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• • • •• • • • •• Is sociology scientific? The research process . - - . .. .. Causation and correlation Research methods .. Ethnography Experiments Biographical research Comparative research Historical analysis ComIJarative-historicaI researcli Sociological research in the real world Restating the obvious? The influence of sociology Sumllla ry {Joi Ilts Further reading Internet links (opposite) Why hang out m pubJtc toilets? owards the end of a working day, the public toilets of a particular park in TSt Louis, Missouri, in the United States, are suddenly busier than one might expect. One man walks in dressed in a grey suit; another has on a base­ ball cap, trainers, shorts and a T-shirt; a third is wearing the mechanic's uniform from the garage where he has repaired cars all day. What are these men doing here? Surely other toilets are more conveniently located. Is there some common interest besides the toilets themselves that brings them to this place? None of these men is visiting the toilets to use them for the purposes for which they were officially built: they are there for 'instant sex'. Many ASKING AND ANSWERING SOCIOLOGICAL QUESTIONS the book caused widespread controversy when it was published, and for some people the issue is still a difficult one to deal with today. For example, Humphreys' research methodology was heavil y criticized for being unethical because his fieldwork had to be covert; it did not involve seeking the informed consent of the men he studied. However, his research in the 'tearooms' was able to cast new light on the struggles of men who were forced to keep their sexual proclivities secret. He showed that many men who otherwise live 'normal' li ves - the people next door - find ways to engage in embarrassing behaviours that will not harm their careers or family lives. Humphreys' research was conducted at a time when there was much more stigma associated with gay and lesbian identities and when police were vigil ant in enforcing laws In contrast to Humphrey's covert research, against such behaviour. Many lives were increasingly the subjects of research are ruined in the process of harsh law enforce­ themselves involved in the research process and may help to formulate questions or ment. Humphreys spent an extended period of comment on the researcher's interpretation of their views. time researching public toilets because one excell e nt way to understand social processes is to participate in and observe men - married and unmarried, those with them. He also conducted survey interviews straight identities and those who see them­ that enabled him to gather more informa­ selves as gay - seek sex with people they do tion than he would have obtained by simply not know. They are hoping to experience observing the toilets. Humphreys' research sexual excitement, but they want to avoid opened a window on an aspect of life that involvement. They do not want any many people were shocked to know existed commitments that extend beyond the at all and that certainly needed to be under­ particular encounters they will have in this stood at a deeper level. His work was based public convenience. on systematic research, but it also carried a This kind of search for anonymous, note of passion; it was conducted with a instant sex between men happens all over certain scientific detachment, but at the the world, yet until the late 1960s the same time Humphreys was involved in the phenomenon persisted as a widespread but search for solutions to social problems. rarely studied form of human interaction. In Humphreys argued that persecution of the USA, the gay community called the gay lifestyles leads men to live anguished toile ts where these activities occur existences in which they must resort to 'tearooms' (in the UK the activity is known extreme secrecy and often dangerous activ­ as 'cottaging'). Laud Humphreys, a sociolo­ ities. His study was conducted before the gist, visited these public lavatories to onset of AlDS; such activity would be much conduct research on the participants. He more dangerous today. He argued that toler­ wrote about them in his book Tearoom ance for a gay subculture would put gays in Trade (Humphreys 1970). Unsurprisingly, a position where they could provide one Asking and Answering Sociological Questions another with self-esteem, mutual support reveal the real reason for his presence in the and relief from torment. tearoom. Was this particular aspect of his behaviour ethical? The answer is that, on balance, this particular aspect of his study Human subjects and did not put any of his subjects at risk. On the basis of what he observed in the tearoom, ethical problems Humphreys did not collect information All research concerned with human beings about the participants that would have can pose ethical dilemmas. A key question identified them. What he knew about them that sociologists agree must be asked is was similar to what all the other people in whether the research 'poses risks to the the tearoom knew. In this way, his presence subjects that are greater than the risks they did not subject them to any more risk than face in their everyday lives'. Ethical issues they already encountered in their everyday have become much more prominent today lives. At the same time, had Humphreys than in the past. In particular, researchers been completely frank at every stage, the are no longer seen as the knowledgeable research might not have progressed as far as experts or participants as mere subjects of it did. Indeed, some of the most valuable research. Increasingly, the subjects of data that have been collected by sociologists research are themselves involved in the could never have been gathered if the research process and may help to formulate researcher had first explained the project to questions, comment on the researcher's each person encountered in the research interpretation of their views and in some process. cases expect to receive a copy of the final If this were the only dilemma posed by research report. Humphreys' research project, it would not Clearly, as is the case in other areas of stand out as a notable problem in the ethics social life (such as doctors and their patients of social research. What raised more or university professors and their students), eyebrows was that Humphreys wrote down 'lay people' no longer automatically defer to the car number-plates of the people who 'experts' in the way they might have done a came into the 'tearooms', obtained their few decades ago. This broad social change is home addresses from a friend who worked also transforming research practice. Indeed, at the Department of Motor Vehicles and all research funding bodies now routinely then visited their homes in the guise of ask research teams what ethical issues they conducting a neutral survey. Even though expect to confront and how they will deal Humphreys did not reveal to the men's fami­ with these, whether deception will be used, lies anything about their activities in the what measures will be put in place to tearooms, and even though he took great protect their participants from risk and how pains to keep the data confidential, the their findings will be fed back to partici­ knowledge he gained could have been pants at the end of the study. damaging. Since the activity he was docu­ In writing Tearoom Trade, Humphreys menting was illegal, police officers might said he was less than truthful to those whose have demanded that he release information behaviour he was studying. He said he did about the identities of the subjects. It is also not reveal his identity as a sociologist when possible that a less skilled investigator could observing the tearoom. People who came have slipped up when interviewing the into the tearoom assumed he was there for subjects' families, or that Humphreys could the same reasons they were and that his have lost his notes, which might then have presence could be accepted at face value. been found by someone else. Although he did not tell any direct lies Considering the number of things that during his observations, neither did he could go wrong in the research process, ASK ING AND ANSWERING SOCIOLOGICAL QUESTIONS researchers today do not consider projects obvious to all (see chapter 7, 'Social Interac­ of this kind to be legitimate. Around the tion and Everyday Life' and chapter 5, 'The world, government funding bodies for soci- Environment'). In this case, what most 010gica research, such as the European people believed to be simply a public Science Foundation or the UK's Eco nomic building with an immediately obvious and Social Research Council (ESRC), as well function was, for a particular social group, as the professional organizations to which primarily a venue for the pursuit of sexual sociologists belong, such as the Interna­ satisfaction. tional Sociological Association (lSA) , now It is also interesting to note that elements have much stri cter ethical guidelines for of modern theoretical approaches can help researchers engaging in sociological us understand the issues addressed by research of whatever kind. Humphreys' study. An interactionist might Humphreys was one of the first sociolo­ ask: how does this behaviour take place gists to study the lives of gay men. His through processes of interaction? What account was a humane treatment that went kinds of interaction take place? Humphreys well beyond the existing stock of knowledge found that people who went into the on sexual communities. Nthough none of tearooms learnt from others to be silent. his research subjects actually suffered as a This was a response to the demand for result of his book, Humphreys himself later privacy without invo lvement. Another agreed with his critics on the key ethical finding was that men who went into the controversy.

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