Problemy społecznej sytuacji wywiadów w badaniach nad stosunkiem ludności do planowania rodziny w krajach słabo rozwiniętych
Streszczenie
Analysing the survey carried out in Algeria on the attitude towards contraceptive practice and fertility and on the knowledge of and practice in preventing pregnancy the author discusses the problem of inadequacy of „western research techniques” – interview with questionnaire and fill-in questionnaire – for the examination of people’s opinions and attitudes in traditionalist communities and cultures. A mechanical transference of techniques and procedures worked out for the modern Euro-american societies and their application to traditionalist communities in the underdeveloped countries causes various disturbances in the research process.
Contrary to the ethnocentric assumptions of some western scholars it is not so common for all people to have developed opinions on and attitudes towards the majority of current problems. In the traditionalist communities of the Third World countries there are often cases when there are no opinions at all and attitudes are not well defined. During an interview-situation both culturally and socially “unnatural” – in a majority of those communities cultural stereotypes appear: the opinions are conventional and trivial. The contact with the interviewer goes beyond the usual experiences of the whole communities and social groups. The relation interviewer – respondent is neither well established nor is it uniform in the people’s culture and social consciousness.
The expansion of sociological research in underdeveloped countries is followed by a sharply increasing need of the “acculturation” of techniques and procedures based on interviews. The methodological solutions (controlled interview, Schuman’s Random Probe Technique) proposed at present seem to be unsatisfactory. The application of the most refined and complex techniques and procedures of collecting and analysing data without a general change of the research attitude must be treated as a palliative.
According to the author the following methodological directives for the survey on opinions and attitudes in the underdeveloped countries should be adopted: 1. the interviews should be adapted to situations socially “natural”; 2. new interviewing techniques less standardized should be worked out and treated as a supplement to the techniques widely applied to the surveys on opinions (interview without questionnaire, interview with a tape recorder, group discussions); 3. monographic studies on deviant cases should be carried out; 4. projective techniques (e.g. Stycos picture tests) should be widely used.
Following Gostkowski the author emphasizes the importance of the society's familiarity with the relation interviewer – respondent which facilitates the institutionalization and standardization of research conditions.
The cultural and methodological encapsulation can also be avoided when the achievements of cultural anthropology, ethnography and psychology – expanding and deepening the approach to the phenomenon under study – are taken into account. The most important principle to be followed in the research into the opinions and attitudes of the people in the Third World countries is a full and thorough knowledge of the social, cultural and economic differences and peculiarities of the communities in question.
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