SY4007:04
Research Design in Sociology
Townsville, Cairns
Prerequisites: Admission to Sociology Honours program on recommendation of HoS
26 hours classes. First semester.
Available to Sociology honours students (see SY4001 above for details on eligibility).
Staff: Professor S Crook and other staff.
The subject links general and often abstract issues in social science methodology to the pragmatic task of designing an honours research project in Sociology. The sequence of topics matches the stages of the design of an honours project, beginning with the identification of research areas and the formulation of research questions, moving through choice of research method and ending with the composition of a formal research proposal. General methodological issues to be examined include: the relations between sociological knowledge and other knowledges of the social world; causality, explanation and prediction in social science; meaningful action and social scientific understanding; the sociological analysis of speech, texts and visual images. Students are encouraged to relate these issues to the choices they make in the design of their own research projects.
Learning Objectives:
- identify and manage the stages in the design of an honours-standard research project in Sociology;
- recognise the basic principles underpinning different approaches to the methodology of the social sciences;
- understand the links between the practice of research design in Sociology and debates about the methodology of the social sciences.
Assessment by 10 class-based exercises (50%); draft research proposal (50%).