Soc. 001 1st Edition Lecture 11 Outline of Last Lecture I. EmpiricismII. EmpiricalIII. GalileoIV. AristotleOutline of Current Lecture V. Clicker QuestionsVI. Empirical SociologyVII. Chapter 5 Reading Assignment NotesCurrent Lecture- Clicker Question 1: What is one benefit of empiricism, according to Wednesday’s lecture? Empiricism…o Reveals flaws in poor theory- Clicker Question 2: Regarding the astronaut’s experiment with a hammer and a feather, was this an example of theory, or was it an example of empirical evidence?o It was mostly an example of empirical evidence- It’s hard to be empiricalo It’s easy to miss stuf Basketball passing/moonwalking bear video Crime scene video with 21 changeso We can each look at the same thing and see something diferent Optical illusionso We can each look at the same thing and see the opposite Ballerina example- Clicker Question 3: What is one difficulty of empiricism? Empiricism is hard because…o It is easy to miss something, it is easy for two people to see the same thing but interpret it diferently, AND it is easy for two people to see the same thing but interpret it in opposite waysChapter 5 Reading Assignment- Scientists follow a simple method of work: Find something of interest, suggest a relationship between those concepts, and then see if that hypothesis reflects what happens in the real world; positive relationship = it does occur in the real worldThese notes represent a detailed interpretation of the professor’s lecture. GradeBuddy is best used as a supplement to your own notes, not as a substitute.- To understand the scientific method and writings, one must first understand the vocabulary usedby scientists- Concepts: the terms with which we organize things that we see o Ex. When you look out your window, you see lots of diferent “things”; but we don’t call them “things”; we might say we see trees, car, stoplights, buildings, etc.; these are conceptso **A concept is “a label that is applied to things with similar characteristics or attributes”- Constructs: words used to describe things that exist analytically but are not directly observable o Love, racism, intelligence, speed- Variables: the concepts or constructs of interest to us, which we use as our first step in conducting scientific researcho Have two important characteristics: A variable is thought to influence or be influenced by another thing- Gender influences occupation- Income influences voting behavior A variable has varying attributes (characteristics or qualities that describes a thing)- Attributes of religious affiliation: Catholic, Jewish, Protestant, Buddhist, etc.- Lists of attributes can vary depending on groups being studied, but they are ALWAYS totally-inclusive, meaning that anyone in the world can fit into one of the categories (usually done by including the categories “other” and “none” within the list as well)o When a variable influences another thing, it is a “cause” and when a variable is influenced by another thing, it is an “efect” Independent variable: one that is believed to influence something else aka the “cause” Dependent variable: one that is believed to be influenced by the independent variable aka the “efect”o Variables that vary in the same direction have a positive relationship while variables thatvary in the opposite direction have a negative relationship Positive Ex.: increased eating causes increased weight Negative Ex.: increased exercise causes decreased weight- Hypothesis: posited, or suggested, relationship between diferent variableso Can be true or false; created to test whether the relationships a true or false in the real world- Operational definition: next step of the scientific method in which one transforms the variables into things that can be observed and measuredo Listing its attributes so that you can count the presence or absence of those attributes in the real worldo Ex. Gender influences occupation Gender- Male - Female Occupation- Professional- Manager- Skilled laborer- Unskilled laborer- Not employed - Othero List of attributes must be exhaustive (every thing or person being observed must fit into one category)o List of attributes must be mutually exclusive (no one person or thing should be able to fitinto more than a single category)- Mean: the average of the data- Median: the middle number within the data- Mode: the number within the data that appears the most- Correlation: a measure of association- Causation: one thing is caused by
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