sociological methods :: essays research papers

MethodsAs we were interested in attitudes and experiences of our subjects we decided to use a qualitative approach to conduct our study. We wished our respondents to define their attitudes and experiences using their own haggle and meanings therefore it was considered that quantitative data was not appropriate for such a study. Qualitative study is more in-depth and much less structured than a quantitative approach, generating a greater depth of information (Mason 1996) A semi-structured discourse technique to gather our data. This was chosen because of the benefits that this method entails and because of the disadvantages of the standardised and non-standardised methods (Gilbert, 2001).The standardised specimen was discarded because although all respondents received the same gestures in the same methodicalness the system lacked credibility due a number of facts. Firstly, not every respondent may chip in the same interpretation of a question thus answers could not be compared to any degree of certainty. Secondly, the audienceer was uneffective to get through any questions that the respondent did not fully comprehend. Most importantly, though, was the fact that the interviewer was unable to explore any area that our respondent unexpectedly enlightened us to, this also hindered us from asking any supplementary questions that may throw away furthered our findings (Punch, 1998).A non-structured approach was instantly ruled out as we wished to forage specific attitudes and experiences of drugs from our respondents. A non-standardised interview could have left us with an copiousness of irrelevant material and little of any actual use.The semi-structured method has many a(prenominal) benefits. Not only does this technique give the interviewer room for scope to probe, wrap up and alter his or her interview schedule on the spot unless it is also relatively easy to code and analyse the information that is procured (Seidman, 1998). The ensampleOur sample w ere four third year students, two males and two females. trinity year was chosen as our sample year-group as this allowed the respondents time to have become fully integrated into the Stirling student life-style. The sample was approached at random in the Stirling University union, The Studio. Random individuals were asked if they were 3rd year students and if so were they willing to take part in our survey. The sample were informed of the excogitation of our research and confirmed the area of questioning which we wished to pursue. The sample was told that the location for their interview was entirely at their own discretion.