Sociology: Perspective, Theory, and Method

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Sociology Perspective, Theory, and Method
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What Is Sociology?

• ...The systematic study of human society
• Systematic
• Scientific discipline that focuses attention on
  patterns of behavior
• Human society
• Group behavior is primary focus How groups
  influence individuals and vice versa
• At the heart of sociology
• The sociological perspective which offers a
  unique view of society

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Benefits of the Sociological Perspective

• Helps us assess the truth of common sense
• Helps us assess both opportunities and
  constraints in our lives
• Empowers us to be active participants in our
  society
• Helps us live in a diverse world

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Importance of Global Perspective

• Where we live makes a great difference in shaping
  our lives
• Societies throughout the world are increasingly
  interconnected through technology and economics
• Many problems that we faced in the united states
  are more serious elsewhere
• Thinking globally is a good way to learn more
  about ourselves

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The Sociological PerspectivePeter Berger

• Seeing the general in the particular
• Sociologists identify general social patterns in
  the behavior of particular individuals
• Individuals are uniquebut
• Societys social forces shape us into kinds of
  people
• Seeing the strange in the familiar
• Giving up the idea that human behavior is simply
  a matter of what people decide to do
• Understanding that society shapes our lives

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Durkheims Study of Suicide

• Emile Durkheims research showed that society
  affects even our most personal choices.
• More likely to commit male protestants who were
  wealthy and unmarried.
• Less likely to commit male JEWS and CATHOLICS
  who were poor and married.
• One of the basic findings why?
• The differences between these groups had to do
  with social integration.
• Those with strong social ties had less of a
  chance of COMMITING suicide.

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Figure 1-1 (p. 3)Rate of Death by Suicide, by
Race and Sex, for the United States
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THE ORIGINS OF SOCIOLOGY

• One of the youngest of academic disciplines,
  sociology has it origins in powerful social
  forces
• Social Change
• Industrialization, urbanization, political
  revolution, and a new awareness of society
• Science
• 3-Stages Theological, Metaphysical Scientific
• Positivism a way of understanding based on
  science
• Gender Race
• These important contributions have been pushed to
  the margins of society

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Sociological Theory

• Theory a statement of how and why facts are
  related
• Explains social behavior to the real world
• Theoretical paradigm a set of fundamental
  assumptions that guides thinking
• Three major approaches
• Structural-functional
• Social-conflict
• Symbolic-interaction

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Structural Functional Paradigm

• The basics
• A macro-level orientation, concerned with broad
  patterns that shape society as a whole
• Views society as a complex system whose parts
  work together to promote solidarity and stability
  
• Key elements
• Social structure refers to any relatively stable
  patterns of social behavior found in social
  institutions
• Social function refers to the consequences for
  the operation of society as a whole

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Whos Who in Structural-Functional Paradigm

• Auguste Comte
• Importance of social integration during times of
  rapid change
• Emile Durkheim
• Helped establish sociology as a university
  discipline
• Herbert Spencer
• Compared society to the human body, organic
  approach
• Talcott parsons
• Sought to identify tasks that every society must
  perform
• Robert K. Merton
• Manifest functions are recognized and intended
  consequences
• Latent functions are unrecognized and unintended
  consequences
• Social dysfunctions are undesirable consequences

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Social-Conflict Paradigm

• The basics
• A macro-oriented paradigm
• Views society as an arena of inequality that
  generates conflict and social change
• Key elements
• Society is structured in ways to benefit a few at
  the expense of the majority
• Factors such as race, sex, class, and age are
  linked to social inequality
• Dominant group vs. Minority group relations
• Incompatible interests and major differences

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Whos Who in Social-Conflict Paradigm

• Karl Marx
• The importance of social class in inequality and
  social conflict
• W.E.B. DuBois
• Race as the major problem facing the United
  States in the twentieth century

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Symbolic Interaction Paradigm

• The basics
• A micro-level orientation, a close-up focus on
  social interactions in specific situations
• Views society as the product of everyday
  interactions of individuals
• Key elements
• Society is nothing more than the shared reality
  that people construct as they interact with one
  another
• Society is a complex, ever-changing mosaic of
  subjective meanings

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Whos Who in Symbolic-Interaction Paradigm

• Max Weber
• Understanding a setting from the people in it
• George Herbert Mead
• How we build personalities form social experience
• Erving Goffman
• Dramaturgical analysis
• George Homans Peter Blau
• Social-exchange analysis

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Forms of Truth

• Belief or faith
• Expert testimony
• Simple agreement
• Science
• Logical system that bases knowledge on direct
  systematic observation

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3 Frameworks for Sociological Investigation

• Scientific sociology
• The study of society based on systematic
  observation of social behavior
• Empirical evidence information we can verify
  with our senses
• Interpretive sociology
• The study of society that focuses on the meanings
  people attach to their social world
• Critical sociology
• The study of society that focuses on the need for
  change

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Scientific Sociology Terminology

• Concepts
• A mental construct that represent some part of
  the world in a simplified form
• Variables
• Concepts whose values change from case to case
• Measurement
• A procedure for determining the value of a
  variable in a specific case
• Operationalizing a variable
• Specifying exactly what is to be measured before
  assigning a value to a variable

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Scientific Sociology Terminology

• Reliability consistency in measurement
• Does an instrument provide for a consistent
  measure of the subject matter?
• Validity precision in measuring exactly what
  one intends to measure
• Does an instrument actually measure what it sets
  out to measure?

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Causation

• Cause and effect
• A relationship in which change in one variable
  causes change in another
• Types of variables
• Independent the variable that causes the change
• Dependent the variable that changes (its value
  depends upon the independent variable)
• Correlation
• A relationship by which two or more variables
  change together
• Spurious correlation
• An apparent, though false, relationship between
  two or more variables caused by some other
  variable

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Correlation Does Not Mean Causation

• Conditions for cause and effect to be considered
• Existence of a correlation
• The independent (causal) variable precedes the
  dependent variable in time
• No evidence suggests that a third variable is
  responsible for a spurious correlation between
  the two original variables

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Scientific Sociology Terminology

• Objectivity
• A state of personal neutrality in conducting
  research
• Value-free research
• Weber says sociologists should strive to be
  dispassionate and detached
• Replication
• Repetition of research by other investigators
• Helps limit distortion caused by personal values

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Limitations of Scientific Sociology

• Human behavior is too complex to predict
  precisely any individuals actions
• The mere presence of the researcher may affect
  the behavior being studied
• Social patterns change
• Sociologists are part of the world they study
  making value-free research difficult

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Gender And Research

• Androcentricity
• Approaching the topic from a male-only
  perspective
• Gynocentricity
• Approaching the topic from a female-only
  perspective (less common than Androcentricity)
• Overgeneralizing
• Using data collected from one sex and applying
  the findings to both sexes
• Gender blindness
• The failure to consider the impact of gender at
  all
• Double standards
• Using different standards to judge males and
  females
• Interference
• This occurs when a subject under study reacts to
  the sex of the researcher and thereby interferes
  with the research operation

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Ethical Guidelines for Research

• Must strive to be technically competent
  fair-minded
• Must disclose findings in full without omitting
  significant data be willing to share their data
  
• Must protect the safety, rights and privacy of
  subjects
• Must obtain informed consent-- subjects are
  aware of of risks and responsibilities and agree
• Must disclose all sources of funding avoid
  conflicts of interest
• Must demonstrate cultural sensitivity

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Sociological Research Methodsa Systematic Plan
for Conducting Research

• Experiment a research method for investigating
  cause and effect under highly controlled
  conditions
• Hypothesis an unverified statement of a
  relationship between variables (an educated
  guess)
• Placebo a treatment that seems to be the same
  but has no effect on the experiment
• Hawthorne effect a change in a subject's
  behavior caused by the awareness of being studied

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Survey Researcha Research Method in Which
Subjects Respond to a Series of Statements or
Questions in a Questionnaire or Interview

• Population
• The people who are the focus of the research
• Sample
• The part of the population that represents the
  whole
• Random Sample
• Drawing a sample from a population so that every
  element of the population ahs an equal chance of
  being selected

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Questionnairea Series of Written Questions a
Researcher Presents to Subjects

• Closed-ended
• A series of fixed responses easy to analyze but
  narrows range of responses
• Open-ended
• Free response broadens range of responses but
  harder to analyze
• Most surveys are self-administered pretesting
  can avoid costly problems

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Other Research Methods

• Interviews
• A series of questions a researcher administers in
  person to respondents
• Participant observation
• A research method in which a investigators
  systematically observe people while joining in
  their routine activities
• Secondary analysis
• A research method in which a researcher used data
  collected by others

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10 Steps In Sociological Investigation

• Select and define topic
• Review the literature
• Develop key questions to ask
• Assess requirements for study
• Consider ethical issues
• Select a research methodology
• Collect the data
• Interpret the findings
• State conclusions
• Publish the findings