Educational Research - the Ethics and Aesthetics of Statistics

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6 P. Smeyers and M. Depaepe The chapter concludes by maintaining that these three factors vastly contributed to the increase of the reported prevalence of child maltreatment in the Western world. In Chapter 5, Norbert Grube claims that social sciences create phenomena. Opinion polls construe the formation of public opinion by selective questions within questionnaires. John Dewey saw social psychological analyses as a means to transfer American mass society into the Great Community, whereas Walter Lippmann wanted to put social sciences into the service of the government. The founding fathers of polls in the USA, especially George H. Gallup, referred implicitly to Dewey and regarded polls as a science that would strengthen democracy. This sentiment echoed in the sentiments of Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann and her husband Erich Peter Neumann, the founder of the Allensbach Institute of public opinion research in 1947, which is a central focus of this chapter. Polls do not only aim to establish and improve democracy. They also aim to create national conformity. The nation stands in the focus of polls, especially if national governments are the customers of pollsters. The presentation of data suggests clarity within the findings along with the possibility of reliable predictions, certainty, comparison and competition. The simplification of data in a few charts shall help to rationalise the political decision-making process for a preventative population policy. At the same time, the graphical simplification should support notions about the social and national body that are based on ideals of unity. Furthermore so-called clear diagrams and findings of applied social surveys should be the convincing starting point for political campaigns and for people’s instruction. The chapter reveals different models of dualistic questions and dichotomous models of graphical designs. This dualism does not only divide the people into two camps but establishes a new national narrative. The exact and suggestive presentation of findings led to several attempts to instruct and convince the West Germans of the veracity of capitalism, the democratic system and the European unification. But because polls often present the respondents as incomplete human beings, it is questionable if polls could redeem the aim of preventative governmental policy or whether they could engender a democratic community based on communication. In Chapter 6, David Bridges argues that individual cases can and do have enormous rhetorical and motivational power in public policy debate: at the same time contemporary discussion of ‘evidence-based policy’ tends to push the individual case study to the margins of policy-makers’ interest, which is focussed instead on population studies and randomised controlled trials in which large numbers provide the appearance of validity and a sense of confidence in the results. This chapter seeks to examine the role of the single case (and by extension small numbers of cases) in informing educational policy and practice, asking how, why and under what conditions should educators pay attention to such research. It begins by looking at the reasons for the predilection for large numbers in quantitative research, but also the role of the single case in these research traditions in challenging generalisations and inviting closer examination of the particular context in which apparently aberrational results are observed. This chapter then observes the significance of the ‘case’ in a variety of academic communities – in psychology and the development
1 Use of Statistics in Education and Educational Research 7 of psychoanalytic theory; in ethnography; in auto/biography and life history; in history itself and in law. It identifies the main characteristics of case study, at least in the forms that are most familiar to educational enquiry. A central part of the chapter examines some of the arguments around the possibility of generalising from individual cases starting with the view that educational conditions are so locally defined by time and social context that such generalisation (from any form of research) is doomed from the start. It considers three particular functions of the case study: (i) as a source of conjecture (and grounded theory) and refutation; (ii) as a basis for understanding one particularity by reference to another (without any attempt to generalise); and (iii) as providing a vicarious form of experience and making a contribution to the reader’s practical wisdom. A final section of the chapter considers the sense in which the conduct of case study research resembles scientific or artistic approaches to understanding. Following MacDonald and Walker it concludes with the notion that ‘case study is the way of the artist, who achieves greatness when, through the portrayal of a single instance locked in time and circumstance, he communicates enduring truths about the human condition’. In Chapter 7, Elias Hemelsoet argues that for various reasons, irregular migration has become a more frequent phenomenon during the last decades. Humanitarian and social problems related to this fast-growing group of people give a boost to political discussion and subsequently to scientific research. Both politicians and scientists want to ‘grab’ the situation and acquire an overview of what is happening. Estimating the number of irregular migrants in a country is in most cases the base to deal with emerging problems. A large number of different methods are used to make these estimations. Unfortunately, these bring forth rather feeble results, which is partially a consequence of a large margin of error. Nevertheless, this does not stop people from basing policy with far-reaching implications on these ‘findings’. The chapter focuses on a methodological question concerning estimations of irregular migrant numbers, i.e. the problematic character of conceptualisations. This problem will be treated in two ways. First, different definitions of people without legal residence lead to specific ways of conceptualising the problem. This is problematic as different statistical outcomes are generated which will lead to multifarious conclusions and recommendations. Second, there is the intrinsic danger of reducing the complexity of a large amount of data to a limited number of variables by taking away the possibility of making distinctions that are often desirable (which unavoidably implies a tendency towards homogenisation). In the case of irregular migrants, their illegal residence is the benchmark of categorisation. The level of diversity regarding the particular circumstances of these people is often ignored as policy treats them as a monolithic group. To conclude, Hemelsoet considers the extent to which questions put forward by policy-makers and researchers ‘make sense’ when it comes to dealing with the problems at stake. Why are these questions so attractive and apparently self-evidently valid? In Chapter 8, Naomi Hodgson focuses on the objects of statistical analysis that provide a current focus for measurement and policy-making in Europe and thereby constitute key indicators according to which states, institutions and individuals become measurable, comparable and governable. She focuses, in particular, on the
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Page 48 and 49: 38 M. Depaepe combination. Moreover
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Page 52 and 53: 42 M. Depaepe Schneider, J. (2010).
Page 54 and 55: 44 J.J.H. Dekker (see Section 4.4).
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56 J.J.H. Dekker Dekker. J. J. H.,
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Chapter 5 Constructing Social Unity
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Chapter 7 To Frame the Unframable:
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Chapter 8 European Citizenship and
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8 European Citizenship and Evidence
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130 U. Stadler-Altmann and E. Keine
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154 J.P. Van Bendegem et al. Day wi
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156 J.P. Van Bendegem et al. statis
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158 J.P. Van Bendegem et al. 10.4 C
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160 J.P. Van Bendegem et al. Van Be
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162 P. Smeyers to be told. Moreover
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164 P. Smeyers us’. It goes witho
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166 P. Smeyers at the basis of the
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168 P. Smeyers indeterminism, as we
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170 P. Smeyers are steps (a plan as
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172 P. Smeyers to the simple fact t
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174 P. Smeyers 6. The role of the a
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176 P. Smeyers conditions. It is in
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178 I. Munday etc. on a PowerPoint
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180 I. Munday To show how Derrida p
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182 I. Munday might talk of 20 bags
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184 I. Munday is unclear whether th
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186 I. Munday in numerals. This mig
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188 I. Munday We might also note th
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190 R. Smith ‘Statisticism’, on
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192 R. Smith identify, and twice in
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194 R. Smith of the final sentence
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196 R. Smith between admitting that
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198 R. Smith 7 www.equalitytrust.or
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200 R. Smith It is an interesting q
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202 R. Smith self-esteem, happiness
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204 R. Smith Reeves, R. (2009, Apri
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206 P. Standish Some students’ no
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208 P. Standish abstract ratio, wit
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210 P. Standish Rice $1.73 1 / 2 Mo
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212 P. Standish research none of us
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214 P. Standish of the products but
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216 About the Authors co-editor-in-
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218 About the Authors voor Wetensch
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220 Author Index Elkins, G. R., 190
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222 Author Index Silverman, J. G.,
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224 Subject Index I Inequality, 29-
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