Core Class

The four crucial components of Power

1. It is a special form of influence
2. It can rest on various resources
3. It is never equally distributed
4. It is a relationship

Power in society is exercised for four broad purposes

1. To maintain peace, order, and stability within the society
2. To organize and direct community enterprises
3. To conflict warfare, both defensive and aggressive against other societies
4. To rule and exploit subject peoples

Authoritarian

A government in which one leader or group of people holds absolute power.

instrumental leadership

group leadership that focuses on the completion of tasks

expressive leadership

group leadership that focuses on the group's well-being

Ideology

a system of ideas and ideals, especially one that forms the basis of economic or political theory and policy.

free rider effect

Gaining the benefits of group membership by avoiding costly obligations of membership and by allowing other members to incur those costs.

sucker effect

a condition in which some group members, not wishing to be considered suckers, reduce their own efforts when they see social loafing by other group members

5 alternative sources of scientific knowledge

1. Authority
2. Tradition
3. Common Sense
4. Media Myths
5. Personal Experience

Hawthrone Effect/ Observer effect

A type of reactivity in which individuals modify or improve an aspect of their behavior in response to their awareness of being observed.

halo effect

tendency of an interviewer to allow positive characteristics of a client to influence the assessments of the client's behavior and statements

Anthropology

The study of humans

Biological Anthropology

the study of human biological variation in time and space

culture shock

the disorientation that people experience when they come in contact with a fundamentally different culture and can no longer depend on their taken-for-granted assumptions about life

cultural lag

the fact that some cultural elements change more quickly than others, disrupting a cultural system

Counterculture

A culture with lifestyles and values opposed to those of the established culture.

Sub-culture

a cultural group within a larger culture, often having beliefs or interests at variance with those of the larger culture.

cultural universals

traits that are part of every known culture

Taboo

Excluded or forbidden from use or mention

Ethnocentrism

Belief in the superiority of one's nation or ethnic group.

Cultural Relevatism

the belief that no culture is superior to another because culture is a matter of custom, not reason, and derives its meaning from the group holding it

cultural norms

prescriptions for how people should interact and what messages should mean in a particular setting

Cultural mores influence

Important norms: written, directions, laws, rules

Tells us right and wrong

Folkways

norms that are not strictly enforced

Sanctions

A way to enforce the norms

Socialization

Lifelong process through which most people learn the values and norms of a given society

Major Socialization Factors

1. Family
2. Peer groups
3. Schools
4. Mass Media
5. The Workplace

Values

* Shared ideas about what is good and desirable
* Abstract - just a suggestion about how people should behave

Symbols

a thing that represents or stands for something else, especially a material object representing something abstract.