My collaboration with Sociologicamente will focus on social research methods . Those who don't know me should know that I've been working in this field for… I'm a little embarrassed to say it… over forty years. I began doing social research as a university student; I continued immediately afterward as a recent graduate, then as an employee of public research institutes, and finally as a freelancer. I taught Social Research Methodology in Trieste and Campobasso (not much, I quickly tired); I founded – with others – the Italian Society of Sociology and the Italian Evaluation Association , in which I held important positions until my undisciplined spirit made me prefer to run alone. I've taught research methods and techniques in countless courses, master's programs, and seminars, written books on social research and evaluation techniques, and, in short, I eat bread and techniques every day.
Now I will try to offer you a series of articles on topics ranging fromepistemology to the methodology for remote servicesSooner or later, there will also be practical, operational suggestions related to techniques, but a certain pedantry forces me to take them at a distance because—as I will explain several times—techniques are merely prosthetics. I have always thought, and said many times, that the operational part of research (the one we do with techniques and instruments) is never a problem; a well-trained monkey could administer questionnaires and manage focus groups, and I'm only half being ironic.
Social research is not the techniques
I wrote above: " Techniques are prostheses ." Prostheses, like the glasses I have to wear on my nose to correct the rigidity of my crystalline lens; prostheses like a car that takes me far without effort, or like the computer I'm using to write this text, which stores and organizes my words with certainty and precision. And what are techniques "prostheses" of? Think about it for a moment, because it's truly a fundamental point. Thought? Found the solution? Well, techniques are prostheses of our intelligence , of our logical capacity, of our sociological imagination, or, if you prefer a more organic image, let's say: of our brain.
The aim of the researcher
The researcher has a topic to investigate for a specific purpose. The researcher's goal might be, for example, to validate a theory; for the evaluator, it's to verify the effectiveness of a policy. In any case, what they ultimately produce will be a text that argues for a hypothesis (for example, this policy is effective in this case but is subject to such and such constraints and runs such and such other risks...). What does it mean that the researcher "argues"? It means they propose a structured reasoning based on logical inferences that, in turn, are supported by empirical evidence. It's not this "evidence" that constitutes the arguments; data doesn't speak for itself, nor does textual information. It's always the researcher who connects information , data , social actors , context , etc., and infers whether that policy worked or not (or whether a given theory was validated or not). There's naturally a strong difference between the so-called "natural" sciences and the social sciences, but we won't discuss that now. What is certain is that the researcher's arguments are supported, based on, and draw strength from data and information collected using research techniques.
Primates and focus groups…
The expert researcher, therefore, doesn't use "random" techniques (or, worse, only those he knows), but rather, precisely, those techniques that will construct the data (data is always "constructed," never "found") in the informative format needed to construct the argument most effectively in that given case, in that context, to answer the initial research questions. Returning to the monkey capable of administering questionnaires: the heart of research, its profound complexity, lies in everything that happens before entering the empirical field. The researcher must invest time and effort in designing the research effectively, validly, and rigorously; he must imagine operational solutions, even novel and innovative ones. This is the creative, intellectual part of research; after that, we can engage the famous monkey.
Ultimately, we put all our intelligence and expertise into this initial ideation phase; this is where we stake our credibility. Then, of course, if you don't have any monkeys handy, you'll have to administer questionnaires, conduct focus groups, and analyze data yourself. But by then, you've already played your hand.
We will explore all these points in more detail in future articles.
If you want, you can write to me at claudio.bezzi@me.comI won't be able to respond to everyone personally, but I'll take your questions and opinions into account in future articles.
Claudio Bezzi
