Preview

characteristics of science

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
550 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
characteristics of science
Sociology is a Science in its own right, a distinct and autonomous science of a social phenomenon. It is a fact or occurrence that appears or is perceived; subject to natural and statics laws. In other words, it is the study of behavioural things. This science is a unique human enterprise that investigates and articulates facts, data and ‘truths’ of the natural world.
This inimitable science is based on common sense and scientific knowledge. Common sense is a belief whilst scientific knowledge is an accumulated study and organized by general principles. It is based and proven by laws and theories as follows.
Namely, validity is an extent to which information or data is a truthful representation of a phenomenon. There can be external or internal validity. Internal measures whether or not the results set out to tell exactly what you want to do whilst external results of this study can be applied outside ‘truthfulness’. For example, the role of an investigator. How objective was the investigator? Did he or she influence the interviewee proving biasness?
The second characteristic is objectivity. This is when a person is not influenced by personal feelings or opinions when considering and representing the facts. They must give unbiased remarks to the statement given.
Reliability is a measure of consistency. It is the extents to which the same results are obtain from repetition of the same research. For example, if the temperature in a room stays the same, a reliable thermometer will always give the same reading. A thermometer that lacks reliability would change even when the temperature does not. Note, however, that the thermometer does not have to be accurate in order to be reliable. It might always register two degrees too high, for example. Its degree of reliability has to do instead with the predictability of its relationship with whatever is being tested.
Empirical is something that must be testable, measurable, questionable, quantifiable and verifiable

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Powerful Essays

    Coun 521 Unit 1 Assignment

    • 2775 Words
    • 12 Pages

    This section should discuss the types of validity for which there is evidence and the adequacy of this evidence to support potential uses of the test.…

    • 2775 Words
    • 12 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Case 11.4

    • 503 Words
    • 3 Pages

    “Validity is the extent to which a test measures what we actually wish to measure” (Cooper and Schindler, 2014, p.257). “Reliability has to do with the accuracy and precision of a measurement procedure” (Cooper and Schindler, 2014, p. 257). Validity is more critical to measurement than reliability because without validity, reliability is meaningless. For example, a bathroom scale may give a weight each time a person weighs themselves, which proves the scale is reliable in giving feedback. If the scale displays an incorrect weight each time then it is not a valid weight and a person cannot accurately measure themselves to know if a goal is being met or not. Validity and reliability can also be thought of in terms of a person and their work. A person may show up to work on time and complete all tasks that are required everyday, which proves they are reliable, however if they tasks are not completed correctly then there is no validity to work and it must be redone. Finally, validity…

    • 503 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Reliability can be explained as the consistency of scores over time. Assessments are usually reliable when you get the same results regardless of when the assessment is taken or who does the scoring. On the other hand, Validity indicates how well an assessment actually measures what it is supposed to measure. Every assessment requires students to complete some task or activity and the validity of the task should reflect some knowledge or performance, and be consistent with current educational theory and practice. The quality of the assessment should be reliable because you would think that teachers thought carefully about the assessment before giving it to their students.…

    • 702 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    If we are looking at the validity of something it means we are measuring what we are claiming to measure, and if we are looking at the reliability of something it means if we repeat the process over and over we should always get the same if not very similar results.…

    • 429 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Reliability of data- meaning to have reliable and valid evidence of information, it has to be verified, e.g getting information from a secondary…

    • 461 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Strengths—The strength of internal consistency is its ability to provide continuously reliable measurement. Sometimes it may provide an internal consistency estimate in which the ability of different items continuously creating and ensuring the results is measureable. Internal consistency tracks down the most reliable contribution to measure the effectiveness of the context.…

    • 1532 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    For a classification system to be meaningful and useful, it needs to be valid and reliable. Reliability refers to the consistency of a measuring instrument, such as a questionnaire or scale to assess, for example, the severity of their schizophrenic symptoms. Reliability of such questionnaires or scales can be measured in terms of whether two independent clinicians give similar diagnoses (this is known as inter-rate reliability) or whether the diagnoses are consistent over time (this is known as test-retest reliability).…

    • 888 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    According to Whiston (2013), “reliability refers to the consistency of such measurements when the testing procedure is repeated on a population of individuals or groups” (pg. 40). In its simplest form, reliability refers examines the dependability of the scores. It also measures the standard error of measurement (SEM) within the instrument. The SEM is a hypothesis of what the scores would be if someone took the test more than once. Whiston (2013) continues on to explain the various types of reliability, including: test-retest, alternate or parallel forms, and internal consistency measures. The designers and authors of the Values and Motives Questionnaire explain that the measurement used internal consistency reliability with the sample (Values and Motives Questionnaire, n.d). Internal consistency of reliability simply means that…

    • 1068 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    * Reliability is measured by the degree to which a test correlates with itself, and validity is measured by the degree to which the test correlates…

    • 1932 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Validity and reliability are the backbone of what is accepted as scientific proof by researchers. Potential challenges to reliability of a research question, data, and analyses are any significant results must be repeatable. Anyone who wanted to perform the same experiment applying the same conditions should arrive at the same result. If this is successful this reinforces the results and makes a larger population accept hypothesis. Potential challenges to validity of a research question, data, and analysis is making sure whether research actually measures what it claims to measure. If someone else who looked at the research and questions if the research really measures what it supposed to, the research results are in danger of being null and void and research findings wouldn't carry weight. Potential challenges to validity and reliability of data and analysis is making sure data is reliable in the first place before any test is applied. Any misconstrue data or oversight from beginning will leave false data entered in the statistical hypothesis test that would not produce accurate results. Challenges to validity of data, and analyses are meeting requirements of the scientific research method. Following all requirements and proper procedures when gather information, chosen right population and sample sizes, and any other requirements when using method. Accurate interpretation of data is a potential challenge to reliability of data. If the research results are not interpreted correctly this leads to a cloudy analysis because data is not appropriately examined according to research…

    • 261 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    unit 7

    • 3346 Words
    • 9 Pages

    Sociology is the study of society and the different social structures within it. Sociology examines the role of the individual within society; it is viewed as the scientific study of society…

    • 3346 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Family Presence

    • 2640 Words
    • 11 Pages

    Reliability refers to the consistency of the results obtained (Burns & Grove, 2003, p 45). The method used to test the reliability of the research was calculated by Cronbach 's alpha. This method revealed overall consistency indexes of 0.92 and 0.91 indicating high internal consistency. [Excellent]…

    • 2640 Words
    • 11 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Validity refers to the instrument actually measuring the variable of interest. There are four primary ways of considering validity: face validity, content validity, criterion validity, and construct validity (CourseConnect, 2016).…

    • 699 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Assessment and Learner

    • 1697 Words
    • 7 Pages

    * Reliability – the ability to be relied on or depended on as for accuracy, honesty or achievement. (dictionary.com) it can also mean - Reliability in assessment is about consistency. Consistency refers to the same judgements being made in the same, or similar contexts each time a particular assessment for specified stated intentions is administered. (http://www.saqa.org.za/docs/critguide/assessment/ch03.pdf)…

    • 1697 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Many types of reliability are used in research. Alternate-form reliability is the degree of relatedness of different forms of the same test. An example of alternate form reliability is a psychological test where the questions are changed. Internal-consistency reliability is the overall degree of relatedness of all items in a test or all raters in a judgment study. Internal-consistency is measured between different items on the same test. For example, if a respondent expressed agreement with the statements "I like to ride roller coasters" and "I've enjoyed riding roller coasters in the past", and disagreement with the statement "I hate riding roller coasters", this would be indicative of good internal consistency of the test. Item-to-item reliability is the reliability of any single item on average. An example would be the reliability of two items such as a collectors coins that are identical. Test-retest reliability is the degree of temporal stability (relatedness) of a measuring instrument or test, or the characteristic it is designed to evaluate, from one administration to another. (Rosnow, 2008) Statitcs.com (n.d) states, “a group of respondents is tested for IQ scores: each respondent is tested twice - the two tests are, say, a month apart. Then, the correlation coefficient between two sets of IQ-scores is a reasonable measure of the test-retest reliability of this test.” (Para. 2) It is more reliable…

    • 1159 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays