Participant Observation Overt

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  • Created by: Lucy
  • Created on: 30-05-17 22:34

Participant Observation Overt

Advantages

  • Practical: researcher can behave normal/ easy to record notes/ researcher is outsider doesn't need any special knowledge if (taking part)- can go in closed minded / can ask naive but important questions/ can ask questions openly/ risk of Hawthorne effect/ access may be difficult/ flexibility
  • Validity throughout involvement - real life environment
  • Flexibility and grounded theory: helps to produce valid data and is particularly useful when studying unfamiliar situations, groups and cultures about which we know little before we start the research, modify ideas in the course of the research/ able to see actors meanings as they develop.
  • Interpretivism: the main concern of interpretivists is to understand actors meanings the key criterion by which they judge the usefulness of a method is how far it is able to produce valid data- that is, a true account of the phenomena it studies. - see it as producing rich and detailed information

Disadvantages

  • Practical:  time consuming may take years to complete/ large amount of data/ researcher needs to be sociologically trained/ personally stressful and demanding/ powerful groups may be able to prevent sociologists participating in them.
  • Representativeness: group studied is small/ the sample is often selected haphazardly/ can't be generalised the wider population as Downes and Rock note
  • Reliability: success of research depends heavily on the personal skills and characteristics of the lone researcher/ unlikely to produce reliable data.
  • Bias and lack of objectivity
  • Hawthorne effect
  • Positivists: reject the use of participant observation as an unscientific method. in their views it lacks objectivity and reliability and does not yield representative data that can be generalised to the wider population. They also reject the interpretivists claim that it produces valid data- prefer structured observation methods

Evaluation

Participant Observations (PO) gives first hand insight into a group's life but there can be problems both joining and leaving, it can be time consuming and stressful. Overt PO avoids more of the practical and ethical issues then Convert PO however can possess more ethical and practical problems. 

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