5
Assignment 2
Nicardo Blake
University At Albany
Social Research Methods
In Choi
10/06/2022
Overview
The study on the effects of weed use among UAlbany University students was guided by three research questions that subsequently resulted in the development of three propositions. The first proposition was that there is a relationship between gender and the likelihood to use marijuana and the literature review supported this proposition. The second proposition was that there is a strong relationship between racial background and marijuana use in UAlbany. Likewise, an extensive review of literature supported this proposition. The final proposition was that social class has an impact on marijuana use among UAlbany students and this too was corroborated after an analysis of existing studies.
Concepts’ Nominal Definition
The concept in the first proposition is gender. Gender could be defined in numerous ways. According to O’Connor (2010), gender is defined as the social attributes and opportunities that are correlated with being male or female. Gender may also be defined as the relationships existing between men and women and boys and girls. Furthermore, O’Connor (2010) explained that these attributes, opportunities, and relationships that define gender are socially constructed and learned as people socialize among themselves. Phillips (2005) defined gender as the roles and expectations attributed to males and females in society. These roles are not rigid and they change with time, place, and stage in life. As such Phillips (2005) concurred with O’Connor (2010) on gender being a social construct and not a biological construct.
The concept in the second proposition is race. Omi & Winant (2015) defined race as a system adopted to classify humans in groups based on phenotypical features. Like gender, race is also a social construct and not a biological one. On the other hand, Lane et al. (2020) defined race as a social construct that groups people into different categories based on their physical appearances. These appearances are mainly based on the skin color. Other definitions of race state that it is an ideology that has been adopted that perceives human beings to belong to different groups based on inherited physical and behavioral variations (Hopcroft, 2018).
Likewise, the third concept is social class or status. One definition of social class is that it’s a division existing in society that is based on both economic and social status of people in that society. Those with more economic and social resources are perceived to be of a higher social class than those with fewer economic and social resources (Noonan & Liu, 2021). Another definition states that a social class is a group of individuals in society that have similar socioeconomic status. It’s a stratification approach that is used to group people based on what they possess Drudy (1991).
Hypotheses
From the above definitions of the concepts in each of these propositions, the following hypotheses can be derived:
Proposition 1: There is a relationship between gender and the likelihood to use marijuana.
Hypothesis 1: Male university students are more likely to use marijuana than female university students.
Proposition 2: There is a strong correlation between racial background and marijuana use.
Hypothesis 2: African-American and Hispanic university students are more likely to engage in marijuana use than their white university counterparts.
Proposition 3: Social class backgrounds have an impact on marijuana usage.
Hypothesis 3: University students from low-class social backgrounds are more likely to engage in marijuana use than university students from middle and high-income social class backgrounds.
Variables Operationalization
The first variable in this study is gender. For this study, gender will be measured as either male or female. The second variable in the study is race. In the study, an individual’s self-report of race will be the most effective measure to use. The categories that will be available for this variable include white, African-American, Hispanic, and Asian. The other variable for this study will be social class. This variable will be measured based on various aspects. First aspect will be education where the measure will be categorical (scale indicating the highest level of education for the people in the community being studied). Also, income will be considered including average family income, federal poverty thresholds, and neighborhood poverty indicators. Another aspect that will be measured in this variable is occupation where the current or the highest job title people in a neighborhood have occupied.
Level of Measurement
The gender variable will be measured using the nominal level of measurement. In this level, the variable is simply named uniquely and each name does not imply ordering of any sort. Therefore, male and female will be unique attributes with no ordering. Concerning the race variable, the nominal level of measurement will also be used. The rationale for this is that racial composition is entirely a name with no ranking placed on either race. Finally, the social class variable will be measured using the ordinal level of measurement. This level measures attributes that can be ranked. Attributes such as income and he highest level of education can be ranked. On the other hand, the nominal level will also be utilized for this study since occupation can only be attributed to a name.
References
Drudy, S. (1991). The classification of social class in sociological research. The British Journal of Sociology, 42(1), 21. https://doi.org/10.2307/590833
Hopcroft, R. L. (2018). Race and ethnicity. Sociology, 213-238. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315169446-14
Lane, K., Williams, Y., Hunt, A. N., & Paulk, A. (2020). The framing of race: Trayvon Martin and the Black Lives Matter movement. Journal of Black Studies, 51(8), 790-812. https://doi.org/10.1177/0021934720946802
Noonan, A. E., & Liu, W. M. (2021). Social class. Psychology and the Social Class Worldview, 7-17. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429317606-2
O’Connor, K. (2010). Gender and women’s leadership: A reference handbook. SAGE.
Omi, M., & Winant, H. (2015). Racial formation in the United States (3rd ed.). Routledge.
Phillips, S. P. (2005). Defining and measuring gender: A social determinant of health whose time has come. International Journal for Equity in Health, 4(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/1475-9276-4-11