Research methods

Research methods in political science
RM

Exam
Brightspace quizzes, due on the following Monday at 17.00 10%
Participation counts – not performance

Final exam 90%
Content will be on the readings and the lectures (lectures are most
important, what is covered in the lecture will be on the test)
70% multiple choice
30 open questions

Lecture 1 – introduction to research methods

Scientific research
All kinds of questions might be a sub track of your scientific research

Causes -> process (events, decisions, actions) -> outcomes

The goal is often to draw up or formulate a theory




Naïve vs. scientific method
Naïve;
Rely on Personal experience
Rely on Intuition
Rely on authority
Appeals to tradition, custom & faith
Magic, superstition & mysticism
-> insufficient / incomplete data
-> either no or biased inquiry

Scientific method;
Systematic process

,Falsifiable theories

Why research methods
From institutions and anecdotes to systematic evidence

Question and problem driven

A good research question is the very important, it is the starting point

Lecture 2 – philosophy of social science

How can we develop knowledge of the social world?
This is the key question for political researchers and it can be answered
by three different approaches: positivism, scientific realism and
interpretivism

Each entail different assumptions about the nature of human behaviour
and, consequently, about the methods that are appropriate to
investigating and explaining that behaviour.

Ontology: What is the nature of the social world? Is there an
objective/subjective reality? Epistemology: What can we know about
social phenomena?
Methodology: How do we obtain knowledge?

Positivism
Search for the truth through systematic collection of observable facts

Played a key role in the middle of the last century

Established by August Comte, 1798-1857 (French philosopher)

Different positions: Classical positivism; Logical positivism; Falsification
(Popper);

Classical Positivism
naturalism (social sciences=natural sciences)

Empiricism (knowledge of the world is limited to what can be observed
and measured trough sensory experience)

The goal of social inquiry is to establish causality between events in the
world

Social world is subject to regular and systematic processes (laws are
explanatory and predictive);
 Induction (observation —> theory)
 Cause-and-effect relationships (observable “constant conjunction”,
David Hume)

,Science is objective and value-free (in the
pursuit of knowledge of the social world
through application of the scientific
methods used in the natural sciences it is
possible to distinguish between facts and
values and to treat facts as independent of
the observer and their values)

Behaviouralism (only observable behaviour may be studied)



Logical positivism
There is an objective reality
Empiricism is not the only source of knowledge – logical reasoning is also
employed;
 Deduction (theory—> observation)
 Retroduction (observation <—> theory)
 Verification (establishing truth claims)

Karl Popper
Rejected induction -> particular experiences can never justify universal
claims (Induction problem)
Rejected verifiability -> Goal must be the falsification of a theory (and
replacement with a better one) since verification of theory is pointless

Falsifiability - our aim should be to falsify a hypothesis instead of verifying

Deductive-Nomological Model (Carl Gustav Hempel) – an observed
phenomenon is explained if it can be deduced from a universal law-like
generalisation (law expresses necessary connection but an accidental
generalisation doesn’t)

Hypothetico-Deductive Model (Carl Gustav Hempel) – test ability of law to
predict events (Law —> Hypothesis -> Explicit Predictions);
 Prediction correct: Hypothesis corroborated
 Prediction incorrect: Hypothesis falsified;

Scientific realism
Social and natural worlds are similar (similar to positivism)

There is an objective reality (similar to positivism)

Reality can consist of unobservable elements as well (e.g.: structural
relationships)

Assessment by observable consequences

, Causal mechanisms instead of law-like generalisations

“Best” theory is the one that explains the phenomena the “best”

Individualism (micro-level):
Interactive relations between individuals can produce properties that are
separate and distinguishable from the individuals themselves

Ontology - the basic unit of society
are individuals, and social
phenomena are the combined
results of individual actions
Methodology - explanations of
social phenomena must be
reducible to the characteristics of
individuals

Holism (macro-level)
Society is not simply a sum of individual action and it is not reducible to
individuals

Ontology - the whole of something is distinct from and not directly
explicable in terms of its parts (social facts have to be social causes that
are irreducible to facts about individuals)

Methodology - the properties of a system as a whole cannot be deduced
by the properties of its components alone since each social entity has a
totality that is distinct (the system as a whole determines how the paths
behave)

How do macro-social mechanisms produce social outcomes?
James Coleman’s “Bathtub”
1) Believes that both levels matter, and can interact with each other
2) Individuals act within macro-entities as micro-actors
3) If you want to understand macro-level outcomes, we need to move to
the micro-level to understand it better;

interpretivism
Social world and natural world are fundamentally different (which begs for
different methods)

The social world is subjectively created (we cannot understand the social
world by searching for objective regularities)

Primary goal of social science is to achieve an understanding of human
behaviour through an interpretation of the meanings, beliefs, and ideas
that give people reasons for acting;