METHODS OF SOCIOLOGICAL INVESTIGATION
In any line of thought or endeavor a correct method of procedure is
all-important. Inaccurate theories of procedure have wrecked nations,
hindered civilization for centuries at a time, and flooded the world
with negative and harmful ideas. It will be worth while, therefore, to
consider the methods by which sociology has advanced.
The ancient makers of social proverbs crystallized what they had
individually observed many times to be true, or what they had heard
repeated on many occasions as being true. Such methods were based on
observation and generalization, carelessly used. Moreover, the data at
the command of the makers of social proverbs were very limited.
The Hebrew prophets, fired by exalted ideas concerning the nature
of Jehovah, insisted upon a practical application of these ideas to
the daily life of the people of their time. When they perceived that
the actions and living conditions of the people fell far below the
implications of the pattern-ideas for which the name of Jehovah stood,
they vehemently proclaimed definite social ideals, and condemned all
who hindered the realization of these ideals. This method of creating
social thought is noteworthy because of the religious dynamic behind
it, and because of the social pattern-ideas which it produced.
Plato and Aristotle were pioneer social philosophers who took cosmic
views of life. One followed the method of abstract reasoning and
centered his thought in a world of Ideas; the other viewed life
pragmatically, employing a method of empirical tests. While sociology
will always have a place for methods which interpret the daily facts of
individual and social experience in their relationships to the whole
human society and to the universe, it will insist that as large a body
of societary data as possible be gathered together before philosophic
sociology speaks positively.
In the teachings of Jesus a rare insight to human nature is manifested.
Jesus studied individuals as individuals and, perceiving their selfish
natures, proclaimed a remedy in an inner transformation through
consecration to objective factors, such as persons and ideals. Jesus
was peculiarly happy in his method of moving among all classes of
people, of studying their needs, and of testing in practice his social
principles. While his acquaintance with human life was limited to
small groups of one race, he sought universal as well as particular
human tendencies. His method included an absolutely unselfish spirit,
a search for the truth, a broad viewpoint--all of which are thoroughly
scientific.
The _Utopia_ of Sir Thomas More, preceded to be sure by Plato’s
_Republic_, introduced another social thought method. The utopian
formula consists in setting forth a set of ideals which presumably are
distinctly in advance of current standards. The method of arriving at
utopian ideas is largely through the use of the imagination. Standards
are postulated so far in advance of current conditions as to make
them of little value. Utopian social thought, however, does have some
scientific merit. The imagination may be used in revealing reality to
otherwise blind individuals. A utopian thought may startle a selfish
individual out of a part of his selfishness. A utopian idea possesses
the power which is inherent in indirect suggestion; it may arouse
without antagonizing.
In the approach to the social question through an analysis of the
natural rights of the individual, the seventeenth and eighteenth social
writers fell into a deductive and a priori procedure which led them far
astray. Like the theory of individual rights, the correlative doctrine
of the social contract contained more error than truth.
The method of positivism, ordinarily connected with the writings
of Comte, essayed a scientific approach to the social question. It
insisted upon accuracy, induction, and a right emphasis upon sequence
and co-existence. But positivism, even in the hands of its exponents,
became deductive and philosophic. It promised well scientifically, but
fell into nearly all the errors which it condemned. It was, however, a
factor in producing the nineteenth century humanitarianism.
The organic analogy method of studying human society attracted
widespread attention, appealed strongly to the imagination even
of scholars, but resulted in findings of negligible value.
The parallelisms between an organism and society proved to be
scientifically valueless, except as they revealed some of the
connections between organic volution and social evolution. They created
a considerable vocabulary of bio-social terminology which has been more
of a hindrance than a help in social thinking.
The psychical approach to the study of societary life, introduced by
Lester F. Ward, and made scientific by the findings of inductive and
behavioristic psychology, has proved thus far to be the best method
of understanding the social process and of arriving at a statement of
sociological laws. This method has revealed human life as a series of
social conflicts and co-operations, and of forms of social control
designed to regulate individuals for selfish and unselfish group
purposes. An explanation of the more important phases of the psychical
methodology has been presented in several chapters of this volume.
The individual rights doctrine, the social contract theories, the
concept of positivism, and the organic analogies belong to the
unscientific age in sociological methodology. In the main these
sets of social theories were philosophic, deductive, a priori, and
argumentative. They were based chiefly on opinions, positivism alone
leaning to observation and induction but failing to live up to its
promises. On the other hand, recent decades have been marked by the
rise of scientific methods in sociology, attention has been centered
on the social process, and particularly on the psychical processes
of which the social process is an elaboration. Although he possessed
an entirely inadequate knowledge of psychology, Lester F. Ward laid
the foundations of modern sociology when he insisted that society is
a psychical affair, capable of mastering itself. As a result of this
contribution to method, not by a psychologist but by a paleontologist,
social thought moved forward into the field of scientific sociology.
There are many writers who would class Ward with the pre-scientific
contributors to sociological thought. His methods, it is true, were
largely deductive; his psychology was seriously faulty; his philosophy
was inefficient. Nevertheless, he pointed the way for sociologists so
clearly that in this treatise his work has been considered as giving
the trend to recent sociology, rather than as being the last word of
discredited types of social thought.
Then there are other types of sociological methodology of which mention
should be made, notably, the statistical, and the classificatory
procedures. The statistical approach had its origin in the early
census. There are evidences that rulers and kings, at least two or
three millenniums before Christ, had enumerations of their subjects
made. In connection with poor-law administration, people as early as
the Roman Era were counted. But it was not until the eighteenth century
that statistics became scientific, with statistical laws drawn from
a study of tabulated facts. Quetelet gives 1820 as the birth year
of statistical science. It was Frederick William I of Prussia who
is reported to have had an enumeration made of occupational facts;
and Frederick the Great, with having established a system for making
regular statistical studies of population. It is said that early in the
eighteenth century the University of Jena began to offer courses in
statistics.
In England, in the latter part of the seventeenth century, Captain John
Graunt is credited with applying methods of counting, measurement, and
induction to the births and deaths in London. His studies were referred
to as political arithmetic, and were a forerunner of the current
investigations in vital statistics. Malthus made use of statistical
methods in his work (1798) on population changes.
Quetelet (1796–1874) is usually considered the founder of statistical
science. He not only applied the method of counting to the study of
the members of human society (the census method in its common form),
but he tried to get at the problem of causation, and to indicate rules
of procedure for making causal studies in statistics. Although this
celebrated Belgian statistician tabulated and analyzed facts ranging
from the astronomical to the societary fields, his ideas can be
mentioned here only so far as they contribute to the subject of social
thought. Quetelet pointed out certain of the pitfalls in the way of
gathering accurate data. He improved the methods of census taking, and
undertook the difficult tasks that are involved in qualitative human
studies.
Among the results of Quetelet’s work, the concept of “the average man”
is well known. Quetelet defined the law of averages and described
types, especially the average individual. Although it is very important
and useful to know about the “average man,” the term is practically
fictitious, since no one even in a large group exactly fits the
description. All individuals are either “above” or “below” the average.
The contributions of Quetelet in the field of social statistics were
admirably supplemented by the achievements of Le Play (1806–1882). This
French sociologist and mining engineer applied the methods of physical
science to social science. He insisted upon observation of data and the
use of induction in making generalizations. His method is illustrated
by his studies in family budgets. In order to secure accurate data he
lived with individual families, studying at first-hand the conditions
by which they made a livelihood. Le Play opposed _laissez-faire_
theories and urged programs of reform through the journal which he
founded, namely, _La Reforme Sociale_. He rejected socialism, and
advocated the method of conciliation and sympathy for effecting
agreements among employers and employees.
Similar methods were evolved by Engels and Bücher, German
investigators. Engels’ studies of family budgets led him to draw
certain average observations. These “averages” are known as Engels’
laws, for example: (1) The smaller the income, the larger the
percentage of expenditure for food. (2) The percentage of expenditure
for clothing, and for lodging or rent, varies directly with the income.
(3) The larger the income, the larger the percentage of expenditures
for sundries (including luxuries).
The statistical method has been carried forward by a large number of
social investigators. With averages, modes, and medians, it is now
possible to make accurate quantitative studies. Current statistical
methods include the use of index numbers, frequency tables, discrete
series, deviations, skewness, correlations. Statistics has thrown
a flood of light upon important phases of societary life, such as
the economic, where wage scales and price levels are significant
concepts. Statistics has been widely utilized in the study of crime and
poverty. The various methods of graphic presentations are valuable in
interpreting tables of statistical data to the lay mind.
Statistical methods can be used, however, to prove almost anything. The
ordinary individual is helpless when statistical methods are treated
unscrupulously. On the other hand, it is probably true that social
thought will become increasingly accurate by the judicious use of
statistical studies.
A recent development, closely related to statistical science, is the
social survey. Beginning with the Pittsburg Survey in 1907–1908, the
social survey method has been widely adopted in the United States. Its
use has been applied to inventories of a specific community, such as a
rural district or a small number of city blocks. There is the specific
survey of a given social problem, such as housing or poverty. Then
there is the survey of an entire industry or a school system.
The social survey is one of the most important sources today of sound
social thinking. By it, large quantities of social facts are being
collected. Urban and rural surveys, specific and general surveys alike,
are affording the best bases at the present time for inductive social
thinking. Some of these results have been indicated in a preceding
chapter upon the contributions of applied sociology.
The nature of the classificatory method has already been indicated
in this treatise. The Greeks classified the various fields of
knowledge under three heads: physics, ethics, and politics. Francis
Bacon classified knowledge according to his understanding of mental
operations. He divided mental processes into three, namely, feeling,
memory, reasoning; and made a corresponding division of knowledge into
art, history, and science. Auguste Comte classified the social elements
into four groups: the industrial, the esthetic, the scientific, and
the philosophical (previsional). His hierarchal classification of the
sciences into mathematics, astronomy, physics, chemistry, biology, and
sociology has been discussed in an earlier chapter.
Guillaume de Greef may be considered the best exponent of the
classificatory method. De Greef accepted Comte’s hierarchy of the
sciences with its basic principles of decreasing generality and
increasing dependence of parts, assented to Spencer’s evolutionary
dictum of increasing coherence and heterogeneity, and added his own
concept of volitional contractualism.
De Greef argued that social progress is characterized by an increasing
degree of volitional activity and freedom. This volitionalism is the
basis of rational social control. The telic factors, however, are not
well developed by de Greef. His social thought rests upon a certain
logical but inaccurate classification of the social elements.
The basis of this classification is increasing volitionalism and
particularism. De Greef gives the following classification: economic,
industrial, genetic, artistic, scientific, moral, juridical, and
political. In holding that the economic elements in society represent
the least volitionalism, and the political the most volitional
activity, with graded degrees of volitional activities represented
by the intermediate factors, the weakness of de Greef’s analysis
becomes evident. While an improvement over Comte’s classification
and superior to Spencer’s mechanistic order, de Greef’s contribution
possesses only a relative degree of logical merit. It is far from
being objectively correct, and is indicative of the difficulties in
the way of classifying social elements in an evolutionary or filial
order. There is no doubt but that any classification of merit would
have to be arranged according to some correlative plan, which would
serve the purposes of an exhibit but would not be of much scientific
value. Moreover, the classifications that are most useful are those
classifications of societary forces; these are psychical in nature and
have been treated in foregoing chapters.
De Greef perceived the importance of the principle of socialization.
He emphasized the importance of a “we” feeling in societary life.
His social unit is the primitive family. In the evolution from the
primitive family and state, the evidence of progress is the degree of
“togetherness” that has been developed. De Greef advanced the idea that
there is an increasing degree of contractualism and hence of freedom
in society. De Greef’s work may be taken as the best attempt to carry
Comte’s classification of the sciences to a logical conclusion by
furnishing a classification of the elements which function in the field
of the “highest” science of all, namely, sociology.
At this point and in concluding, the methodology of Albion W.
Small will be considered. Professor Small’s other contributions to
sociological thought have been indicated at the proper places in
earlier chapters. The correct method for pursuing sociological analyses
is to treat human society in terms of process. The main current in all
sound sociological study is the social process. The significant test of
progress in this social process is achievement.[XXVII-2] According to
Professor Small’s classification, there are six main phases of social
progress, namely:
1. Achievement in promoting health,
2. Achievement in harmonizing human relations,
3. Achievement in producing wealth,
4. Achievement in discovery and spread of knowledge,
5. Achievement in the fine arts,
6. Achievement in religion.
These grand divisions are the expressions of certain interests[XXVII-3]
that human beings possess: (1) health interests, (2) wealth interests,
(3) sociability interests, (4) knowledge interests, (5) esthetic
interests, and (6) rightness interests. As a result of the operation
of these interests, social problems are produced. Sociology is “the
science of human interests and their workings under all conditions.”
In this classification human interests serve as the main key forces to
an understanding of the social process. Upon psychological examination,
however, the interests are found to be bafflingly complex. The
psychologist has not given a satisfactory description of interests. And
yet it is clear that what people are interested in is a fair criterion
of the direction which their evolution will take. Furthermore, the
changes in the interests of people are fundamental in telic social
progress. With a correlation of interests as a subjective criterion,
and of achievement as an objective test, Professor Small has shown the
dualistic nature of the social process. Those methodologists who would
measure all things human in purely objective terms are scientifically
negligent of important human elements. Mind is not simply matter; the
social process is not entirely behavior.
Professor Small has sharpened three important tools for the use of the
sociological investigator. These are: the social process, personal
interests, and the group. His analyses are sound, except as he does
not show how “interests” usually possess social origins. Otherwise
he speaks consistently and helpfully in terms of groups and group
processes.
With concepts such as have been favorably presented in the foregoing
paragraphs--and chapters--the sociologist of the future will be able to
make contributions to thought that will help to determine educational,
religious, economic, political, and other important human aims.