HSCRP Feb 2012

Positivism and Interpretivism

Positivism is the view that sociology can and should use the methods of the natural sciences, (e.g. physics and
chemistry). That doesnt usually mean using experiments because there are all sorts of ethical problems with
doing that, but positivists do believe that sociologists should use quantitative methods and aim to identify and
measure social structures.

Anti-positivists, or interpretivists, argue the opposite. They take the view that since human beings think and
reflect, scientific methods are inappropriate for the study of society. Unlike objects in nature, human beings can
change their behaviour if they know they are being observed. So interpretivists argue that if we want to
understand social action, we have to delve into the reasons and meanings which that action has for people.
Take the example of crime. A positivist would argue that researchers can simply measure crime using
quantitative methods and identify patterns and correlations. An interpretivist would argue that sociologists need
to understand what people mean by crime, how they come to categorize certain actions as criminal and then
investigate who comes to be seen as criminal in a particular society.

These views thus reflect the main positions in a debate now rather old about whether sociology can or
should be scientific. More recently, many sociologists avoid these polarised positions and adhere to what is
called realism. Realists acknowledge that scientific methods are not foolproof (e.g. see Kuhn) and agree that
humans are reflective. However, they would say that this doesnt mean that either set of methods, positivist or
interpretivist, have to be ditched. Realists argue that sociologists can be pragmatic and use whatever methods
are appropriate for particular circumstances. Social reality is complex and to study it, sociologists can draw on
both positivist and interpretivist methods.

Three Key Concepts

Reliability, Validity, and Representativeness

These are vital concepts, so learn them and get them right! Warning they are easily confused, so you need to
concentrate carefully.

Representativeness is the research showing us what is typical? Can we make generalisations from it? A
study of a group of girls from one town in the UK which found that they did better than boys in secondary
school, but earn less than boys when they get work would be representative if it was found to be typical of most
other towns in the UK. Sociologists interested in representativeness tend to be positivists they want sociology
to be scientific.

Reliability if a research finding can be replicated the research is reliable. Positivists (see below) see this as a
desirable characteristic, because they want sociology to be like science. Look at it this way; if an experiment
kept giving different sets of results, scientists would say they were unreliable. So, sociologists taking a positivist
approach want their research to be reliable. Scientific findings are supposed to be reliable if different
Acknowledgements
http://tutor2u.net/blog/index.php/sociology/comments/sociology-revision-
methodology-positivism-and-interpretivism/
 HSCRP Feb 2012
scientists repeat important experiments, they are supposed to get the same results. The idea is that if results
can be repeated, they are likely to be true.

Validity Not the same thing as reliability at all. It simply means does the research give a true picture of
reality? Are the findings valid? A more complicated definition of validity is to say its about whether the research
measures what it is supposed to measure. This is a more theoretical definition and relates to what is called
operationalisation. Operationalisation is about how a researcher defines some aspect of society they want to
study. Examples would be class, gender or educational attainment. The last two are fairly easy we use the
indicators of sex or level of qualifications attained. But things social structures or forces like class are
impossible to see, so researchers have to pick something observable to indicate the presence of a particular
part of society.

This gets difficult! The best or at least, most important example is Durkheims study of suicide. Durkheim
argued that suicide rates were caused by the level of social integration (impossible to see) in a society.
However, interpretivist (or anti-positivists) critics argue that Durkheim wasnt really measuring social integration,
but rather the likelihood of coroners to bring in suicide verdicts, which was in itself heavily dependent on their
own religious beliefs.

Good research would ideally be reliable, valid and representative. In reality, its very hard for any single piece of
research to be really robust on all of these criteria. Some research does come close to it though, when
methods are triangulated; that is, researchers use a mixture of quantitative and qualitative methods, thus
making it easier to achieve all three of these key criteria. But researchers do not always triangulate in this way;
it does very much depend on their theoretical approach and the aims of a particular research project.

Acknowledgements
http://tutor2u.net/blog/index.php/sociology/comments/sociology-revision-
methodology-positivism-and-interpretivism/