In broad terms, social research is the study of issues in society. According to Bryman (2012), "social research involves research that draws on the social sciences for conceptual and theoretical inspiration" (p5). It can be range from a small scale research study on a few participants to researching the whole of society and beyond on a whole range of topics such as class and race. It can solve sociological dilemmas and even change social policies, for example, research into the study of media violence on young children has led to censorship on all video games and films. However, there are many factors that affect how and what kind of social research sociologists conduct. In this essay I will explore these factor and explain why, discuss the types of research that can be conducted, and what this means for the results of the research. The first step when conducting social research is to select which topic you want to study, and then to choose your research questions. In my opinion, the main influence of social research depends on your epistemological position. There are two main views that sociologists take in terms of how they look at society. Firstly, Positivism is the term used for sociologists who believe that society can be studied scientifically, and in an objective way, just like the natural sciences. As a result, they therefore generally conduct quantitative research, using quantitative methods, producing numerical and objective data. There is evidence that Durkheim, who is one of the most influential sociologists of all took a positivist approach when conducting his research. One of his most famous pieces of research is his study of suicide. He chose to study suicide as a way of showing the validity of sociology as a discipline and the usefulness of positivist methods, even for something as personal as suicide (sociology exchange, 2012). It is a classic study of positivist research through the use of his methodology, official statistics. However, this is argued by the sociologists holding the opposing