Making Sense of the Social World: Methods of Investigation - Softcover

Chambliss, Daniel F.; Schutt, Russell K.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 141292717X ISBN 13: 9781412927178

Publisher: SAGE Publications, Inc, 2006

Synopsis

Congratulations to esteemed author Russell K. Schutt, 2007 recipient of University of Massachusetts, Boston′s Chancellor′s Award for Distinguished Service!

In this Second Edition of the bestselling Making Sense of the Social World: Methods of Investigation, authors Daniel F. Chambliss and Russell K. Schutt once again provide students with an engaging, innovative, and accurate introduction to social research. More than a brief derivative of Schutt′s widely successful Investigating the Social World, this version is written in a less formal, occasionally humorous style, with more concise examples drawn from everyday experience, and less coverage of complex or more rigorous methods.

New to the Second Edition:

• Provides greater detail on qualitative data analysis: A new chapter draws attention to the distinctive features of qualitative data analysis and illustrates several different approaches. There is a new section in this chapter on visual sociology and more on computer-assisted qualitative data analysis.
• Offers an expanded appendix on secondary data resources: The appendix on sources of secondary data has been greatly expanded and now includes instructions for using the resources available at the Inter-university Consortium on Political and Social Research (ICPSR).
• Provides writing techniques: New sections on writing techniques and literature reviews provide tips for writing clearly and on preparing a composite literature review.
• Improves clarity of traditionally difficult topics: There is expanded coverage of conceptualization, units and levels of analysis, ecological fallacy, and the varieties of longitudinal research designs to provide a better understanding of these often difficult topics. The authors also include mnemonics–memory tricks–to help students remember important distinctions.
• Increases international examples: Reflecting the increasingly global scope of social science research, more examples are included from researchers in other countries or about persons from countries outside the United States.
• Expands treatment of human subjects issues: More details are provided about how to consider ethical issues involving the treatment of human subjects in research, as well as the increasing role of university IRB′s in student research.

Accompanied by High Quality Ancillaries!

• Student Study Site at http://www.pineforge.com/mssw2/index.htm: includes journal articles, online exercises, and much more!
• Instructors′ Resources on CD-Rom contain a variety of carefully developed and useful materials for the instructor. Included on the IRCD are teaching resources, student projects, a multitude of test questions, Powerpoint slides for every chapter and reformatted Exhibits from the book that can be printed for overhead transparencies or incorporated into Powerpoint slides created by the instructor.

at : includes journal articles, online exercises, and much more!

To request an IRCD for this book (qualified instructors only) please contact Customer Care at 1.800.818.SAGE (7243) (6 am – 5 pm Pacific Time).

Intended Audience:
This is an excellent introductory methods text for undergraduate research courses in the fields of sociology, criminal justice, media studies, political science, and public administration. It is ideal for students who need to understand how social research is done and appreciate the results, but may never do research themselves in the professional lives.

About this title

About the Authors

Daniel F. Chambliss, PhD, is the Eugene M. Tobin Distinguished Professor of Sociology, Emeritus at Hamilton College in Clinton, New York, where he has taught from 1981 to 2023. He received his PhD from Yale University in 1982; later that year, his thesis research received the American Sociological Association’s (ASA’s) Medical Sociology Dissertation Prize. In 1988, he published the book Champions: The Making of Olympic Swimmers, which received the Book of the Year Prize from the U.S. Olympic Committee. In 1989, he received the ASA’s Theory Prize for work on organizational excellence based on his swimming research. Recipient of both Fulbright and Rockefeller Foundation fellowships, he published his second book, Beyond Caring: Hospitals, Nurses, and the Social Organization of Ethics, in 1996; for that work, he was awarded the ASA’s Eliot Freidson Prize in Medical Sociology. In 2014, Harvard University Press published his book How College Works, coauthored with his former student Christopher G. Takacs. His research and teaching interests include organizational analysis, higher education, social theory, and comparative research methods. In 2018, he received the ASA’s national career award for Distinguished Contributions to Teaching.

Russell K. Schutt, PhD, is professor emeritus of sociology at the University of Massachusetts Boston, where he received the 2007 Chancellor’s Award for Distinguished Service and taught from 1979 to 2022. He is also a Clinical Research Scientist I at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and a Lecturer (part-time) in the Department of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School. He completed his BA, MA, and PhD degrees at the University of Illinois at Chicago and was a postdoctoral fellow in the Sociology of Social Control Training Program at Yale University (where he met Dan). In addition to ten editions of Investigating the Social World: The Process and Practice of Research and one of Understanding the Social World, as well as coauthored versions for the fields of social work, criminal justice, psychology, and education, his other books include Homelessness, Housing, and Mental Illness (2011), Social Neuroscience: Brain, Mind, and Society (coedited, 2015), and Organization in a Changing Environment (1986). He has authored and coauthored more than 65 peer reviewed journal articles, as well as book chapters and research reports on homelessness, mental health, organizations, law, and teaching research methods. His currently a Dual Principal Investigator (with Matcheri Keshavan, MD) in randomized comparative effectiveness trial of two socially-oriented interventions to improve community functioning among persons diagnosed with serious mental illness, funded by the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI). His other recently concluded research includes co-principal investigator on a National Science Foundation-funded study of the social impact of the pandemic in Boston, and co-investigator on a Veterans Health Administration-funded study of peer support.  His earlier research has been funded by the National Cancer Institute, the Veterans Health Administration, the National Institute of Mental Health, the Fetzer Institute, and state agencies. Details are available at https://blogs.umb.edu/russellkschutt/.

Edition details

• Publisher: SAGE Publications, Inc
• Publication date: 2006
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 141292717X
• ISBN 13: 9781412927178
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 2
• Number of pages: 368