Positivists prefer to collect quantitative data through the following research methods which are seen to collect reliable data: This is just a quick view read more about quantitative research methods.
- closed questionnaires
- structured interviews
- official statistics
- the experiment
- social surveys
- the comparative method
The core principles of positivism are:
- social scientific research is based on logic with a clear methodology
- research must be objective throughout all processes
- the role of theory is to generate a hypothesis (prediction) which can be tested
- look for cause and effect (patterns of behaviour) in order to uncover universal laws about the social world – what Durkheim termed social-facts
The core ideas of positivism are:
- Positivism is the branch of sociology which argues society can be studied/researched by using principles similar to the natural sciences – biology; chemistry and physics. What is being applied here is sociologists can adopt an objective approach to their research just like the natural sciences do.
- The way to understand this is in the same way you might look down a microscope to objectively study some red blood cells what you see has no bearing on the gender, sexuality, age etc of the observer looking down the lens of the microscope – the observer is detached from what they see.
- Although sociologists don’t walk around carrying microscopes through which they examine society what they do instead is use quantitative methods to examine society and so in their minds are conducting objective research.
- In addition positivists seek to falsify any hypothesis they are examining, which entails looking for any evidence which will undermine a theory. Karl Popper argues why the principles of falsification are important.
- This page looks at most of the above points in greater depth
Three types of schools were established by 1944 Education Act – grammar schools; technical schools and secondary modern schools. Which type of school you ended up attending was decided by the 11+ examination, as ever this process had its advantages as well as its disadvantages:
Advantages
- the brightest 15% – 20% went to grammar schools meaning bright children were all working together creating a stimulating and academic environment of people from every social background
- brighter children could be pushed along an academic route ready to sit O and A levels and possible university in preparation for higher managerial positions in the workplace
- less academic children went to either secondary technical or secondary modern schools. The secondary technical were for children with a particularly strong practical ability (trouble was very few technical schools were ever built). The vast majority of 11+ failures went to secondary modern schools engineered to teach lower-ability students, by pooling these children together it was felt they could be taught in a more suitable environment in preparation for the workplace
Disadvantages
- most secondary modern schools were full of working-class children
- many children developed their abilities much later on but secondary modern schools were unable to meet their educational needs and so never fulfilled their potential
- the 11+ test was selected at an arbitrary age, it could easily have been a 13+ test and so the 11+ eventually became discredited as a means of predicting potential and assessing ability
- many teachers, parents and even students saw children who failed the 11+ as failures leading to a self-fulfilling prophecy with many children leaving school with no qualifications
- the 11+ test was seen to entrench social class divisions
Despite the fact comprehensive education is the most common form of schooling in Britain the debate continues regarding the strengths and weaknesses of this type of education.
The most common features of such a debate are as follows:
Advantages
- late developers can flourish in comprehensive schools better than in secondary moderns (schools which those who failed the 11+ went to). For those people who argue intelligence and ability continues to develop the comprehensive system is better placed to help late developers reach their full potential. Their evidence comes from high ability students doing just as well as those in grammar schools favouring working-class students
- large comprehensives teach a wider range of subjects as well as providing a wider range of facilities than purely academic institutions like grammar schools. This allows all children to reach their potential through a number of avenues other than just academic ones
- true mixed ability teaching means classrooms are full of children of all abilities so weaker students can learn from stronger ones
- setting and streaming within comprehensives allows students to move between sets or streams depending on the changing abilities this makes for a more tailored education as well as allowing lower ability students to make better progress
- they help create a common culture whereby one social group learns about the dynamics of another and so helps pull down social barriers and so removing social-class barriers
Weaknesses
- because classrooms contain students of all abilities, brighter pupils are held-back as the weaker learners catch-up, a problem critics says grammar schools don’t have
- as comprehensive schools have such large intakes, it makes discipline more challenging in addition the anonymity students feel in such large schools makes it difficult for teachers to get to know pupils at an individual level
- setting and streaming with comprehensives means comprehensive education is no different to the tripartite system where working-class students are invariably found in the bottom sets and streams
Social policies engineered to guarantee the well-being of a nation’s population are known as welfare policies. When 
these welfare polices are co-ordinated by the nation state they are more commonly known as the welfare state.
The state seeks to eliminate poverty, unemployment and ill-health by providing a range of services paid for through taxation, providing social security for its citizens. Up until the 1970s the term social security was the noun more commonly used to describe ‘care’ given by the state to its people this was because people paid a weekly contribution of National Insurance through their pay-packet in exchange for the benefit of social-security.
This is because social security is mainly a means of insuring against economic risk making it an insurance program.
Content analysis of the media would show an increasing use of the term welfare instead of social security during the 1990s more often than not in a derogatory manner – a 1993 Sunday Times splash about lone mothers being “wedded to welfare” being a typical example – hence the common usage of the term welfare to describe social security.
Notwithstanding this changing discourse Britain’s welfare state began with the Beveridge Report of 1942 recommending the creation of state-run welfare services to eliminate the five social curses of want; disease; squalor; ignorance and idleness. The foundation of the National Health Service (NHS) saw the start of the welfare state we recognise today.
The following link provides a clear example of many of the points listed below actually being used by social researchers 
looking into the survival time of chocolates on hospital wards.
The following extract was recorded from BBC’s Today programme on 6th December 2014.
Having studied the effect of globalisation on the state as well as society centred ; state-centred and new right theories of the state we can now listen to some actual discussions on competing theories of the state.
The discussion focuses on what size of a state we really want, what we are prepared to pay for and what we can really afford? Where do other countries draw the line? Ann Pettifor is a director of Prime Economics Policy Research in Macroeconomics. Liam Halligan is an economist and Telegraph columnist.
BBC © 2014
- qualitative secondary sources by Sam Cook a former student
Qualitative secondary sources include newspapers, films, radio broadcasts; Youtube clips; Facebook posts (diary);
autobiographies, letters; diaries; school records; police records; content analysis; minutes from meetings to name but a few. The accompanying links provide you with good examples if you’re at all uncertain as what each one is.
Advantages of this form of data:
- qualitative secondary sources are sometimes the only form of information available on a particular topic. For example Laslett’s research on the family across several centuries wouldn’t have been possible if records hadn’t been kept. This shows how this form of documentation is useful for making comparisons over time
- qualitative secondary sources provide a gateway into the past allowing researchers to understand the concerns and attitudes of people at the time. This can be carried out by reading letter columns in newspapers as well as comment postings on online newspapers such as the Guardian for example
- analysing historical documents is useful in allowing interpretivists to gain insights into the beliefs, values and ideologies held by their authors
Disadvantages of qualitative secondary sources of data
- how credible is the evidence. An individual diary entry could be full of exaggerations and biases, moreover any entry could merely reflect the interests and beliefs of the author. For example autobiographies and diaries of politicians might contain selected content in order to portray the author in a more positive light
- how representative is the evidence? It could be that other documents which would challenge an account of are ignored in order to keep the author in a positive light
- how credible is the evidence? For example newspaper accounts of an incident might reflected the values of the newspaper creating the report
factors affecting the choice of research method by Sam Cook a former student
qualitative secondary sources by Sam Cook, a former student
sociologytwynham.com 