Revision summary
Surveys estimate population rates with known error. NFHS and NSSO illustrate Indian strengths. Weaknesses: thin meaning, missing frames, social desirability, weak process. Blumer, Weber, and Oakley name those limits. Use for prevalence; pair with fieldwork for why.
Model answer
Copper italics in this answer — like this — are the key facts. Each one is unpacked in the Facts & figures rail.
Introduction
The social survey asks standardised questions of a sample to describe a population. NFHS and NSSO are Indian strengths of the method. Weakness begins when meaning, power, and absence from the frame are forced into a tick.
Body
Strengths
- Probability surveys estimate rates with known error, which ethnography cannot.
- Comparison over time and regions: fertility, work, and education become public facts, as Emile Durkheim needed rates.
- Policy can be checked. Anonymised large N reduces some interviewer whims.
- Mixed with a census frame, it can represent hidden rural interiors better than a city anecdote.
Weaknesses
- Max Weber’s meaning thins in a closed option. Herbert Blumer warned of frozen variables.
- Frames miss pavement dwellers and some migrants. Informal labour is undercounted.
- Ann Oakley: the interview is a relation; a schedule can still extract.
- Social desirability on caste, violence, and income. Translation fails across languages.
- Causation is weaker than a well-chosen comparison of processes.
Analysis
- Use surveys for prevalence and gradients.
- Do not use them as the whole of verstehen or of class struggle.
- Strength is at its peak when the question matches a well-defined indicator.
Flow diagram
flowchart TD SUR[Social survey] --> STR[Rates comparison error] SUR --> WEAK[Meaning frame gaps] NFHS[NFHS NSSO] --> STR ETH[Ethnography] --> MEAN[Meaning process]
Conclusion
Social surveys are strong for population rates, comparison, and democratic publicity of facts. They are weak for meaning, unlisted lives, and causal process. Durkheim needs them; Geertz cannot live on them. Analyse by matching tool to claim, as NFHS versus a village ethnography shows.
Quick related
Students also ask
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Phenomenological perspectives in sociology reject many of the assumptions of positivism. Comment.
Next question on this syllabus topic (2020 · Q7(b)). View answer →
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Is a census a survey?
A census aims at complete count. A survey samples. Both can use standardised schedules.
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Can online polls replace NFHS?
Not if the frame is volunteers. Probability household design is the strength being asked about.
Same topic · past papers
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