Introduction
The fieldwork tradition in anthropology has been one of the foremost breakthroughs in human research. For the first time, a methodology was developed for first hand contact with people from the field and the means and ways of contacting them. As a result of this, a sea of change occurred in the way field data was collected, organised and thought about. A whole new methodology emerged as a result.
This new way of collecting human data emerged from quite simple beginnings. Initially, field analysts of social data put together their ideas regarding the origins of quaint and odd human practices of ‘other’ cultures by putting in data collected from reports written by others. The origins of these reports show that they may not have had correct data. For instance, data from early sailors travelers and missionaries were used. Some of the social data used were thus fictionalised, mythologised or even imagined accounts of the lives of people. Many of these early anthropologists worked in museums, where they saw the
by-products of human culture without any human contact with those who had produced them. Using this material, they began to speculate on the origins of many human characteristics like family, marriage, kinship and politics in order to search for their origins.
This search for origins, coupled with the Victorian (since this was the period of Queen Victoria’s reign in Britain) industrial worldview, led the colonial powers to hypothesize a series of evolutionary stages. All of these stages ended with the final and best of stages – which was the Western world at that time. Many, like Kipling, felt that this kind of a lifestyle had to be the best, and thus the others being described were more ‘primitive’ and from a past period. These communities, they felt had not advanced enough in their evolution. Thus they used the terms ‘barbarian’, ‘primitive’ and ‘backward’ for these communities.
These theoreticians were called the ‘armchair’ anthropologists or classical evolutionists. Except for Louis Henry Morgan, none had done any fieldwork. They included anthropologists like Edward Burnett Tylor, Sir James Frazer, Henry Maine, McLennan, Ferguson, among others. Their ‘conjectural history’ of human social evolution became a part of anthropology and their ideas were used by many other social scientists, including Marx and Engels. Engels found the work of L.H. Morgan to be very useful and his Primitive Society was used as a background for developing the idea of ‘modes of production’ by him and Karl Marx. The Soviet state republished Morgan’s work and sold it cheaply all over the world as the epitome of new research in social science.
However, the flaws in the theory could not be overlooked. When one looked at societies, one felt that looking at them from this perspective would be to wrong them. Many were very ‘advanced’ in their ideas, perhaps more than what was even imagined in the Western or more developed nations at that time. Also, such societies seem to be more integrated within themselves, and living happily. As a result of these ideas, Bronislaw Malinowski, a Polish migrant from Britain started fieldwork among the Polynesian islands in the Pacific Ocean. He conducted fieldwork for over one year among the Trobriand Islanders and eventually wrote a series of books beginning with Argonauts of the Western Pacific (1922). For the first time, he described in detail the life of the community in detail that captured their struggle in overcoming everyday problems, their essential humanity and the intricate detail of the ideas that structured their society. A new methodology of doing research thus started emerging.
Malinowski called this participant observation, where , anthropologists lived with the community through at least one calendar year, living with and participating in the community’s life in order to understand it better. Later investigators amended this to mean that one had to stay with the community for one year over all the seasons and months of the year, with each stay being
for a period of three months at the least.
There has been much that has been celebrated about regarding this technique in anthropological technique. Many claimed that it was an answer to finding out the nitty-gritty of everyday life among the people studied by anthropologists.
Eventually, this anthropological technique became very useful as one of the most intense methods of fieldwork interaction between the people being studied and the investigator/s. As a result, others who were not anthropologists started emulating this technique. Unfortunately, without this background many used it piecemeal, neither maintaining field studies for a full year nor being as intense in their researches or as detailed as was the original intention.
Even as these developments were taking place, some anthropologists complained that this technique created ‘subjects’ and ‘informants’ out of the people and thus it was wrong, politically, to just stress on forcing oneself on the people when they may not accept this role of the researcher. They claimed that the main role here was that of the observer and not of the participant. They claimed that the political imbalance thus created could be redressed by reversing these roles, by having an observing participant in the field situation.
Whatever be the ultimate outcome of this argument, participant observation has become popular among a wide section of the public and has grown in its usage to a large variety of areas. In the portion below we describe the different aspects of fieldwork which are involved to make it viable.
TECHNIQUES
The word technique was first known to be used in about 1817 by the French, meaning ‘technical’ from the Greek technikos. As a noun, it came to mean a method or systematic procedure of accomplishing a desired aim or a body of technical methods as in a craft, art or scientific method. In other words, it was a particular way of doing something, especially where one had to learn special skills through which one could do something practical. Thus, it was a systematic procedure, formula or routine by which a task could be accomplished. It was also closely linked to proficiency, where skillfulness in the command of fundamentals deriving from practice and familiarity was the norm. It could also be a method used in dealing with something, thus linking it with approach, attack, course, line, modus operandi, plan, procedure or tack. It could also include natural or acquired facility in a specific activity, thus bringing it closer to ability, adeptness, art, command, craft, expertise, expertness, knack, mastery, proficiency, skill or know-how.
METHODS
The word method came from the medieval French methode, or the Latin methodus meaning “way of teaching or going”. The Greek methodus means “method of inquiry” or “scientific inquiry” or “pursuit, or following after”. It is formed from two words, ‘meta’ meaning “after” and ‘hodos’, meaning “a travelling way”. It has since then come to mean a way of doing something, especially in a systematic way, implying an orderly logical arrangement. This is often in the form of steps. Hence, it is a logical process, a regular and systematic way of accomplishing something, mode of inquiry, body of skills or techniques, orderly arrangement of parts or a series of steps by which a task is completed. It involves the procedures and techniques characteristic of a particular discipline or a field of study. It could also be a discipline that deals with the principles and techniques of scientific inquiry.
In other words, unless these terms are used in more specific and specified ways, they tend to merge together and sound similar. Some of these terms are also linked to a past baggage of dogma and belief. To get over such problems it is always better to look through these terms again and understand what they really mean and how they are linked to each other. Each word is often linked to others using a variety of different meanings. The context decides the meaning.
Hence, we have to specify the context and decide which of the given meanings we are to assign to the word used.
Many believe that science is universally clear and so is the scientific method. However, this is not entirely true. The scientific method is not a universal mode of understanding, or discourse. It is often about general guidelines based on which each problem-solver/scientist negotiates a pathway. The scientific method is often referred to as a “hypothetico-deductive method”.
The deductive method is where an individual assumes a truth to be present, and attempts to prove it to be true. If the evidence is found, then the truth is asserted, if not then another deduction is made and the same procedure is carried out. As a result, the truth of the assertion is then used in other contexts.
If a similar situation exists, then it is claimed that the same results hold true. The inductive method, on the other hand, is not so confident. It does not begin by asserting a truth and then proving it. Rather, it checks out a situation in all its aspects, before making any assumptions. Even after a set of assumptions have been checked and found to be true, no generalisation is immediately made. A general statement is only made in this case after the same statement has been found to be true in many different contexts and situations. Hence, by gradually sifting through all the data, it is hoped that generalisations will
eventually stand out.
Science usually uses a mix of these two methods which has come to be called the “hypothetico-deductive method” where a set of hypotheses are deduced from previous researches or from one’s own experiences. These are then tested. Hence, scientific knowledge is attained from testing hypotheses or theories by logically deducing hypotheses frpm them, using experiment and careful observation to test the hypotheses, and revising theories that lead to incorrect predictions. Hence, we see that the scientific method is a series of steps scientists use to acquire, test and describe the world around them. In the first step, the questions arp asked in the form of a hypothesis. This is like a working explanation of a natural process. In the next stage, patterns that link up observations are observed and noted. Based on these observations and patterns, a working hypothesis or theory is formulated, which specifies a more formal set of assumptions put forth to explain observations and natural phenomena. After this step, experiments are specifically designed to test whether the theory is applicable in all contexts and situations. There is constant refinement, revision and adjustment. This ‘fine-tuning’ is the crux of the scientific method.
Some would claim that a method is a systematic ‘presentation of a system of work while technique is a procedure. A method seems not to be derived and common to the entire group of disciplines, like the social sciences. In studying any social phenomena, different kinds of methods may be used like the comparative method, historical method, etc. However, techniques may be interview, schedule, questionnaire, and so on. In order to avoid fallacies and to make it sound, a method is tested ahd specific steps are undertaken in the case of a method. Oh the other hand, techniques keep getting modified, and are changed according to the requirements of different contexts. A method aims at getting to systematize knowledge, while a technique attempts to collect knowledge in a systematic manner.
Thus there seems to be only one scientific method, rather than thinking of them as being plural. Scientific investigations are carried out under this method using different techniques.
METHODOLOGY
The word methodology came from the Latin methodologia. It was first used in about 1790-1800 AD. The word methodology has often been confused with method, hence some people have claimed that methodology is a pretentious way of saying “method”.
Methodology is the analysis of the principles of methods, rules and postulates employed by a discipline. Methodology may incorporate the study of methods that are, can be, or have been applied within a discipline. In other words, it is the study or description of methods. Methodology does not specify any specific method, rather it specifies several processes that require to be followed. These processes are like an overall framework. They may have parts or be in sequence or may be broken down into sequences. These sequences may also change. Yet, to complete the work, in one form or the other, these sequences need to be completed.
So, methodology could be said to be a description of the process, which might be expanded to include a philosophically consistent collection of theories, inquiry procedure, concepts or ideas related to a discipline or a field of inquiry.
Methodology may also include the analysis of the principles or procedures of inquiry in a particular field. It includes the study of the principles that underlie the organisation of the various sciences and how scientific inquiry may be conducted. This is why Mason Cooley said, “methodology is applied ideology”. Methodologies are often a step-by-step set of procedures detailed out for doing a piece of work. They may include diagrams for documenting the results of the procedure. They may also include an objective, sometimes quantified set of criteria for determining whether the results of the procedure are acceptable; a kind of “quality control”.
Thus, we see that methodology is a general study of method in fields of inquiry like science, history, mathematics, psychology, philosophy and ethics, among others. It may then be felt by some scientists that there is one true mode of inquiry which is a guarantee of finding the truth. The task of the philosopher would be to find the correct method for any discipline and to ensure that “quality control” is maintained by keeping out other methods. This belief was part of the earlier period of science and is called the positivist philosophy of science. This was started by the Father of Sociology, Auguste Comte. However, today, few scientists see this as the true idea behind science.
This idea claims that every kind of science and knowledge needs to be strictly ‘objective’ and non-partisan, without bias. It thus seems to think that there is a logic in the system that we cannot find out just by doing things naturally and normally but needs to be analysed. Comte also assumed that this kind of logic was set up as if it were before the basics of the thing to be analyzed. Hence, he called it a priori, a kind of ‘first principle’.
However, this kind of pushed the credibility of what was possible. Later philosophers and scientists agreed that reality could not be proscribed by ‘first principles’ but was often contingent upon the context and how events developed.
A changing reality meant that science was also free to change. Today, though science still believes in objectivity, subjective elements are given grudging acceptance after much thought.
What does this do to methodology? Methodology has become more modest. It analyses the methods that have been actually adopted at various historical stages of investigation of different issues. It does not criticize but keeps creating systematic overviews of what the methods are at any given point of time and how they might be classified and understood.
The question then arises, are local research methods never to be important enough to have their say? This is not so. In the community of researchers who are investigating one kind of phenomenon, there are often disputes regarding the accusation of a method being called unsound or unscientific. According to present practitioners of the discipline, logic and philosophy would not provide such disputes with any guidelines or weapons for addressing the issue. In fact, current researches show that such disputes are more about political action for control and power within the discipline rather than about policing the boundaries of the discipline.
In determining the structure of each discipline, we may consider the proper object of the discipline, the manner in which it develops, the type of statements or generalisations that emanate from it, its philosophical foundations or assumptions and its relation with other disciplines and its applications. Thus, methodology is a kind of guidelines rather than a formula for producing a result. It is a set of practices that could lead to appropriate questioning and to the right kind of changes.
Science and logical reasoning has been obsessed with methodology. Sometimes, a group of scientists feel, the way the experiment has been conducted has become more important than the actual experiment and its results. Paul Feyerabend would go against this kind of methodology. In Against Method, he claims that: “One might get the impression that I recommend a new methodology which replaces induction by counter-induction and uses a multiplicity of theories, metaphysical views, fairy tales, instead of the customary pair theory/observation. This impression would certainly be mistaken. My intention is not to replace one set of general rules by another such set: my intention is rather to convince the reader that all methodologies, even the most obvious ones, have their limits” (1975: 23).
Some Important Methods in Anthropology
HISTORICAL METHOD
One of the early anthropologists to use the term historical method was Franz Boas. He pointed at the limitations of comparative method, and suggested for use of comparisons within a small well defined geographical area. His method
is known as historical particularism. Evans-Pritchard stressed on the importance of history in anthropology. He argued that functioning of society cannot be understood without understanding its history. His argument is that social anthropology could very well be a kind of historiography in itself.
The historical method is primarily concerned with the past and attempts to trace the past as a means of understanding the present. It can be sub-divided into the true historical, legal and documentary types. Social scientists, especially philosophers, social-psychiatrists and historians use such methods. Today they are also being used by those who look into the past of the discipline and historians of science. They see society as a dynamic organism with its structure and functions undergoing steady changes and sudden transformations.
Social scientists often wish to note how changes affect their population or group or community that they have been studying. It seems that all groups undergo some changes over time, and this leads to changes in their roles, statuses, personalities and institutions. Thus, historical research would involve scientific modes of inquiry to historical problems. It demands standards of careful methodology and reliability of the kind which characterizes other kinds of research.
Historical research is undertaken primarily to gain a better understanding of the present. Most current events seem to have a past historical beginning and understanding these help to understand the underlying processes that frame the present behavior of individuals in society. Also, the historical method helps us to more accurately understand the historical past in order to frame ideas relating to the present and to the pre-historic past.
Initially, it was assumed that history meant that one had to just find out the correct material from a variety of sources and put together the truth. Over the years, it has come to be recognised that such historical material is always subjective and biased and that history is always subject to different interpretations. Thus, historical accounts are also different in perspective and
there can no longer be a true or correct perspective. Thus, the ‘history of the conqueror’ is always written by the conqueror. In recent years Ranajit Guha started a trend in writing subaltern history, the history of those who had been marginalized by the majority and the mainstream. For Edward Said, history was often written by the West and they suffered from peculiar biases when they studied Eastern societies which he clustered together under the title of Orientalism (1978).
Thus, history then seemed to be an unending project rather than the finite one which had been envisaged earlier. It was seen to be a very useful form of critical analysis of social systems and their concomitant societies. A historical study would thus be a very holistic study of social systems in order to uncover the processes of social change. On the other hand, much more specific probes and forays into history, that look for specific backgrounds of change occurring in the past of specific events or kinds of behavior would normally conduct a historical survey, a study which would have a much limited purview.
A historical study is likely to have many problems and limitations. There is a dearth of much reliable data. There is also the problem of the availability of records in the public sphere. Many records may have been destroyed or lost.
Also many of the records still remain secret or locked up in private collections which are often outside the knowledge of the public at large. Many of the records are not kept preserved correctly and as a result much of it is being lost on a daily basis. Without proper keeping of documents, they keep getting dispersed. It then becomes impossible for a researcher limited by time and money to trace them out and access them over a long period of time and space.
There may be inaccuracies in the time frames chosen by the researcher. As a result, the events that are required may be outside the time frame chosen by the researcher and thus the true picture of events may remain concealed. Testing,
verifiability and reliability of the data is often questionable and limited.
Calculation and measurement of data available under these conditions may be difficult if not impossible. As stated earlier, there may be inherent biases in the data that may get overlooked. Historical writing has to become selective. Thus, what is selected and what is left out is a matter of subjective bias. Also, not every event gets recorded and always much remains unknown. There is always the problem of sampling.
Thus historical data may be said to be accurate and reliable when they are presented as complexes of social forces, shown in order that social phenomenal meaningfully depict intricate social processes, and when all the institutions of society go to the making of the analysis as an integrated whole. Reliable historical data may come from government sources, from more recent studies rather than from older ones, data which exhibits more detail than data which shows less detail, as well as data which may be verified through other sources.
The historical method may help us collect better quality of comparative data, since history provides a much diversified scope of data. A realistic idea of the grounding of social events may be collected using this method. The knowledge of circumstances and conditions may be obtained in much greater detail using this method. A section of researchers within anthropology are much concerned with the growth and origin of the discipline from the historical past. They link the social context of past societies to show how historical processes were socially embedded practices. Such anthropologists who worked on these areas include Fred Voget, Margaret Hodgkin, Regna Darnell and George W. Stocking. Jr. Stocking started a journal called History of Anthropology which deals with such issues.
In India such historical studies in anthropology have been conducted by L.R Vidyarthi, Dhami Sinha, among others. The reconstruction of tribal histories by K.S Singh can be mentioned here. He studied tribal movements, state formation among tribes, etc. His approach was a combination of ethnography with sensitivity to historical reconstructions. B.S Cohn studied the impact of British rule on Benares state in India. In using historical approach to understand colonial impact, he went against the dominant trend of microscopic synchronic studies.
However, it must be remembered that each and every sub-division of anthropology requires some historical study and analysis.
COMPARATIVE METHOD
Anthropology is known as a comparative discipline. Anthropology started as the study of ‘other cultures’ and comparisons formed integral part of it.
Anthropologists compare cultural traits, cultural complexes, institutions,cultural wholes, tribes and civilizations. Comparisons lead to typologies, concepts, inferences, generalisations, and theories. It is the comparative method that has led to the theory of organic evolution, through comparative anatomy and taxonomy. Evolutionists are known for the use of comparative method. Though, Comparative method is known as the method of evolutionists, others like diffusionists made use of it. Structural functionalist Radcliffe-Brown called his method of illustrative comparisons as comparative method.
The first formulation of what was to become the comparative method in anthropology was made in 1761 by Karnes. However, in 1889, it was consciously used as a method for the first time by E.B. Tylor in a paper entitled ‘On a method of investigating the development of institutions; applied to laws of marriage and descent’ at a meeting of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain.
There was a very strong belief in the scientific method among the public. This was propagated mainly by the Positivist School; one of whose founders was the French sociologist Auguste Comte.
The early anthropologists gradually realised that cross-cultural analyses were fraught with problems. For instance, certain features of the ‘primitive’ people were as ‘advanced’ as those of ‘civilized’ ones. This problem was tackled by dividing up cultures into entities called traits. Each of these traits was then assigned a typical developmental sequence. This is seen in the works of the diffusionists and in the culture-area approach. Hence, traits could be taken in isolation and the evolutionary sequence of such traits could then be used to assign which features of any culture need ‘progress’ to reach the ideal of Western civilization. This kind of evolutionary trend was seen in the works of Morgan and Tylor, among others.
The objectivity in the sciences was sought to be mirrored in anthropology. Coupled with the inductive approach, it meant that all ethnographic data was assumed to be collected in an objective manner. It became simple to chop up the cultural whole into trait-sized pieces for cross-cultural comparisons. In this way diverse traits from around them could be fitted into a few pigeonholes. Memorable generalisations from such work included that of Frazer. Franz Boas, in a reaction against ‘armchair’ anthropology and indiscriminate theorising, proposed the concept of historical particularism. It did not waver from the inductive approach used in the sciences, but proposed that all cultures are unique and particular. Each culture has to be studied in its historical context, and cannot be compared with any other culture.
This collection of endless streams of ethnography without any attempt at deductive, unifying, grand theories was disliked by many. From this grew the attempts to see cultures as organic entities as in functionalism and structuralfunctionalism. It was felt that if traits were not comparable entities, then institutions like kinship, family, marriage, etc. were, and therefore could be
studied cross-culturally. Similar objections to comparisons come from cultural relativism. Cultural relativists point that units that are being compared are part of the respective cultures. Parts of culture are functionally integrated and interrelated. It is argued that parts cannot be torn out of the totality of context for the purpose of comparison.
Attempts were made to analyse the universal categories found in every culture. One extreme was reached by George Peter Murdock, who set up the Human Relations Area Files (HRAF) in which common categories of cultures were filed together. As newer and newer material arrived, it was broken up and entered into the files at the appropriate places. Even now, it is still one of the most basic of references that may be consulted by any anthropologist working on cross-cultural analyses. According to Murdock, the justification for such cross-cultural analyses could be put down in seven points as follows:
1) Culture is learned
2) Culture is inculcated
3) Culture is social
4) Culture is ideational
5) Culture is gratifying
6) Culture is adaptive
7) Culture is integrative
These seven postulates of culture indicated that there should logically be remarkable similarities between human beings all over the world. Therefore, the cross-cultural studies should reveal the underlying similarities of human beings all over the world. This kind of tautological thinking, goes on to state that such cross-cultural studies would logically elaborate hypotheses, and check on the validity of theorems. Then, it would critically analyse the results from an area-wise or distributional point of view since a valid hypothesis should hold true in any area. Exceptions or negative cases could then be examined in detail.
In France, the search for cross-cultural features was taken to another extreme. Levi-Straussian Structuralism broke up words and cultural sections into phonemes, morphemes, and the like, in the search for the underlying reality of the human mind.
To recapitulate, the proponents of the cross-cultural approach would claim that the ideal natural science paradigm can only be followed by large-scale cross-cultural generalisations conducted through detailed and meticulous crosscultural studies. They assume that parts separated from cultures do form analysable entities.
On the other hand, the opponents of cross-cultural studies would claim that culture cannot be separated into its various components. If separated, they lose their identity as part of a culture. Therefore, cultures can only be studied separately and understood as historically formed units. A new twist to this argument was added by the ethno-methodologists. They argued that a culture can only be understood from the view of a participant, not as an objective outsider. Hence, all ethnographies are non-comparable, uniquely interpreted works. Their ultimate validity can only be seen from the acceptance or rejection
of such a work by a person from the culture described, as an accurate description of that culture.
The large variety of cross-cultural studies appears to fall into two broad categories. Idiographic studies focus on particularistic details located in time and space. On the other hand nomothetic studies focus on law-like generalisations of societies valid over space and time.
On the small scale, Fred Eggan’s method of controlled comparison would be more suitable. In this case, the investigator “knows almost all of the culture inventory and the ecological and archaeological bases shared by all the peoples in the study; he has only to explain the relatively few differences. In such a study the investigator has less chance to distinguish an idiographic relationship from a nomothetic one ” (Driver, 1973: 328).
Larger generalisations do not require such detailed data. They require more quantifiable data that can then be put through statistical tests. However, statistical correlations are not definitive indicators of causal relationships. This problem was put together specifically by Galton. In 1961, Naroll gave a statistical solution to the problem based on a three-fold division. He put
historical associations and functional associations on two poles of a continuum. The third association fell in-between the two and was called semi-diffusional/ mixed historical-functional. This, however, does not solve the argument against Weberian ideal types which need not exist as a real type but is an average of the ones that exist.
Hence, the comparative method is not without its problems. It is still used, however, in many studies in order to gain a better idea of comparisons between people of various regions. However, it must be remembered here that the comparative method is possible only through the data collected during fieldwork where individuals are the focus of attention. Anthropologists use a variety of techniques to approach these individuals – the ‘others’. We would question then, who are the ‘others’? In earlier studies, it were the ‘primitives’. Later, the focus shifted to peasants. Still later, the focus shifted to urban areas. Anthropology, by its decision to study someone creates a subject object dichotomy; it is the anthropological enterprise that creates the ‘other’. The ‘other’ may be people from a remote and far away land. They can also be the next door neighbour or the members of one’s family: and within the ‘other’, the anthropologist meets parts of himself/herself.
SURVEY
Primary Data is that which the investigator or the researcher collects himself or herself. Secondary Data is collected from reference sources like the library, etc. The second method is used for comparative methods. Anthropologists, generally, prefer to work with primary data.
There are two main techniques of data collection. These are Intensive Fieldwork Methods and Survev Methods.
Intensive fieldwork methods include observation, interview, case-study and genealogy. Survey methods are divided into questionnaires, schedules and interview guides. Both these methods may be rounded off by content analysis.
Descriptive studies are primarily to describe accurately a given phenomenon with a view to testing hypotheses or a hypothesis and the relationships among its different dimensions. The objective of such studies is to work out the characteristics of a population. These studies can be further categorized into two:
a) Surveys: A survey is carried out on a small unit of the entire population.
b) Census: A census is a study of the entire population and mainly studies demographic characteristics.
A survey is usually carried out in order to understand the status of the phenomenon under observation. They may be subdivided as being descriptive, analytical, school surveys or genetic. Descriptive or normative Surveys may be of the survey testing method kind, or a questionnaire method survey or an interview based survey. Analytical surveys may include documentary surveys, observational surveys, rating surveys, critical incident surveys, and factor analysis surveys.
Survey research may be based on the nature of the variables as in status surveys and survey research. It may be based on the kind of group being measured as in sample surveys and population surveys. Finally, it may be based on the source of data collection as in questionnaire surveys, interview surveys and controlled observation surveys.
To improve the cross-sectional surveys, one may use longitudinal surveys, where the cross-sectional study is conducted repeatedly. When the conducted on the same individuals they are called panel surveys. Hypothetical situations are given to informants to note their reactions in factorial surveys.
Other surveys are randomized response surveys. Many anthropologists have combined surveys with other kinds of methods in their research, like Raymond Firth among the Tikopia and William Foote-Whyte among the villagers of highland Peru.
Surveys may go beyond mere description of current situations and contexts to describing in detail strengths and weaknesses of different approaches to the issue and development programmes. They help us to study what exists, what is required and how to achieve certain goals.
The survey method has the advantage of gathering data from a relatively large number of cases at a particular time. The data thus collected is usually crosssectional. It is usually not concerned with the particular instances of individuals. It involves a clearly defined problem with definite objectives. It requires an expert imaginative planning to undertake. The data needs to be carefully analysed and interpreted, and logical and skilful reporting of findings. Surveys vary greatly in complexity. Surveys are not undertaken to develop an organised body of scientific knowledge. It usually develops knowledge in order to determine present trends and solve local problems. It advances knowledge by giving a good overview of the issues involved, thus suggesting the course of future developments. It may help to fashion tools for doing research.