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Sociology - AQA Unit 4 - Crime and Deviance and Research Methods Jan 2011

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Its a very hard paper..my friends couldnt get over the amount of essays and that we had to learn and it actually is impossible..even our teacher said that to us. I wouldn mind if it was like the education paper where we had like 5 past papers to look from and rule out a few things but theres just waaay too much possibilities that could have came up

Reply 221

Jade2009

I didn't like the 12 mark question at all and never wrote enough on the subcultures one, but I think the rest was ok. I hope.

Reply 222

zadaafridi

Guys what are we exactly supposed to have wrote for the 33 marker?

Reply 223

laurakeenan

everyone in my class including myself hated the 33 marker because we werent actually sure what to write seems after coming on here....everyone else thought that tooo, i wrote about a page and a half for that but this was just crap and anythin that came to my head.

hopefully if everyone wasnt too sure on this....they will take that into account

thank god i didnt waste the whole night stayin up and learning all the theories :smile:

Reply 224

Jade2009

For the 33 mark question it said something like 'Assess the idea that positivist methods are inappropriate to investigate society' or something, so I thought that methods meant to talk about things like questionnaires/official statistics/structured interviews etc. I also put in theorists and what they say about positivist methods. But because it was so vague you can shape the answer how you want within reason I think.

Reply 225

teaandcoffee

Original post by Lily B

WELLLL what did i tell use...sociology is a science would come up!!
Although was general enough but everyone in my class managed to write 3 or more pages for it cause our teacher had an inkling it was coming up :biggrin:

sociology as a science didn't come up?

Reply 226

teaandcoffee

Original post by Blah12345678

I thought the Positivism 33 marker was about research methods not specifically about sociology as a science - that did cross my mind but I decided against it, perhaps wrongly :P. I did put in some things on suicide, postmodernists, feminists and particularly interpretivists but I thought it was specifically about research methods. I think they deliberately made it ambiguous to test people's knowledge and may reward a variety of answers.

For the first question I thought that was hard for a 12 marker also. I did the usual class, age, gender, ethnicity, victim precipitation, repeat victimisation and a little on positivist victimology but it still wasn't much.

As for everyone worrying, I revised this one really hard and felt I had a pretty good grasp of all the topic areas yet the last question was really ambiguous and I think everyone found it hard. The content was very large too so don't worry about it, everyone is in the same boat as you and there's no point in thinking about it until results come around :P

Hmm I doubt the 33 marker was solely on sociology as a science as it asked for the inappropriateness of positivist methods for studying society - official stats, questionnaires that kind of thing, and I guess interpretavist? I can understand how science bit may come up, but that didn't cross my mind in the exam.

Reply 227

zadaafridi

Original post by teaandcoffee

sociology as a science didn't come up?

Wasn't the 33 marker in other words 'is a sociology a science'?

Reply 228

teaandcoffee

Original post by zadaafridi

Wasn't the 33 marker in other words 'is a sociology a science'?

No? It was something along the lines of 'assess the positivist methods and their inappropriateness in studying society'.

Like I said above, I can see how science can link in, but I don't think it was the main part of the essay, the main part of the essay is on methods and things. So I spoke about Durkheim's study of suicide and things. But who knows? Like someone else said the essays can be so vague you can include so much! :dontknow:

Reply 229

Irishmonkey1992

Original post by zadaafridi

Wasn't the 33 marker in other words 'is a sociology a science'?

No... lol It was asking about positivist methods and how they were inappropriate. Didn't really set the debate to go off rambling about how it's a science/isnt a science. I do understand that you could include a paragraph on the science bit though.

Reply 230

kaygee

Original post by teaandcoffee

FML TSR is being stupid and not letting me reply! :angry:

I've done the exact same for green crime and observation then? :cool:

For 33 marker I based it on Durkheim's study of suicide and things.

yea me too, i also mentioned Durkheims study on Sucide, and how he used a scientific approach...at least i think he did.

towards the end, i had a lot of ideas and i really needed more time than the two hours given.

Reply 231

teaandcoffee

Original post by kaygee

yeah the scientific positivist approach blah blah blah.

I feel most people didn't do amazingly in this essay.. haha :tongue:

Reply 232

Irishmonkey1992

Original post by teaandcoffee

yeah the scientific positivist approach blah blah blah.

I feel most people didn't do amazingly in this essay.. haha :tongue:

PRAY TO THEE LORD FOR LOW GRADE BOUNDARIES! lol
I looked them up there and Jan's in 2010 were like 39 for a B! I dunno if thats good when it's out of 90? Is that like percentage?

I'm praying for low boundaries for all my exams.... lol

Reply 233

teaandcoffee

Original post by Irishmonkey1992

Jan 2010 was 56% for an A, so around half-ish marks. But who knows...

Reply 234

ECullen

hey guys, has someone got a list of the questions that came up?

Reply 235

IHeartAmerica1993

Ughhh I couldn't sleep at all last night so my mind went blank in the exam.
I mumbled something about positivist/critical victimology in the 1st question. Didn't even think to mention ethnicity/age etc :/
Then in the second question I said something along the lines of Cohen said subcultures formed out of frustration of failing to achieve legitimate goals.
Then I just said that Cloward and Ohlin said there were different subcultures and described them. Ughh I phrased all my questions so badly I know I'm going to be lucky to get a D and I'm predicted an A.

The last question was unexpected to say the least :/ It was so unspecific. I just rambled something about positivists see humans like rocks so we can study them in a detached way hahhahahaha. I think by this time I was so high on tiredness.

Tbh I think the examiners were complete b*stards with this exam. No major theories came up like marxism, functionalism, interactionism. Nor did any of the easy sections like gender or ethnicity. I'm actually really angry about this.

Reply 236

Irishmonkey1992

Original post by teaandcoffee

Jan 2010 was 56% for an A, so around half-ish marks. But who knows...

:O You're actually joking right!? :L Well... I suppose they will never be that low again as that was just the first sitting of the new spec.

Reply 237

teaandcoffee

Original post by Irishmonkey1992

:O You're actually joking right!? :L Well... I suppose they will never be that low again as that was just the first sitting of the new spec.

No I'm not. In June 10 is was 67% for an A, so I think grade boundaries will be lower, specifically with the vast variety of answers to the 33 marker. :confused:

Reply 238

laurakeenan

Original post by teaandcoffee

No I'm not. In June 10 is was 67% for an A, so I think grade boundaries will be lower, specifically with the vast variety of answers to the 33 marker. :confused:

thats very low because was it not over 100 in June 10 for the education one to get an A