Social research work is found in various fields such as sociology, political science, anthropology, and education. Researchers use different methods to collect data and can find employment in social research centers, universities, and non-profit organizations. The need for social researchers remains strong due to constantly changing demographics and politics.
Social research work can be found in the social sciences, which include sociology, social psychology, human geography, political science, social anthropology, and education. Social researchers are responsible for creating and conducting research projects. They need to be creative enough to find ways to gather information about their subjects or topics, and they can also formulate ways to accurately measure their results.
Social research jobs in political science often involve learning how certain public policies affect citizens and who is specifically affected. Jobs in anthropology involve learning how human beings live and behave in society and in different social groups. In education, a social researcher is expected to study different educational policies or different educational processes. Human geography is another area where social research work is found, and an example of work in this field is census work and data interpretation.
Clearly, there are many different areas that are studied by social researchers. Social research assignments may also involve gender, unemployment, and public health studies. In basic terms, anything that deals with how humans interact or how they are affected by certain aspects of life, such as politics, falls within the social research spectrum.
A social researcher should expect to work with numbers or data, often derived from tools such as surveys. Questionnaires are another way to collect data in addition to focus groups, interviews and field observations. Researchers use different research methods such as qualitative or quantitative research. Quantitative research involves crunching numbers and analyzing data, while qualitative research involves experiments and definitions.
Social researchers can often find employment in social research centers and organizations, which can be found all over the world. Some of the largest centers are the Center for Advanced Study of Communities and Information in the US; Institute for Social Research, located in Germany; the Matrix Knowledge Group in the UK; The Arab Center for Applied Social Research in Israel; as well as the UK Economic and Social Research Council
Colleges and universities, non-profit organizations, as well as private equity groups often hire social researchers. Most large universities employ social science researchers and research assistants. There are also opportunities to work for the US federal government as a social science research analyst.
As politics, demography and the general population of the world are constantly changing, the need for social researchers remains strong. Social research jobs usually require at least a high school education, and higher positions often require a college completion.
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