This module is not currently running in 2025 to 2026.
This course will provide with the understanding and skills necessary to apply research methos and carrying out research project. It engages directly with core ethical issues that you will meet in any job be it in research or not.
The module adds to the skills you learn on other methods modules and will help you develop the skills to answer two sets of broader questions:
First, it critically analyses central concepts such as truth, power, ethics, and uncertainty in social research. When addressing these issues, we will engage with how they are dealt with and approached in qualitative and quantitative research. You will engage actively with these issues and critically reflect upon their own views and how they apply them in their own research projects. We particularly discuss the difficulties of causal inference and generalisation, coming to conclusions from research reviews, and philosophical issues around ‘truth’ and values.
Second, it looks at the link between research and action. In doing this, it goes from the very practical (how to ensure that your research is used by policymakers and/or practitioners, and to deal with the political pressures on researchers) to the conceptual (in what ways does evidence get used by wider society?) to the normative (should researchers be ‘critical’, and if so, what are their ethical obligations in doing this?).
Lecture 8, Seminar 16, Workshop 8
MA in Methods of Social Research (MSR) MA in International Social Policy
2,000 words Critique and Reflection at 50%
2,500 words Essay at 50%
Reassessment Method: Like-for-like
Brady, Henry E., and David C. Collier, eds. 2010. Rethinking social inquiry: Diverse tools, shared standards [2nd edition]. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield. Buroway, M (2004/2005), 'For public sociology [2004 American Sociological Association Presidential Address]'. British Journal of Sociology, 56(2):259-294. DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-4446.2005.00059.x Douglas, H (2009), Science, Policy and the Value-free Ideal. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press. King, Gary, Robert O. Keohane and Sidney Verba. 1994. Designing Social Inquiry. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Kuhn, T (1962/2012), The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Nutley, S
Walter, I and Davies, HTO (2007), Using evidence: how research can inform public services. Bristol: Policy Press. Vayda, AP & Walters, BB (eds) (2011), Causal Explanation for Social Scientists: A Reader. Alatamira Press. Weiss, Carol H (1979), The Many Meanings of Research Utilization' Public Administration Review, 39(5):426-43.
See the library reading list for this module (Canterbury)
On successfully completing the module, students will be able to:
Convey a systematic and critical understanding the various theoretical and philosophical bases for social research, different epistemological models used in the social sciences and how they relate to and differ in terms of concepts such as the role of social research and understandings of truth, power and ethics.
Critically appraise methodological choices and epistemological limits of research methodologies and studies.
Compose critical arguments and analysis of the political and policy contexts of social research, how they are related to power structures and how they influence social research as well as the reflexivity of social research.
Have a comprehensive and in depth understanding of how to conduct and present research in ways that add to knowledge as well as having wider ‘impact’.
Critically reflect on, evaluate and criticise the data analyses they encounter in the literature in their field.
University of Kent makes every effort to ensure that module information is accurate for the relevant academic session and to provide educational services as described. However, courses, services and other matters may be subject to change. Please read our full disclaimer.
