Sociology Test 1 (Ch 1-6)

Sociology

the study of human society

Sociological imagination

the ability to connect the most basic, intimate aspects of an individual’s life to seemingly impersonal and remote historical forces

Who coined the term “sociological imagination”?

C. Wright Mills, who encouraged questioning and “making the familiar strange”

What is an example of using one’s sociological imagination?

being puzzled by how people in another country greet one another and then thinking about why they might do it that way

Social institution

a complex group of interdependent positions that, together, perform a social role and reproduce themselves over time

Examples of a social institution

the legal system, the labor market, the educational system, the military, the family

Auguste Comte

believed that the best way to understand society is by determining the logic or scientific laws governing human behavior, which he called “social physics”

Positism

initially called “social physics”, this approach to sociology emphasizes the scientific method to study the objectively observable behavior of individuals irrespective of the meanings those actions have for the subjects themselves. Argued that sociology should have a scientific basis and be objective

Harriet Martineau

the first person to translate Comte’s written works into English ad one of the earliest feminist social scientists. She addressed topics ranging from the education of children to the relationship between the federal and state governments

Karl Marx

proposed the theory of historical materialism, which identifies class conflict as the primary cause of social change, his writings provided the theoretical basis for Communism

Marxism

an ideological alternative to capitalism

Max Weber

emphasized subjectivity

To truly understand why people act the way they do, a sociologist must..

understand the meanings they attach to their actions

Verstehen

German for “understanding”

Interpretive sociology

a type of scholarship in which researchers imagine themselves experiencing the life positions of the social actors they want to understand

Emile Durkheim

wished to understand how society holds together and how modern capitalism and industrialization have transformed the ways people relate to one anther, he proposed that division of labor didn’t just affect work and productivity, it also helped determine a society’s form of social solidarity, he is famous for his study in which argues that anomie is a main social force leading to suicide, and he is considered a founder of positivist sociology

Anomie

a sense of aimlessness or despair that arises when we can no longer reasonably expect life to be predictable; inadequate social regulation; normlessness

Positivist sociology

the approach to sociology that emphasizes the scientific method as an approach to studying the objectively observable behavior of individuals irrespective of the meanings of those actions for the subjects themselves

Georg Simmel

proposed a formal sociology, or a sociology of pure numbers (how a group of 2 is different from a group of 3), his work was influential in the development of urban sociology and cultural sociology, and his work with small group interactions served as an intellectual precedent for later sociologists who came to study microinteractions

The Chicago School of American Sociology emphasized the importance of

the environment in shaping people’s behavior and personalities

Jane Addams

founded Hull House, where the ideas of the Chicago Schoo were put into practice and tested, 2nd woman to be awarded Nobel Peace Prize, prolific author on both the substance and methodology of community studies and her work at Hull House was influential in the development of the Chicago School’s theories, yet she was never afforded the same respect as the majority of her male contemporaries

W.E.B DuBois

the first African American to receive a PhD from Harvard and the first sociologist to undertake ethnography in the African American community

Double Consciousness

a concept conceived by W.E.B DuBois to describe the behavioral scripts, one for moving through the world and the other incorporating the external opinions of prejudiced onlookers, that are constantly maintained by African Americans

Functionalism

the theory that various social institutions and processes in society exist to serve some important (or necessary) function to keep society running. Functions may be manifest (explicit) or latent (hidden). Society is like living organism, each part of which serves an important role in keeping society together. The state or government was seen to be the brain, industry was the muscular system, media and mass communications were the nervous system.

Talcott Parsons

a leading theorist of functionalism in the mid 20th century

Conflict Theory

the idea that conflict between competing interests is the basic, animations force of social change and society in general

According to conflict theorists,

inequality exists as a result of political struggles among different groups (classes) in a particular society

Symbolic Interactionism

a micro-level theory in which shared meanings, orientations, and assumptions form the basic motivations behind people’s actions

What was the groundwork for symbolic interactionism?

Erving Goffman’s dramaturgical theory of social interaction, which used the language of theatre to describe the social facade we create.

According to Goffman,

we make judgements about class and social status based on details of how people present themselves to others

Postmodernism

a condition characterized by a questioning of the notion of progress and history, the replacement of narrative within pastiche, and multiple, perhaps even conflicting, identities resulting from disjointed affiliations

Social Construction

an entity that exists because people behave as if it exists and whose existence is perpetuated as people and social institutions act in accordance with widely agreed-on formal rules or informal norms of behavior associated with that entity (monopoly money vs USD example)

Midrange Theory

a theory that attempts to predict how certain social institutions tend to function, neither macrosociology nor microsociology, the key is that it generates falsifiable hypotheses- predictions that can be tested by analyzing the real world

Feminist Theory

a catchall term for many theories with an emphasis on women’s experiences and a belief that sociological and society in general subordinate women, emphasize equality between men and women and want to see women’s lives and experiences represented in sociological studies

Feminist sociologists remain interested in..

how power relationships are defined, shaped, and reproduced on the basis of gender differences

What do history and anthropology tend to focus more on?

particular circumstances

Psychology and biology examine things on a more ____ level than sociology does.

micro

political science focuses on only one aspect of social relations:

power

Sociology is distinct from other academic disciplines in its attempt to..

detect patterns in how societies handle or respond to similar phenomena

Microsociology

understands local interactional contexts, focusing on face-to-face encounters and gathering data through participant observations and in-depth interviews

Macrosociolgy

looks at social dynamics across whole societies or large parts of them and often relies on statistical analysis to do so

Which is an example of a study that might be undertaken by a macrosociologist?

conducting a statistical analysis of when professional men and women choose to start families

danah boyd’s research is an example of __

ethnography

ethnography

a qualitative method of studying people or a social setting that uses observation, interaction, and sometimes formal interviewing to document behaviors, customs, experiences, social ties, and so on

Scientific Method

a procedure involving the formulation, testing, and modification of hypotheses based on systematic observation, measurement, and/or experiments

Theory

a systematic, generalized model of how some aspects of the world works. It is more abstract and general than a specific hypothesis and in fact, it may generate multiple, testable hypotheses. It articulates a system of relationships between facts and suggests causes and effects emerging out of those relationships

Research methods

approaches that social scientists use for investigating the answers to questions

Quantitative methods

methods that seek to obtain information about the social world that is already in or can be converted to numeric form

Qualitative methods

methods that attempt to collect information about the social world that cannot be readily converted to numeric form

causal relationship

the idea that one factor influences another through a chain of events; such a dynamic is different from two factors being merely associated or correlated, in which case they may appear to vary together but that could be due to chance or a third factor causing both

Deductive approach to research

starts with a theory, develops a hypothesis, makes empirical observations, analyzes the data collected through observation to confirm, reject, or modify the original theory

Inductive approach to research

starts with empirical observation, works to form a theory, determines if a correlation exists by noticing if a change is observed in two things simultaneously.

Correlation (association)

when two variables tend to track each other positively or negatively

What describes the deductive approach to research?

A researcher starts with a theory, forms a hypothesis, makes observations, and then analyzes the data to confirm, reject, or refine the original theory

Natural experiment

something that takes place in the world that affects people in a way that is unrelated to any other preexisting factors or their characteristics, thereby approximating random assignments to treatment or control groups

Causality

the notion that a change in one factor results in a corresponding change in another

3 factors needed to establish causality

correlation, time order, and ruling out of alternative explanations

Reverse causality

a situation in which the researcher believes that A results in a change in B, but B is in fact causing A, important to establish time order

Dependent variable

the outcome the researcher is trying to explain

Independent variable

a measured factor that the researcher believes has a causal impact on the dependent variable

most important independent variable

key independent variable

Hypothesis

a proposed relationship between 2 variables, usually with a stated direction

The ______ of the relationship refers to whether the variables move in the same direction (positive) or in opposite directions (negative)

direction

A study to test any hypothesis begins with ____

operationalization

Operationaization

how a concept gets defined and measured in a given study

Good research should be

valid, reliable, and generalizable

validity

the extent to which an instrument measures what it is intended to measure

reliability

the likelihood of obtaining consistent results using the same measure

generalizability

the extent to which we can claim our findings inform us about a group that is larger than the one we studied

A thermometer that consistently gives readings that are 5 degrees cooler than the actual temperature is

reliable but not valid

White coat effect (Hawthorne effect)

the phenomenon wherein a researcher’s presence affects their subjects’ behavior or response, thereby disrupting the study

reflexivity

analyzing and critically considering our own role in, and effect on, our research

What is a moderating variable?

a factor that affects the relationship between the independent and depend variables

Feminist Methodology

a set of systems that treat women’s experiences as legitimate empirical and theoretical resources, promote social science for women (think public sociology, but for a specific half of the public), take into account as much as the overt subject matter

participant observation

a qualitative research method that seeks to uncover the meanings people give their social actions by observing their behavior in practice, involves significant time investment because the participant observer must gain access to a given community, learn its local norms and logic of behavior, and then watch social dynamics unfold

Interviews

another common form of gathering qualitative data, we can learn how and why people do things by asking them about it, can be structured, semi-structured or unstructured

Unstructured, open-ended interviews

allow subjects to share intimacies and details, but they typically take more time and require more conversational skills from the interviewer

Semi-structured interviews

researchers develop a specific set of questions to address with all respondents in a relatively fixed sequence

Survey

an ordered series of questions intended to elicit information from respondents

population

an entire group of individual persons, objects, or items from which samples may be drawn

sample

the subset of the population from which the researcher is actually collecting data

representative sample

the idea that a particular slice of social observation- a sample of survey respondents, an ethnographic research site as an organization, or a batch of social media posts- captures in an accurate way the larger set (or University) of those phenomena that it is meant to stand in for

census

if you don’t use a sample and instead collect information on the entire population

case study

an intensive investigation of one particular unit of analysis in order to describe it or uncover its mechanisms, main drawback is that they may not be broadly generalizable, major benefit is that they provide very detailed information

historical methods

research that collects data written from reports, newspaper articles, journals, transcripts, television programs, diaries, artwork, and other artifacts that date back to the period under study

comparative research

a methodology by which two or more entities (such as countries), which are similar in many dimensions but differ on the dimension in question, are compared to learn about the differences

general approach to comparative research

find cases that match on many potentially relevant dimensions but vary on just one, allowing researchers to observe the effect of that particular dimension

content analysis

a systematic analysis of the content rather than the structure of a communication, such as written work, speech, or film

manifest content

refers to what we can observe

latent content

refers to what is implied but not staged outright

experimental methods

methods that seek to alter the social landscape in a very specific way for a given sample of individuals and then track what results that change yields; they often involve comparisons to a control group that did not experience such an intervention

which of the following data collection methods are commonly used in social research?

comparative study, survey, interview

Joan systematically observes where people sit on the bus every day for a month. Based on the patterns she observes, she comes up with a theory of personal space in public situations. This would be an example of

the inductive approach

golden rules of research

do no harm, get informed consent, ensure voluntary participation

do no harm

often, we try to design research projects so that subjects will encounter no more risk than that associated with everyday life

get informed consent

subjects have a right to know they are part of a study, what they are expected to do, and how the results will be used

ensure voluntary participation

people have a right to decide if they want to participate in your study. They must be allowed to drop out at any point with no penalty

culture

the sum of the social categories and concepts we embrace in addition to beliefs, behaviors (except institutional ones), and practices; everything but the natural environment around us

the term ___ has also been used to refer to the distinction between what is natural and what is modified or created by humans

culture

culture is always a …

relative concept; we cannot talk about culture without reference to the world