she found little evidence of their husbands sharing the housework. Only 15% had a husband who shared domestic work to a significant level.

Source: Oakley, A, The Sociology of Housework (1974)

Identify and explain one advantage of using a mixed methods approach to investigate conjugal role relationships.

Item B

Writing in 1976, Eli Zaretsky argued that the nuclear family had an economic function that served the interests of capitalism. He believed the family to be a key unit of consumption; in other words families bought and consumed the products of the capitalist economy.

He also believed that it was through the family that each social class reproduced itself over time. Through inheritance, the bourgeois family transmitted its private property from one generation to the next, whilst the proletarian family reproduced the labour force by producing future generations of workers.

Source: Zaretsky, E, Capitalism, the Family and Personal Life

Identify one ethical issue that you would need to consider when investigating relationships within families and explain how you would deal with this issue in your investigation.

Item B

Carlen was interested in explaining female criminality, and conducted ground-breaking research.

She conducted her research using unstructured interviews with 39 women between the ages of 15 and 46, all of whom had been convicted of one or more crimes. According to Carlen, four major reasons were given by the women as to the cause of their criminality: poverty; being in residential care; drug and alcohol addiction; and the quest for excitement.

Although all the women had committed at least one crime for financial gain, most of them agreed that it was one of these four factors which led them to develop criminal careers.

Source: Carlen, P, Women, Crime and Poverty, (1988)

Identify one disadvantage of using a qualitative method to investigate criminal behaviour and explain how you would deal with this in your investigation.

Item C

Many sociologists are concerned about the relatively poor performance of working class pupils when compared to their middle class peers. According to a study by the universities of Leicester and Leeds middle class pupils do better because parents put more effort into their children’s education. The researchers suggested that policies aimed at improving parental effort could be effective in increasing children's educational attainment. Effort was measured using indicators of a student's attitude, such as the answers given by 16-year-olds to questions including whether they think school is a "waste of time'', and teachers' views about students' laziness. Other factors studied were the parents' interest in their children's education, measured by, for example, whether they read to their child.

The research, Must Try Harder, used the National Child Development Study, which follows individuals born in a given week in 1958 throughout their lives.

From Item C, examine one weakness in the research.

Identify one ethical issue that you would need to consider when investigating anti-social behaviour in a community and explain how you would deal with this issue in your investigation.

Item C

The sociologist Steve Craine studied the lives of 39 unqualified urban school leavers, 19 males and 20 females, over a ten year period between 1980 and 1990. As a youth worker he was familiar with the area in which these young people lived and he used both his own observations and interviews in his research.

Craine looked at how these young people’s lives developed and how they made choices about what to do next. Many of the members of this group failed to secure long-term employment. They experienced regular cycles of unemployment, government schemes and work in the informal economy. Some individuals became involved in criminal activities. Only those who received appropriate support from professionals or family members were able to escape this cycle.

From Item C, examine one strength of the research.