Personal Values May Influence Sociologists' Research

Topics such as capital punishment, euthanasia and abortion are (and will most likely always continue to be) extremely controversial issues. Due to the level of controversy, there is a lot of research and ideas on both the pros and cons of these issues. Sociologists study different groups of people and how their surroundings and societies influence them (Henslin 2). The values that sociologists hold high in their own mind are going to differ from person to person, which can influence research on such controversial subjects due to biases and different moral beliefs.

For instance, if you take capital punishment into consideration, there are many different ideologies to take into consideration. Punishment and retribution are the most common deciding factors for those who are pro death penalty, because they feel that it removes the threatening criminals from society (National Center for State Courts' Knowledge and Information Services). On the other hand, you have those sociologists who believe that the death penalty should not be legal because it has been proven that innocent people have been put to death (National Center for State Courts' Knowledge and Information Services).

Ever since Jack Kevorkian helped patients with assisted suicide, euthanasia has been a hot topic in the media and as a social issue. There are many different beliefs on whether or not we should be able to decide how and when we die in today's day and age. In April of 1999, physician-assisted suicide became illegal in most states in the United States. In fact, only one state (Oregon) has legalized euthanasia (The Kevorkian Verdict: The Law on Assisted Suicide)! Just because something is illegal or not common for society does not mean that there are not sociologists and other believers out there in favor of euthanasia. Having beliefs that may differ from the norm can cause research to become frustrating for the researcher because they may try to make their research fit their ideologies.

James Henslin wrote about a German sociologist named Max Weber on page 11 of his book that who believed that sociology should be value free. Essentially, he believed that all of the sociologist's moral beliefs on what is right and wrong, or their ideas on how they thought society should be, need to be left out of their research and should not affect the search for valuable information. If a sociologist lets their beliefs interfere with the topics they are researching, objectivity gets thrown out the window and data can become largely biased. This is why sociologists must look at everything with objective eyes.

References

"Capital Punishment." National Center for State Courts' Knowledge and Information Services.

21 Dec 2007. National Center for State Courts. 14 Feb 2008

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Henslin, James. Sociology: A Down-to-Earth Approach. 8. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 2007.

"The Kevorkian Verdict: The Law on Assisted Suicide." PBS Frontline. 2008. Public

Broadcasting System. 14 Feb 2008

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