International Social Research Methods
Framework Part 2 Key Search Terms
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This part of the framework presents a non-exhaustive list of the key terms that will be available for searching the on-line database of International Social Research Methods Case Studies. Authors should select the most relevant terms (one or more from each section) for their projects and add others that they think would be helpful for users of the database. The terms selected should be listed at the beginning of the case study under the relevant headwords.
Download the following table in Word format |
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2.1 | Disciplines | Back to the top |
anthropology, area studies, business & administration, communication sciences, demography, development studies, economics, education, environmental sciences, epidemiology, gender studies, history, human geography, international relations, law and criminology, linguistics, philosophy, political economy, political science, psychology, social pedagogy, social policy, social work, sociology, sociology of religion, sports science |
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2.2 | Topics/Themes | Back to the top |
citizenship | ||
civic and political participation, human rights, non-governmental organisations, NGOs |
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cultural life | ||
arts food practices identity leisure media religion sports value and belief systems |
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economy | ||
consumption globalisation markets organisational change productivity public debt recession trade |
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education | ||
curriculum development, evaluation , lifelong learning, management , training |
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environment | ||
climate change, sustainability, transport |
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governance | ||
electoral systems, ideology, political parties, regulation, trades unions, voting patterns, welfare regimes ,welfare states |
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health | ||
addictionsm, alcohol use and misuse, diet and nutrition, dignified dying, disability, drug use and misuse, general practice, hospitals, palliative care, physical activity, prevention,risk and safety, substance use and misuse, treatment, well-being |
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interactions | ||
communications, internet use, intersectionality, networking, relationships |
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policy | ||
benefits systems , delivery, health and social care, implementation, policy development , policy provision , poverty, professional practice, public / private sector, social exclusion/inclusion, social housing, social justice, social security, social services, welfare reform |
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socio-demographic processes | ||
children, childhood, consumption, demographic trends, family–employment reconciliation, family structure, fatherhood, gender relations and roles, integration, intergenerational relations and transfers, life course, life–work balance, migration, mobility, motherhood, parenting, population ageing, social deprivation, social mobility, social transitions, young people / youth |
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working life | ||
domestic / household labour, employer / employee flexibility, employment, unemployment, work organisation, working parents, working time |
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2.3 | Units of comparison | Back to the top |
administration | ||
central / regional / local government , companies / enterprises, labour administration, non-governmental organisations, NGOs organisations |
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cultural units | ||
artistic, leisure and sporting activities / facilities / groups, educational institutions, citizenship / faith / religious groups, media and communication networks and products, youth cultures (gangs) |
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demographic units | ||
age groups, ethnic groups, families, fathers, gender, generations, households, life course, migrants, mothers, social classes, socio-economic groups |
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economic systems | ||
agricultural, industrial and tertiary sectors, financial institutions, labour markets, trades unions |
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employment | ||
job seekers, labour markets, occupational mobility, occupational structures, pay structures, professions, public / private sector employers, unemployment, working time regimes |
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legal institutions | ||
courts, legal status and systems, prisons, rights |
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political institutions | ||
ideological groupings, interest and pressure groups, members of organisations, political parties , policy actors, policy networks |
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social protection systems | ||
benefit categories (disabled, retired, unemployed) , practitioners, service providers (education and training, health, housing, social care),social policies, welfare professionals |
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spatial units | ||
cities, communities, continents , countries, ecological systems, EU member states, regions, rural areas, towns, villages |
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spatial units | ||
cities, communities, continents , countries, ecological systems, regions, rural areas, towns, villages |
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2.4 | Concepts | Back to the top |
culture | ||
education, identity, internet use, lifelong learning, social networking, spirituality |
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politics | ||
agency, bureaucracy, civic and political participation and engagement, empowerment, leadership, legal recognition, participation, rights, transnationalism |
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socio-demographic processes | ||
ageing (biological / population, healthy), caring, childhood, distribution of household labour, family, fathering, fertility, gender, generation, grandparenting, household, life course, marriage, mothering, negotiation, parenting / parenthood, partnerships, step-parenting, transitions, youth |
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values | ||
connectedness, equity, ethnicity, identity, individualisation of rights, inequality, integration, intergenerational solidarity, social exclusion, social inclusion, social status, well-being |
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welfare | ||
care, poverty, religious welfare provision, social solidarity, stigma, take up, welfare dependency |
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work | ||
domestic labour, educational attainment, flexibility, informal economy, labour market concentration and segregation, management, reconciliation of paid and unpaid work, work–life balance, workplace, time banks |
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2.5 | Funding | Back to the top |
European organisations | ||
European Commission: Framework Programmes, Policy Directorates-General, Eurostat |
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International organisations | ||
International Labour Organisation, ILO, Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, OECD, United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation, Unesco, World Health Organisation, WHO | ||
National government agencies | ||
National government departments | ||
National research agencies | ||
Non-Governmental Organisations | ||
2.6 | Theoretical underpinnings | Back to the top |
critical realism, culturalism, interpretivism, particularism, phenomenology, positivism, post positivism, post structuralism, grounded theory, psycho-social theory, queer theory , social constructionism, universalism |
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2.7 | Methodological approaches and methods | Back to the top |
case studies | ||
embedded case studies, randomised experiments |
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comparative methods | ||
documentary searches | ||
content analysis, diaries, discourse analysis, literature reviews, project evaluation |
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mixed / combination methods | ||
qualitative approaches | ||
biographical / biographic–interpretative methods, Computer-Assisted Personal Interviewing (CAPI), ethnographic methods, focus groups, in-depth interviews, narrative method, oral history, Paper-Assisted Personal Interviewing (PAPI), participant observation, policy analysis, secondary analysis of interview data, semi-structured interviews, vignettes, visual methods |
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quantitative approaches | ||
multi-level modelling, secondary analysis, statistical analyses |
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social surveys | ||
cohort studies, cross-sectional surveys, longitudinal studies, panel studies, random stratified sampling |
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2.8 | Methodological issues | Back to the top |
bias (cultural, interviewer) , case selection, causality, comparability, contextualisation, explanation, generalisation, inference, interpretation, measurement equivalence (conceptual, functional, meaning), missing data, recruitment and retention of respondents, reflexivity, reliability, research cultures, representativeness, response rates and attrition, rigour, sampling, statistical generalisation, translation and back translation, transparency, universality (generalisation) vs particularity, validity |