Category Archives: Chapter 15
The Significance of Touch
We live in a language-centered culture and so it is no surprise that the methods we use to investigate our social relations focus largely on language. From survey methods to life histories, from content analysis to conversation analysis, we seek … Continue reading
Affective Realism?
Is seeing believing? It’s natural to feel that when we observe events, or conduct lengthy interviews to learn what people saw or heard, we’re learning about the social world as it “really is.” But recent experiments by psychologists demonstrate a … Continue reading
Can We Save (More) Babies?
800 cities and towns have adopted a home visiting program for young mothers in an ambitious effort to reduce infant mortality in the U.S. Although home visiting programs have been used for more than a century, their popularity increased dramatically … Continue reading
Movie “Facts” … or Fantasy?
Movies based on true stories often gain a wide audience. Selma. American Sniper. The Theory of Everything. The Imitation Game. I think you could call each of them a great movie. But how accurate are they? Research by psychologists has … Continue reading
Facelessness and Social Research
Is “the world of faces” dissonant from “the world without faces”? This question is posed in a New York Times article on the social problem created by our ability to communicate directly with others through social media without actually seeing … Continue reading
Why Use Mixed Methods?
My SAGE Webinar on this topic is available at: http://youtu.be/oO3cspRrq4E Primary Sources: Schutt, Russell K. 2015. Investigating the Social World: The Process and Practice of Research, 8th ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications. http://www.sagepub.com/books/Book242232?siteId=sage-us&prodTypes=any&q=schutt&fs=1 Schutt, Russell K. 2011. Homelessness, Housing … Continue reading
A new social world in the 21st century?
A recent Boston Globe article on “online personas” was motivated by a tragic case of child neglect in Blackstone, Massachusetts. A woman who was ostensibly living with two school aged children and their father in a small home, while maintaining a cheery … Continue reading
Researching in a Social World 