Assess the Strengths and Limitations of Questionnaires for the Study of Parental Attitudes to Education

There are many strengths and limitations of questionnaires for the study of parental attitudes to education, which could be practical or ethical issues. Positivists agree with using questionnaires, as they are reliable, because they can be repeated, and they are representative. In contrast, Interpretivists dislike the use of questionnaires, as they believe that they are invalid, because they are closed questions that can’t go into detail and they are impersonal due to the lack of depth in answers.

From item A, it shows that there are limitations of questionnaires that are studying parental attitudes to education, as is it harder to gain information from parents than it would be to gain information from pupils because it’s would take longer to contact parents as sociologists can’t access a school’s database. However a strength that is shown in item A is that parents want to be involved in their child’s education, therefore they are willing to participate in a questionnaire that shows their attitudes to education, so it is easier for sociologists to get the parents feedback. Also a person can find out a lot of information about parental attitudes from questionnaires.

There are many practical advantages of questionnaires that study parental attitudes of education. Questionnaires are quick to fill out for the participant and are quick and cheap for sociologists to produce. Therefore if there are a large number of respondents that live far apart, then it’s easier to get questionnaires to them and they can be mass produced. An example is that Connor and Dewson sent out around 4000 questionnaires to students around the country, therefore their results were widespread and they had a large sample size. Another practical advantage is that there is no need to employ and train another person to conduct or collect interviews, which saves money and time, because the respondents complete and return the questionnaires themselves. Also the data that is collected can easily be...