IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/ehsrev/v62y2009i4p893-925.html

Turning qualitative into quantitative evidence: a well‐used method made explicit1

Author

Listed:
  • A. W. CARUS
  • SHEILAGH OGILVIE

Abstract

Many historians reject quantitative methods as inappropriate to understanding past societies. This article argues that no sharp distinction between qualitative and quantitative concepts can be drawn, as almost any concept used to describe a past society is implicitly quantitative. Many recent advances in understanding have been achieved by deriving quantitative evidence from qualitative evidence, using the two dialectically, and indexing them against other quantitative findings from the same population. We show that this triangulation method can be extended to many apparently qualitative sources. Despite its successes, the potential of turning qualitative into quantitative evidence has only just begun to be exploited.

Suggested Citation

  • A. W. Carus & Sheilagh Ogilvie, 2009. "Turning qualitative into quantitative evidence: a well‐used method made explicit1," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 62(4), pages 893-925, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:ehsrev:v:62:y:2009:i:4:p:893-925
    DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-0289.2009.00486.x
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0289.2009.00486.x
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/j.1468-0289.2009.00486.x?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ogilvie Sheilagh, 2004. "Women and Labour Markets in Early Modern Germany," Jahrbuch für Wirtschaftsgeschichte / Economic History Yearbook, De Gruyter, vol. 45(2), pages 25-60, December.
    2. Crafts, N. F. R. & Ireland, N. J., 1976. "Family Limitation and the English Demographic Revolution: A Simulation Approach," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 36(3), pages 598-623, September.
    3. E. A. Wrigley, 1966. "Family Limitation in Pre-Industrial England," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 19(1), pages 82-109, April.
    4. Pamela Sharpe, 1991. "Literally spinsters: a new interpretation of local economy and demography in Colyton in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 44(1), pages 46-65, February.
    5. Ogilvie, Sheilagh, 2003. "A Bitter Living: Women, Markets, and Social Capital in Early Modern Germany," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780198205548.
    6. Richard B. Morrow, 1978. "Family Limitation in Pre-Industrial England: A Reappraisal," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 31(3), pages 419-428, August.
    7. Wrightson, Keith & Levine, David, 1995. "Poverty and Piety in an English Village: Terling, 1525-1700," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780198203216.
    8. E. A. Wrigley, 1978. "Marital Fertility in Seventeenth-Century Colyton: A Note," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 31(3), pages 429-436, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. David A. Bateman & Dawn Langan Teele, 2020. "A developmental approach to historical causal inference," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 185(3), pages 253-279, December.
    2. Giuliana Freschi, 2023. "From the edge to the heart: female employment in 19th-century Italy," LEM Papers Series 2023/38, Laboratory of Economics and Management (LEM), Sant'Anna School of Advanced Studies, Pisa, Italy.
    3. Martha A. Starr, 2014. "Qualitative And Mixed-Methods Research In Economics: Surprising Growth, Promising Future," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(2), pages 238-264, April.
    4. Paul Atkinson & Catherine Porter & Ian Gregory & Brian Francis, 2017. "Spatial modelling of rural infant mortality and occupation in 19th-century Britain," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 36(44), pages 1337-1360.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ogilvie, Sheilagh & Carus, A.W., 2014. "Institutions and Economic Growth in Historical Perspective," Handbook of Economic Growth, in: Philippe Aghion & Steven Durlauf (ed.), Handbook of Economic Growth, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 8, pages 403-513, Elsevier.
    2. Sofie De Langhe & Isabelle Devos & Christa Matthys, 2013. "Survival strategies of single women in the Bruges countryside, 1814," EED-Working Papers 6, EED research unit, department of History, Ghent University.
    3. Sheilagh Ogilvie, 2004. "Guilds, efficiency, and social capital: evidence from German proto‐industry," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 57(2), pages 286-333, May.
    4. Alexandra de Pleijt & Jan Luiten van Zanden, 2021. "Two worlds of female labour: gender wage inequality in western Europe, 1300–1800," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 74(3), pages 611-638, August.
    5. Ogilvie, Sheilagh & Edwards, Jeremy & Küpker, Markus, 2022. "Economically relevant human capital or multi-purpose consumption good? Book ownership in pre-modern Württemberg," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 83(C).
    6. Nicolini, Esteban A., 2007. "Was Malthus right? A VAR analysis of economic and demographic interactions in pre-industrial England," European Review of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 11(1), pages 99-121, April.
    7. T. K. Dennison & Sheilagh Ogilvie, 2007. "Serfdom and social capital in Bohemia and Russia1," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 60(3), pages 513-544, August.
    8. Francesco Cinnirella & Marc P. B. Klemp & Jacob L. Weisdorf, 2012. "Malthus in the Bedroom: Birth Spacing as a Preventive Check Mechanism in Pre-Modern England," CESifo Working Paper Series 3936, CESifo.
    9. van den Heuvel, Danielle & Ogilvie, Sheilagh, 2013. "Retail development in the consumer revolution: The Netherlands, c. 1670–c. 1815," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 50(1), pages 69-87.
    10. Guinnane, Timothy W. & Ogilvie, Sheilagh, 2008. "Institutions and Demographic Responses to Shocks: Wuttemberg, 1634-1870," Center Discussion Papers 5977, Yale University, Economic Growth Center.
    11. Jeremy Edwards & Sheilagh Ogilvie, 2022. "Did the Black Death cause economic development by ‘inventing’ fertility restriction? [Land use and management in the upland demesne of the De Lacy estate of Blackburnshire c. 1300]," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 74(4), pages 1228-1246.
    12. Martin Kolk, 2011. "Deliberate Birth Spacing in Nineteenth Century Northern Sweden [L’espacement volontaire des naissances au 19e siècle dans le Nord de la Suède]," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 27(3), pages 337-359, August.
    13. Jane Humphries, 2013. "The lure of aggregates and the pitfalls of the patriarchal perspective: a critique of the high wage economy interpretation of the British industrial revolution," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 66(3), pages 693-714, August.
    14. Ville, Simon, 2004. "Social Capital: An Insight Revealed or a Concept Too Many?," Economics Working Papers wp04-05, School of Economics, University of Wollongong, NSW, Australia.
    15. D. Eversley, 1977. "Population patterns in the past," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 14(4), pages 539-548, November.
    16. Partha Dasgupta, 2005. "Economics of Social Capital," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 81(s1), pages 2-21, August.
    17. Pilar Pérez-Fuentes, 2013. "Women's Economic Participation on the Eve of Industrialization: Bizkaia, Spain, 1825," Feminist Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 19(4), pages 160-180, October.
    18. Alexander Klein & Sheilagh Ogilvie, 2016. "Occupational structure in the Czech lands under the second serfdom," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 69(2), pages 493-521, May.
    19. Le Bris, David & Tallec, Ronan, 2021. "The European Marriage Pattern and its Positive Consequences Montesquieu-Volvestre, 1660-1789," MPRA Paper 105324, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    20. Youssouf Merouani & Faustine Perrin, 2022. "Gender and the long-run development process. A survey of the literature [Rethinking age heaping: A cautionary tale from nineteenth-century Italy]," European Review of Economic History, European Historical Economics Society, vol. 26(4), pages 612-641.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:ehsrev:v:62:y:2009:i:4:p:893-925. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ehsukea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.