Official statistics are very high in terms of reliability and representativeness. Sometimes the entire population is required by law to provide statistical information often relating to demographic and economic trends. As well as this, the government has the necessary resources to carry out this type of sampling. In this way generalizations can be made which are most likely to be typical of the wider society.
However, statistics are not always accurate. For instance, when the British crime survey was sent out to random sample of the population a large difference was found to be between official statistics and people’s experience of crime. This call into question the validity of statistics as many crimes go unreported. With regards to objectivity, official statistics are affected by political and economic factors. The government may not sanction a study unless the hypothesis is framed in a way that produces a favored outcome. Interationists for that reason consider official statistics socially constructed.
Marxists would consider official statistics as a tool of the ruling class to justify the status quo in the capital system.
Also, to what extent can official statistics be regarded as representative? They provide merely a ‘snapshot’ of reality which no indications as to people’s meanings. For example, statistics can provide us with the number dropouts from school but the question remains as to why these dropouts occurred.
Interpretivists would argue that although statistics are useful they should be utilized in a different manner and one should completely rely on them as a source of data. They would place more emphasis on the uncovering the views of the people who made them. They tend to favor data sources, which could be seen as important for allowing ‘verstehen’ a German word, which means the understanding of human activity.
Interpretivists consider life documents useful in revealing personal meanings, which they see as shaping behavior. Life documents are a secondary source that involve the expression of feelings e.g. diaries, letters, emails and blogs. Since they are preexisting they cost the sociologist nothing. Although they may be difficult to obtain, once a life document is in the hands of a sociologists they can add real depth and variety to the research. Valeria Hey’s,“The company she keeps” (1997) studied the notes girls past between each other behind the teacher’s back in lessons in conjunction with participant observation.
Dairies and other similar life documents are useful when they are not intended for public consumption. They can be a very authentic source of data however, as stated in the question they can ‘too subjective’. Where emotions are concerned e.g. in the case of guilt people may be more concerned with justifying their actions rather than giving an exact account of a situation. Also, they may not be true particularly when people fantasize rather than record actual experiences. There could be highly biased interpretations of events or people e.g. in the case of jealousy one might shoot the envied individual down with mean comments. Researchers may ask their subjects to keep dairies, however they may not be as valid.
Historical documents are also a vital source of secondary data. The findings of one historical document can be compared with another to ensure validity. However, this may be difficult, as certain documents may have deteriorated over time. Also, asking four key questions should assess the reliability and validity of any historical document – How authentic it is? Does it have credibility? Is the document representative? And do we share the author’s interpretations?
Mass media reports such as newspapers etc may also be used as a secondary source of data but these too are often ‘too subjective’ as they largely reflect the views of journalists or those who created them. They have also been criticized for distorting images of society.
All in all, official statistics are useful, however, they are often questioned in terms of validity. It could be argued that it would be a better use of the sociologist’s time to not completely rely on official statistic but perhaps to use them in comparison with the findings of primary data. For instance is the trend uncovered by primary research typical of the wider society? In the case of say, demographics, official statistics are vital however, other secondary sources can provide data more an insight into people’s subjective states. Perhaps a combination (known as methodological pluralism) can be used to balance out the research in terms of objectivity and subjectivity.
