SOSC 3800 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Causal Reasoning
4 Oct 2017
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Researchers - use direct observations and systematic observations. Systematic - planned activities to observe certain social phenomenon. Causal reasoning recognizes that future circumstances are somehow rooted in or conditioned by present ones - cause and e ect relationship. Eg. getting good grades - put in e ort, study, understanding material - cause and e ect. Eg. poverty and crime; marginalization and crime - living conditions, lack of income, unemployment - conducive factors that explain higher levels of crime in a particular social group. Probabilistic reasoning - interested in understanding causes that produce certain types of outcomes - probability/likelihood of the cause/e ect - explaining and predicting possible outcomes. Eg. reasons why public demonstrations occur in particular contexts - past grievances, organization and leadership in that community, resources - these will predict likelihood versus communities where these elements do not exist. Di erent strategies used to explain a particular phenomenon.
