Premium
BRINGING THINGS TOGETHER: DEVELOPING THE SAMPLE SURVEY AS PRACTICE IN THE LATE NINETEENTH CENTURY
Author(s) -
GUNDELACH PETER
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
journal of the history of the behavioral sciences
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.216
H-Index - 26
eISSN - 1520-6696
pISSN - 0022-5061
DOI - 10.1002/jhbs.21831
Subject(s) - intuition , coding (social sciences) , sociology , politics , survey data collection , sample (material) , psychology , survey methodology , cognition , epistemology , social science , political science , law , philosophy , statistics , cognitive science , chemistry , mathematics , chromatography , neuroscience
The first sample surveys in the latter parts of the 19th century were an intellectual social movement. They were motivated by the intention to improve the economic and political conditions of workers. The quantitative survey was considered an ideal because it would present data about the workers as facts, i.e. establish a scientific authoritative truth. In a case study from Denmark, the paper shows how the first survey – a study of seamstresses – was carried out by bringing several cognitive and organizational elements together: a network of researchers, a method for sampling, the construction of a questionnaire, a procedure for coding, and analyzing the data. It was a trial and error process where the researchers lacked relevant concepts and methods but relied on their intuition and on inspiration from abroad.