School of Social and Political Science

Research Training Centre

Research Training Centre

About the centre

At the Research Training Centre, we apply expertise in a diverse set of social science methods through teaching and research to contribute new insights to the key challenges in society.

Find out more
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Study

Learn about social science research methods through our degrees, courses and training activities.
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Research and Impact

Discover how we apply social science methods to societal problems in ways that make impact.
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Updates

Find out what’s new at the Research Training Centre and read our latest blogs.

Latest blog posts

Blog posts content

Image of people sat around tables, talking, with trees around
31/05/2024

An Introduction to Utopia as Method

What would radically improve the quality of your life? The quality of your family’s life? The quality of your friends’ lives? And their family and friends’ lives?

By Dr Rebecca Hewer
28/03/2024

Is there a place for generative AI in sociological research? The coming crisis of ‘the coming crisis of empirical sociology’

Generative Artificial intelligence has barely been out of the headlines in 2023. As we move into 2024, the expectation is that this is the year in which the rubber will meet the road, with hype and speculation either crystallising into a set of core use cases, business models, and designs, or alternatively collapsing entirely into another ‘AI winter’.

By Ben Collier
Lecturer in Digital Methods
Science, Technology and Innovation Studies
Screenshot of the NCRM page of the blog
20/02/2024

NCRM: How do you analyse large amounts of qualitative data? Try our step-by-step guide

This blog is a re-print of a blog originally published by National Centre for Research Methods on 12th February 2024, and is available here: https://www.ncrm.ac.uk/news/show.php?article=5812’

"How to work with such large volumes of data and yet retain the depth and richness of analytic engagement that is the hallmark of rigorous qualitative analysis? This was the methodological question that motivated our team and led to our development of a breadth-and-depth approach to analysing large volumes of qualitative data, in our NCRM work package Working across qualitative longitudinal studies: feasibility study looking at care and intimacy (2015-2019)."
Image of Howalygmaa, a Tuvan shaman playing traditional instrument.
25/01/2024

Sensorial Ethnographies: Ethnography in Sound by Dr Mally Stelmaszyk

What does it mean to do and think things through sound? What kind of insides about the world can sound reveal when used as a method of inquiry?

Our events

Events content

RTC Talking Methods Seminar - Critical and quantitative? by Dr Laura Sochas
07 January 2025
13:00 - 14:00

RTC Talking Methods Seminar - Critical and quantitative? by Dr Laura Sochas

In this talk, I take feminist critiques of demography & public health seriously, to demonstrate how we can include social structure, better model distributions and heterogeneity, and use critical theory to shape research questions, within quantitative population research.

03 December 2024
13:00 - 14:00

RTC - In Defence of What’s There: Notes on Scavenging

This talk will reflect on the concept of scavenging as a methodology of refusal that might encourage us to rethink our approaches to doing social sciences.
Image of banner of the RTC Talking Methods Seminar: Inclusive Methods, Queer Data and Who Counts?
05 November 2024
13:00 - 14:00

RTC Talking Methods Seminar: Inclusive Methods, Queer Data and Who Counts?

Whether we use surveys or interviews, ethnographies or focus groups – the methods we use as researchers do not arrive with us as some sort of apolitical or ahistorical artefact. They do not collect information about the outside world that is static, fixed and simply waiting to be uncovered. Rather, methods are crafted, tweaked and changed to serve the particular interests of individuals, organisations or ways of thinking.
Distancing the Past: Racism as History in South African Schools
01 October 2024
13:00 - 14:00

RTC Talking Methods Seminar - Distancing the Past: Racism as History in South African Schools

How are histories of racial oppression dealt with in contexts of diversity? Chana Teeger tackles this question by examining how young South Africans, born into democracy, confront their country’s racist apartheid past in high school history lessons.