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Examine the Advantages of Sociologists Using Official Statistics in Their Research.

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Statistics is the study of the collection, organization, analysis, interpretation and presentation of data. There are variety of different types of statistics, hard statistics are numerical data that can not be manipulated, soft statistics are numerical data that can be manipulated, official statistics are produced by formal institutions whilst unofficial are carried out by informal institutions. By definition, statistical data is quantative data which increases its reliability. Using Statistics in research has a variety of different advantages.
This kind of research is cheap and easily accessible. Also, as not much time is spent on primary research, analysis will be fairly quick so the results are fairly up to date. The ready availability of official statistics mean the researcher does not have to spend time and money collecting his / her own information. Unlike in Qualitative research methods such as interviews that could possibly involve travelling costs.

It may be the case that official statistics are the only available source for a piece of research. Durkheim, for example, in his study of in 1897 used official statistics drawn from coroners' reports from different societies to establish that suicide rates varied within societies. By doing this, he was able to argue that social factors, such as religious belief, were significant variables and influences in the explanation of why people committed suicide. For some topics, therefore, secondary research is the only way to find data that relates to your study. You cannot go back in time to collect data so you have to use what has already been collected.

Despite the fact that Statistical data makes a piece of research highly reliable it also has it’s weaknesses. The definitions used by the collector of statistics may not be the same as those used by the sociologist. For example, we need to ensure that the

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