1. Describe two types of interviews.
The interview could be divided into two types. The first one is the structured interview, which is used to
select quantitative data which is reliable. The structured interview is similar to the questionnaires that
could be given to individuals or groups, and it must ask some questions each time with closed questions.
This method is always used in some large-scale explain the questions, means that the response rate of it
could be high. In addition, the benefit of this type of interview is that the interviewer could explain the
question, thus, there is low possibility that the respondent could not understand the question, which could
lead to error data. However, a coin has two side, this way could be more expensive due to the large-scale,
and thing that need to be given up is that the detail --- interviewer cannot ask for more detail as there is a
list of questions.
The second type of interview is the unstructured interview. It is not as formal as the structural interview,
so that there is not a rigid structure of list of interviews. And it is very flexible, which could be used to find
out facts or attitudes. It is also open-ended. But there are still some limitations of it, for example, due to
lack of rigid structure, the interviewer should have some skills or enough ability to interview. Also, this type
of interview is made for small sample (not very representative). Finally, it may takes up more time to write
up an unstructured interview, and the cause of it is lack of rigid structure or list, but it is freer than then
structured one.
2. (a) Explain two reasons why some social groups may be more difficult to
research than others. [8]
Criminal is a kind of social group that is difficult to research by sociologist. This is because it is
unpredictable. Sociologists cannot know who is going to commit a crime and then come to the crime scene
earlier than the police to interview the criminal who is still trying to escape.
The second reason to support the criminal is a social group that is difficult to research is that it is difficult
for sociologist to apple to have an interview to a criminal, like murderer, because the police or GOV will
not ensure the rule that do not allowing these offenders to meet with anyone other than their families. And
for sociologist, it is difficult to find a person who have committed a crime before and not yet caught by the
police, also to let him/her to admit that he/she is a criminal and have committed a crime before is rough.
Sociologists also need to consider their own safety, for example whether the offender might suddenly
become emotionally angry and try to harm them. So that is why the criminal is a kind of social group that
is more difficult to research.
Furthermore, some Rape victims are often not interviewed about this either, partly because they don't
want to recall their past memories, and partly because most rape victims are reluctant to admit that they
have been raped, let alone be interviewed in a questionnaire or face-to-face. It is also difficult for
sociologists to find many people who have been raped because they appear to be the same as ordinary
people. To save time, sociologists have to apply to organisations such as the Women's Defence Institute,
but they are often turned down for reasons of privacy.
(b) Explain one strength and one limitation of overt participant observation as a
research method. [6]
It is clear that the benefit of overt participant is that the sociologist can avoid some of the ethical
accusations that arise from conducting observations without disclosure by publicly declaring that the
experiment is being monitored by the entire staff and participants, as well as by the entire nation.
The limitations or said the drawbacks of this are also very obvious. The observed may bias the result of
the observation for some reasons, for example, they are extremely nervous and concerned about their
every move because it is an open observation, also they may decide to perform wired because they may
not want the sociologist to know their real condition. In addition, for some special social group, like criminal,
the overt observation is not very suitable. For example, if a sociologist knows where the criminal group
are and tells them he/she want to observe them, this sociologist may be in danger, or these criminals will
not behave like criminals anymore.
3. Evaluate the use of scientific methods in sociological research. [26]