Walker & Cohen: Scope Statements for Theory Development & Research
Walker & Cohen: Defining Scope Statements
According to Walker and Cohen, the scope of studies is determined by the definition of the subject. It aims at taking the objectives as the thumb rule. We need to focus in this direction from a research point of view (philosophy, subject, institution, policies).
Project Initiation and Stakeholder Agreement
This is the end of the initiation process for the project as a whole. Your project should now be defined. That is, you should have reached agreement with your key stakeholders about the following:
- Project objectives (time, cost, and quality or functionality).
- The exact nature of the product of the project.
- Who will deliver it.
It is good practice to write a short statement at this stage which defines what the project is going to deliver. It should be no longer than one or two sentences. The vision (scope) statement functions as a kind of project “vision” statement. It is used to keep the attention of the project team and key stakeholders on the purpose of the project during the planning and implementation phases when projects are likely to suffer from “scope creep” or change in direction, particularly as new stakeholders arrive.
Scope Conditions and the True-False Paradox
Qualifying statements, also known as scope conditions, serve to constrain the applicability of universal propositions. These are universal statements that define the circumstances in which a theory is applicable, often used to reconcile contradictory findings. The scope statement acts as a written confirmation of the results your project will produce and the constraints and assumptions under which you will work.
The True-False Paradox is a dilemma for the development of cumulative knowledge, for every proposition that is advanced as a general sociological principle is both true and false. At the same level of theory, the paradox suggests that all theories are true and false; it depends on who you are applying the concepts or phenomenon to.
The main theoretical approach promotes using scope to target certain classes of phenomena to which your theoretical proposition will apply. The central thesis is that you cannot measure abstract concepts directly; you have to put them into testable hypotheses. There is no way you can know if a theory is true or false unless you operationalize and define the conditions in which that is going to apply. There is no way to test theory at the abstract level.
Particularly, you can say a theory is falsifiable to a given scope—meaning, “I am saying it applies here but not in the other places.” That way, you can have negative findings (and not throw out the theory). You can say, “Within this scope, I have refined it, and it works or it doesn’t.” This is a set of strategies for researchers to make more meaningful statements. They argue it is not possible to prove a theory false. If it doesn’t work within the scope, it doesn’t invalidate the whole theory.
The scope statement applies to the whole thing (theoretical levels). The authors would argue that you cannot claim the unconstrained theory (without scope) is the True-False paradox; you can never say that at the abstract level.
Scope Statements and Theory Development
How do Walker and Cohen suggest that scope statements can be an integral part of the ongoing development of theory through research?
Generalization and the Research Process
The arguments relate to the process they have described, starting on page 291. Their argument is that you start narrow, meaning the hypothesis is more likely to work, and gradually begin to apply it to more and more cases. That is how you generalize.
For example, considering social class: heterogeneous groups or different kinds of social classes commit crimes, but not all social classes commit this crime, etc. Using scope conditions allows for more variance in choosing groups. You choose a scope condition in a way that gives you a better chance to get support for the theory and then work your way out until it doesn’t work.
The authors are discussing the sample to which you are applying the theory—the set of cases where the relationship between social class and severity of sanction will work. They are literally talking about the part of the sample to apply it to.
Limiting Cases in Analysis
Using scope conditions here limits cases in the analysis to that of the scope condition. For instance, you might only include offenses where there are relatively equal numbers of offenses in each social class (focusing only on a relatively equal distribution of social class). Then you run your analysis.
Argument 3 suggests that when you do not meet the scope conditions, you cannot determine anything from the results. The end result is that if you do not specify scope conditions, you cannot say anything because of the True-False paradox; you cannot define the scope in which the theory is going to hold. It comes down to this: when you do not specify scope conditions, you cannot complete the research, and once you specify them, you cannot make any claims if you have not satisfied them.
Expanding Scope and Foundational Research
The way this plays out in research is through generalizing via the theoretical route. When critiquing work, researchers focus on scope conditions, building off foundational research and expanding the scope conditions. We know it works here, but can we broaden that scope condition so it applies to an even larger set of conditions?
Scope Condition 2 (p. 294) opens up to all cases, so now you run the analysis. Argument 5 states that if the condition is satisfied (C2, operationalized down to the hypothesis level), it means they have limited it to the cases where only those need scope conditions. When you open up broader, it doesn’t necessarily hold.
For example, the theory works in Scope Condition 1 but not in Scope Condition 2 or broader cases. If the theory fails under Scope Condition 2, you can make it less constricted than in SC1 but more restricted than in SC2. You must back it up and not be so broad, or take it in an entirely different direction.
The scope conditions of this theory are used in the process of generalizing because they are applied to the whole relationship.