SOC 101 Final

Sociology

Study of social life, its nature, structure, patterns, causes, meanings.

Sociological Imagination

The ability to "zoom out" and view issues from a broader perspective in society.

Who came up with the 4 types of suicide?

Durkheim

Egoistic Suicide

Not enough integration, little or no social bonds.

Anomic Suicide

Not enough regulation, state of anomie or normlessness, no sense of what is expected.

Altruistic Suicide

Too much integration, so devoted to something beyond yourself that you take a backseat.

Fatalistic Suicide

Too much regulation, rare.

Who came up with rationality? What is rationality?

Weber. Reason and logic with a focus on empiricism. This allowed people to see the world in a new way with rules and laws that applied to everyone.

Iron Cage of Rationality

Too much rationality can leave people feeling trapped, forcing people to live in fully rationalized environments. It can be disenchanting, dehumanizing, and alienating. Exclusive to modern society.

Mcdonaldization. What are the 4 aspects of it?

Profit is the driving source and is a natural result of a society ruled by rationality.
Efficiency - producing the best result by wasting as little time and resources as possible.
Calculability - quantifying over quality. objective standards need to be met.
Predictability - routine, consistency, methodical operation, expectations of products bring comfort, less critical thinking.
Control - often replacing human labor w/ human technology

Mechanical Solidarity

Traditional society, shared understanding of how society works, which is based on sameness. Same values. beliefs, and social norms.

Organic Solidarity

Modern society, bound together by need, society is based on difference, people are dependent one each other. Less agreement on norms, values, beliefs, and morals.

Working class

Proletariat, majority of people, work to survive and share minority of the wealth.

Ruling class

Bourgeoisie, minority of people, own majority of wealth and don't need to work to survive.

What is the relationship between the working and ruling class?

The ruling class exploits the working class for a profit, capitalism, in its nature, is exploitative.

Commodification

Treating non-commodities as commodities to be bought. (ideas, land)

Alienation

Feeling a sense of disconnection from people/things, unique among capitalism.

How do Marx and Durkheim understand society differently?

Marx saw society based on conflict and the economy, every other institution is a reflection of the economy. Durkheim saw it based on solidarity and integrated society based on collectiveness.

Culture

Values, ideas, practices, and symbols that create a collective identity, members have a shared understanding and is learned, gives lives meaning.

Ideology

Shared beliefs about what the world is and how it should be. Directs and motivated belonging.

Values

What is important to the culture. How culture is organized.

Symbols

Representation of cultures, cultural markers that denote belonging.

Norms. What are the 4 types?

Guide us on what to do and how to act, signals others that we are behaving accordingly or doing to the right thing. Folkways, Mores, Taboos, and Laws; they exits on a continuum and sometimes there is not a distinct difference.

Folkways

Informal ways we should act, speak, . . . Unconsciously done. If violated, social pressure is felt.

Mores

Right vs. wrong. Violation may result in sanctions. Can shift over time and be different across cultures.

Taboos

Extreme violations. Most are illegal, some are legal. often considered disgusting, other members of the group can expel members.

Laws

Can encompass all of the above. State deals with those who break laws.

Goffman's Dramaturgical Analysis

Social world is a theater performance. Identity is based on how well you play roles.
Front stage - every singe social interaction is a performance for an audience and the goal is to appear authentic/genuine no matter the performance.
Backstage - no performance, no audience, free to act how you want, a place to "rehearse" when you're alone.

Cooley's Looking Glass Self

Identity is based on perception of other people's perceptions of you. Subjective interpretation.
1. you imagine how you appear to others
2.imagine other's judgement of your appearance
3. you form an identity based on your performance of others' judgement of you

What is the scientific method?

There are 6 steps: Uncover a question in need of an answer, review the relevant literature, develop a hypothesis, identify an appropriate method for answering the research question, collect data, and analyze the data. (surveys)

Qualitative Data

Non-numerical, descriptive data that captures attitude, opinions, and emotions. (focus groups)

Quantitative Data

Numerical data used to explain a phenomenon on a large scale. Often a sample that is generalizable to a larger population.

Deviance. What are the names of the different perspectives?

Any action, speech, belief, or characteristic that violates the norms of a group. (rule/norms, violator, audience to judge, negative reaction). The absolutist perspective, relativist perspective, social power perspective.

Absolutist Perspective

(Durkheim) Deviance is functional b/c it sets and reinforces boundaries. The act is considered deviant itself, traditional society.

Relativist Perspective

Deviance resides in the eye of the beholder and not in the act, created and decided by people, modern society.

Social Power Perspective

(Marx) Conflict, what is considered deviant is decided by powerful groups. Laws and their enforcement reflect the concerns and interests of the dominant class.

Stigma. What are the 3 types of stigma?

Identity that significantly deviates from whats expected or considered normal. Tribal, abominations of the body, character defects.

Tribal

Based on race, religion, etc. Individually or generations and groups.

Abominations of the Body

Part of the body that is different from the majority causing someone to perform differently.

Character Defects

Blemishes of the individuals that are perceived as the fault of the individual.

What is the US homicide rate and how does it compare to other countries?

The U.S. has a very high homicide rate compared to other Western, developed countries. The past decade, the U.S. has been close to historic lows for homicides and violent crime, but since 2020 there has been a sharp rise. Crime and violence is associated with poverty, unemployment, and alcohol.

Who commits violence in society?

Young men.

How common is intimate partner violence?

I in 4 women. 1 in 9 men.

Asch experiment

It tested social conformity and pressure. In the experiment, 5 people were instructed to say the wrong answer to an easy question to pressure the participant to also say the wrong answer. It found that 1/3 participants succumbed to social pressure and gave the wrong answer. People conform for two main reasons: because they want to fit in with a group and because they believe the group is better informed than they are.

Milgram experiment

It tested the obedience to authority figures and measured the willingness of study participants to obey and authority figure who instructed them to perform acts conflicting with their personal conscience. The majority of participants obeyed the authority figure.

Generalized Other

Attitude of the entire group, seeing yourself as an element of a group. If an individual "takes on" the generalized other, they look at themselves from a perspective of the group.

What are the stages of "becoming human"?

Pre-play stage, play stage, game stage.

Pre-play stage

Birth to 2, "I", don't care what others think.

Play stage

2-6, "Me", children mock or imitate roles of people in their life.

Game stage

6 and up, "Generalized Other", learn to understand multiple roles and take on more than one. Begin to develop a sense of others' roles and how your role fits within the group.

Wealth

Net worth, assets (money, property, stocks), liability (debt).

Income

Money made from a job. (salary, wage)

GDP

Total value of goods/services a country produces, measures how "rich" or "poor" a country is.

GDP per Capita

GDP/population. Measures standard of living and can vary w/ GDP.

Race vs. Ethnicity

Race - socially constructed classification system used to group individuals based on shared physical characteristics. (didn't exist before the 16th century)
Ethnicity - social group that has a common language, culture, heritage, etc. often a geographic region.

Social determinants of health

Broader range of factors that vary across time and place that can impact one's health and well-being. (smoking, geographic region)

Social Construction. How is it different from biological determinism?

Concepts that exist not in objective reality, but as a result of human interaction. They exist because humans agree on them. Social constructions are created by us, not discovered. Often placed in contrast with biological determinism. Biological determinism is the idea that most human characteristics, physical and mental, are determined at conception by hereditary factors passed from parent to offspring.

How is drug use understood sociologically?

What is considered deviant drug usage is dependent on what society deems a certain drug to be acceptable or not. Certain drugs become stigmatized, while others are normal/expected. Linking drugs to bad health is a relatively recent phenomenon and attitudes towards drugs/drugs usage/addiction are often based in objective science but socially constructed.

How is addiction understood sociologically?

How they interpret the sensations of experiencing reality in a new way. Overdosing on heroin, cocaine, etc. can be a result of changed location. Addiction is much more than a physical dependency on a drug. Can often be a natural response to trauma and it acts as a replacement for a social bond in society (ex. during and after rehab facilities).

The Thomas Theorem

Objective consequences of subjective interpretation. "If men define situations are real, they are real in their consequences".

How is society stratified by race and gender?

Classification of people in society into groups and ranked on hierarchy. There are three dimensions: class, status, and power. Certain race and gender's have an advantage placing them in a higher stratification, such as more power, more generational wealth, historical standards. Native Americans are the largest population in poverty.

Class

Economic position (lower class, middle class, upper class) that reflects income and wealth.

Status

Prestige attached to one's position in society.

Power

The ability or exert one's will onto others, even against their will.

How do class, status, and power relate to each other?

A different combo of positions in different categories can result in different placements in society. Class position is objective by status/power can be relative to one's social group.

Sex

Biological characteristics that define people as male or female at birth, biologically determined. (intersex exists)

Gender

Norms, behaviors, roles associated w/ males or females. Can be binary or non-binary. Can be both a social construct and a biological reality, though much or understanding is socially constructed.

Stratification in the US

Highly stratified, with the US poverty like at $27,000. The top 1% holds about 32% of the wealth, and the bottom 50% holds about 2.6%.

Global Stratification

Top 4 countries: Luxembourg, Norway, Ireland, and Switzerland. Gini-coefficient. 1 Billion people live in abject poverty.

Gender differences. What categories were measured and what was found?

Altruism, non-physical aggressiveness, empathy. Similar among men and women. Differences appear when gender is performed.

Gender identity through socialization.

Begins at a young age and is reinforced by socialization agents, teaching boys and girls how to be boys and girls. Seeing a world of males/females and learning how to participated in it, categorizing the world.

Social Model of Health

Emerged in the 1970s. Uncovers causes of disease/illness through social, economic, cultural, and environmental aspects.

Biomedical Model of Health

Physical, biological aspects of the body. Diagnosis, treatment, cure of illness/disease. Individual focus, technology advances, rational, most understood model. Miasma theory to germ theory. Life expectancy is a measure of health.

How does the history of mental illness lead some to believe it is a social construct as opposed to an objective medical illness?

Mental illness is dependent on how we construct and create definitions and criteria, which has heavily changed through time. It depends on regional and cultural factors, such as acceptance, and social factors have led to a rise in mental illness.

Prevalence of mental illness in the US?

21% Americans, 10% globally. 26% W, 16% M. 30% 18-25, 25% 26-49, 15% 50 and up. Has increased in the last 50 years.

Nation

Group of people that share cultural, linguistic, religious identity over a long period of time.

State

Ruled through a centralized political organization that has a monopoly on violence, creates and enforces laws and policies, sovereignty over its own territory.

Nation-State

Nation that is politically organized into a state (gov.), homogenous.

Pluralism

Groups w/ competing interests balance the power. Checks and balances. Constants competition prevents one from getting too powerful, brings stability.

Power-Elite Thoery

Power is concentrated among few people that control society, such as military officials, leaders of the corporate world, upper echelons of the government.

Cooptation

Power elite come from the same families and socialize w/ each other, have a shared ideology.

Economic Model of The Media

The three main media business models are monopoly, oligopoly, and monopolistic competition.

Chomsky's "Manufacturing Consent"

Two targets: the educated political class and one's that follow and don't think. Perception of politically educated class, elites control the media by owning it and sell ads and their viewpoints.

Democracy vs. Dictatorship

Democracy - governed by the people, consent of the governed, rights and freedoms, representative and direct democracy.
Dictatorship - rule w/o the consent of the governed, often totalitarian or expansionist.

Environment

Natural and human-made and the interaction between the two.

Social Ecology

Human populations and their impact on the world.

Renewable vs. Nonrenewable Resources

Water vs. Iron, can be replaced vs. what will run out.

Sustainable Development

Policies, projects, investments that provide benefits w/o sacrificing environmental, social, and personal health.

Population

All the inhabitants of a particular town, area, or country.

Demography. What are the 3 processes?

Current state and changes over time in the size, comparison, and distribution of the population. Birth, death, migration.

Birth rate

# of live births/1000 (yearly)

Death Rate

# of deaths/1000 (yearly)

Migration (Immigration and Emigration)

Immigration - movement into an area to take up permanent residence. (adds to population)
Emigration - movement out of an area to take up permanent residence. (subtracting from population)

Zero Population Growth

Ideal. Birth rate equals death rate, population remains relatively stable.

What is the focus of sociology on religion?

The function of religion on society, consequences, and how it organizes itself in social life.

What is the global prevalence of different religions?

2015; 31.2% Christians, 24.1% Muslims, 15.1% Hindus,
16% unaffiliated, 6.9% Buddhists, .2% Jewish, .8% other, 5.7% folk religions.

Marx & Religion.

Coping mechanism, can offer relief and happiness, can obscure real cause of suffering.

Durkheim & Religion. (Sacred vs. Profane)

Social integration and regulation, need solidarity that comes from religion. Every religion has a difference between the sacred and the profane.
Sacred - separation from profane, awe-inspiring extraordinary experience.
Profane - mundane, ordinary, everyday life.

Rituals

Coming together for a social purpose to bond, separation between sacred and profane.

Collective Effervescence

An altered state of consciousness coming from intense social rituals, fear, love, etc. An overwhelming experience, where you're aware that you're part of something bigger than you.