Sociology Research Proposal?

Question

I have to write a Research Proposal for this class and Im stuck on finding a topic.

1) Im interested in consumer habits of women

2) Also body image and the media

Any suggestion on a good topic??

Answer 1

I recently wrote a paper on how the internet provides a safe/welcoming environment for overweight individuals...  Community building for stigmatized individuals is facilitated when geography is irrelevant and when identities can be protected by screennames, etc.

Because of the requirements for the paper, I wasn't able to compare the body ideals of heavy internet users vs. light internet users to see that really does make a difference...   Something along those lines (beauty ideals, consumption of beauty products, etc.) would certainly be interesting.

Good luck with your proposal.  :)

Answer 2

Society views on people and how they are/ such as how a girl is supposed to look likde to be good looking/ if a guy has a lot of girls hes a pimp but if a girl has a lot of guys shes a w***e/  views that society give us on things that most people believe in

Answer 3

maybe make your proposal about any of the following variables working together:  married vs. single, men vs. women, older vs. younger, wealthy vs. poor, white vs. minority and spending habits, rate of self esteem, proportion of income spent on something (housing, makeup, household necessities), overall happiness, or any other thing you find interesting.  

put it together and you've got numerous proposals - ex "wealthy women have higher rates of self esteem than poor women."

Answer 4

With up to 80% of purchases in American society being made by or directly influenced by women, you certainly have a wide selection of concepts and variables to select from.

Depending on your perspective and the time and effort you have (or want) to devote to your research proposal, here are my research questions:

(1) Is consumerism rational behavior?

(2) Do consumers (generally) and females (specifically) tend to purchase goods and services that are not based on need?

(3) Is it possible that consumerism is a phobia?

(4) Is the act of buying goods and services ameliorative?

From those questions you can develop a series of different hypotheses ... I'll offer one as an example: "It seems likely there is a relationship between disposition (or mood) and the propensity to purchase goods and services."

Depending on how you prefer to proceed from that hypothesis, at a minimum, you could propose to structure your study to investigate when female conumers purchase out of need and when they purchase randomly (or not having need), and look to determine if there's an underlying influnce that's prompts "shopping" when there's seemingly no reason to be making purchases.

I hope this perspective is somewhat helpful -good luck, and have fun!