Chapter 2 focuses on mainly the Theoretical perspective on families, and study methods on Families. The theoretical perspective branch off into hierarchical order of perspectives. these include, the structural functionalist, conflict perspective, feminist, ecological, developmental, symbolic interactionist, social exchange, and family systems. The way these different perspectives are broken down are their level of analysis and their respective views on the family. The two different ways these perspectives are analyzed are either micro or macro methods. Some as in the structural functionalist and conflict perspective are both macro analyzed while the symbolic interactionist, social exchange, and family systems are analyzed by micro methods. However, the other three perspectives are analyzed by using both micro and macro techniques. Continuing, there are usually only 6 different ways to conduct family research. These methods are, surveys, which are usually mailed in questionnaires, clinical research, field research which studies families in everyday life, secondary analysis which relies on data collected by someone else, experiments cause and effect scenarios with families in closed settings, and evaluation research which is confronts and deals with certain family problems (i.e, drugs, pregnancy, etc). All of these research methods have pros and cons which mainly focus on bias, cost, effectiveness, and boundary limitations.
What Interested Me:
The way some of the research methods on families are conducted. For example, studying family members in their everyday life then bringing them into a closed setting while testing cause and effect can really show the difference for how certain environments can change people. For example, someones behavior can completely change when put into different scenarios. One can be social and a leader in a work setting but when put into a more stressful situation, that person can alone become isolated and easily controlled. For example, the jail and guard study was a ground breaking experiment for seeing how people interact in different scenarios. Also, for scientists to compile this data ethically and without bias is also an are on intrigue for me.
Question:
What limitations must scientists have to ethically and correctly conduct research on a family? What boundaries must be set by scientist and family to correctly find the issue at hand and must some lines be crossed to compound the necessary research? Moreover, how can a study that doesn't cross the ethical line become ineffective? Could it be due to the certain method used and the bias of the scientist? There must be a way to find a non bias, completely ethical way to conduct a correct study on a family that addresses problems and finds solutions.
Billy Bayer
Billy,
ReplyDeleteYour question about the ethics in conducting research is a very controversial one. Some scientists will be very professional and have pre-set ethical boundaries that will not be crossed and are willing to draw new ones with the family. However, some scientists will do whatever it takes to gather the correct research. The question I ask is should more time be taken to properly assess the ethical boundaries to correctly compile research on families. For example, a non ethical scientist can produce a ground breaking study faster but may violate boundaries and in some instances laws but taking a more professional approach may take a lot longer to produce the same results. I am on the fence about your question because though I feel that scientists should not be able to cross the ethical boundaries as some do just to speed up their research, by speeding up their research it allows them to conduct more studies and gather more information. This will remain a controversial topic for ages and for me, will still remain one even if they set laws or regulations.
-Devon Schenker
Billy,
ReplyDeleteI also had a hard time with the ethical codes and scientific conduct. Because I wondered what really determined an experiment susceptible to violating the codes, and if the violation would actually be worth the while and would do more good then bad.
Brianna Edwards