Sociology Chp 1-3

Sociological research generally begins with a _____ that asks what causes a certain social phenomenon to occur

question

Measures used to evaluate variables in a hypothesis must be _____ and ______ and the outcomes of a particular research study must be generalizable to a larger population

valid reliable

The ______ ______ focused on empirical research with the belief that people's behaviors and personalities are shaped by their social and physical environments.

Chicago School

Common in social psychology, highly controlled environment; looking to find something consistent within a large amount of people, control group and experimental group (comparison)

Experimentation

treats women's experiences as legitimate empirical and theoretical resources, promotes social science that may bring about policy change to help women, and is as conscious of the role of the researcher as that of the subjects being studied

Feminist methodology

Society is a living organisms and institutions are like vital organs

Functionalism

will the findings of this study apply to some other population or groups of people?

Generalizabilty

______ _____ established what is today referred to as formal sociology, or a sociology of pure numbers.

Georg Simmel

________ ________, the first to translate Comte's written works to English, was one of the earliest feminist social scientists.

Harriet Martineau

different from domination, is important for understanding the impact of media on culture and for examining how people and societies shape, and are shaped by, culture

Hegemony

connecting biography and history

Historical Context

________ ________, a theory developed by ______ ______, identifies class conflict as the primary cause of social change.

Historical Materialism Karl Marx

Types of Data collection

Historical methods, content analysis, experimentation, comparative research, participant observation, interviews, survey research

a proposed relationship between two variables

Hypothesis

refers to any form of media that reaches the mass of the people.

Mass Media

everything that is a part of our constructed environment, such as books, fashion, and monuments.

Material Culture

______ ______ felt that culture and politics as well as economics were important influences on society, and his emphasis on subjectivity became a foundation of _______ ______.

Max Weber Interpretive Sociology

Formats or vehicles that carry, present, or communicate information

Media

any formats or vehicles that carry, present, or communicate information. Examples of media include books, posters, Web pages, clay tablets, and radio

Media

Hegemony occurs when one group rules or dominates another In a hegemony, unlike other forms of power, the subjugated group are complicit in their subjugation This means that we allow the media to exert their control over our culture

Media Mechanisms

factors that are positioned between the independent and dependent variables but do not affect the relationship between them

Mediating Variables

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

Quantitative Methods

Culture reflects society's underlying realities and structures

Reflection Theory

culture is a projection of social structures and relationships into the public sphere. A Marxist version of reflection theory argues that cultural objects reflect the material labor and production relationships that went into making them

Reflection Theory

Does not explain why some cultural products: remain popular or fade away, or why they change meaning over time

Reflection Theory Limitations

the process by which a person internalizes the values, beliefs, and norms of a given society and learns to function as a member of that society.

Socialization

A group distinct from the larger culture, united by shared meaning Some way to identify their group, visually

Subculture

group united by sets of concepts, values, traits, and/or behavioral patterns that distinguish it from others within the same culture or society

Subculture

Questionnaire; phone, mail, door to door, internet; the cellular effect—during presidential election, younger people were using cellphones

Survey Research

-Focuses on how face-to-face interactions create the social world -Bottom up theory -Individuals act based on symbolic meanings attached to objects and people

Symbolic Interactionism

Culture = human-nature

Technology by which humans dominate nature Ideologies and symbolic representations

Society is the result of divine will

Theological Stage

Comte's 3 Historical Epistemological Stages—how he believed society would evolve

Theological Stage Metaphysical Stage Scientific Stage

says culture has no impact on society

Unidirectional

moral beliefs

Values

The French scholar ______ _____, founder of what he called "social physics" or "positivism," felt that we could better understand society by determining the logic or scientific laws governing human behavior. Known for trying to turn sociology into a science, figured out easier said than done

Auguste Comte

exists when we can prove that a change in one factor causes the change in the other factor

Causation

In the mid-twentieth century, sociologist __ _____ _____ argued that we need to use our sociological imagination to think critically about the social world around us

C. Wright Mills

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

Casuality

Identifies power relationships that create different phenomena in society

Conflict Theory

Belief that happiness and fulfillment can be achieved through material possessions

Consumerism

the belief that happiness and fulfillment can be achieved through the acquisition of material possessions

Consumerism

Performed on media: books, documents, video, paintings; analyzing these things for a theme

Content Analysis

Sociologists conduct research to try to prove causation. In order to prove causation, researchers need to establish ______ and time order and rule out alternative explanations

Correlation

exists when we simply observe change in two things simultaneously

Correlation

Understanding cultural differences without assigning value

Cultural Relativism

a term coined by the anthropologist Ruth Benedict in the 1930s, is the idea that we should recognize differences across cultures without passing judgment on, or assigning value to, those differences

Cultural Relativism

Behaviors and understandings that are not universal or natural Often based on gender

Cultural Scripts

modes of behavior and understanding that are not universal or natural, but that may strongly shape beliefs or concepts held by a society

Cultural Scripts

a set of beliefs, traditions, and practices distinction between what is part of our natural environment and what is modified or created by humans

Culture

one example of subverting the power of media.

Culture Jamming

Culture = Man - Machine

Culture as pursuit of perfection The best which has been thought and said

we start with a theory, develop a hypothesis, make empirical observations, and then analyze the data collected through observation to confirm, reject, or modify the original theory.

Deductive Research

is the outcome that a researcher is trying to explain

Dependent Varaible

_______ _______, a concept developed by _____ ______, refers to an individual's constant awareness of how others perceive them and how those perceptions alter their own behavior.

Double Consciousness W.E.B. Dubois

something may not work in society anymore if something else in society changed

Dysfunction

______ _______, considered the founding practitioner of positivist sociology, developed the theory that the division of labor in a given society helps to determine how social cohesion is maintained, or not maintained, in that society.

Emile Durkheim

Correlation Time order Nonspurious (reasonable explanation)

Establishing Causation

Believing your own culture is superior

Ethnocentrism

a system of concepts and relationships that includes an understanding of cause and effect

Ideology

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

Independent Varaiable

we start with empirical observation and then work to form a theory

Inductive Research

Researchers must guard against causing physical, emotional, or psychological harm to their subjects. By adhering to______ ________ and _________ __________ _________, researchers can make sure their subjects know they are participating in a study and have voluntarily chosen to participate.

Informed consent Voluntary participation guidelines

The _______ and _______ we ascribe to social institutions shape and change them

Interactions Meanings

focuses on the meanings people attach to social phenomena, prioritizing specific situations over a search for social facts that transcend time and place

Interpretive Sociology

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

Macrosociology

Human behavior governed by natural, biological instincts

Metaphysical Stage

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

Microsociology

factors that affect the relationship between the independent and dependent variables

Moderating Varaibles

What's in a name?

Names follow socially structured patterns

encompasses values, beliefs, behaviors, and social norms.

Non-material Cuture

how values tell us to act

Norms

For all hypotheses, both a _____ hypothesis and an _______ hypothesis exist

Null Alternative

the process by which a researcher specifies the terms and methods he or she will use in a particular study

Operationalization

If we successfully answer 1 question, it only spawns others. There is no moment when a social scientist's work is done

Paradox

Seeks to observe social actions in practice; tearoom—"watch queen", consensual, "chicken", interview with questionnaire,

Participant Observation

idea that society can be studied scientifically and logically

Positivism or social physics

also called the "normal science" model of sociology, attempts to reveal the social facts that affect social life by developing and testing hypotheses based on theories about how the social world works.

Positivist Sociology

refers to the practice of using sociological research, teaching, and service to reach a wider (not solely academic) audience and to influence society.

Public Sociology

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

Qualitative Methods

More detailed, harder to sort Opinions, feelings, experiences

Quantitative Methods

You lose detail when completely in numeric form Large amount of data quickly

Quantitative Methods

if you conduct the study again, will you get the same results?

Reliability

standard rules that social scientists follow when trying to establish a causal relationship between social elements.

Research Methods

Develop a social physics to understand human behavior

Scientific Stage

school system isn't producing people who are able to do jobs immediately (dysfunction)

Skills Mismatch

how individuals define themselves in relationship to groups they are a part of (or in relationship to groups they choose not to be a part of). We all contribute to one another's ______ _______, which can also be thought of as a grand narrative constructed of many individual stories.

Social Identity

a group of social positions, connected by social relations, that perform a social role. ________ _______, such as the legal system, the labor market, or language itself, have a great influence on our behavior and are constantly changing

Social Institution

Process of internalizing values, beliefs and norms Learning to function as a member of society

Socialization

Make the familiar strange; Question habits or customs that seem natural

Sociological Imagination

the ability to connect one's personal experiences to society at large and greater historical forces. Using our ___________ _________ allows us to "make the familiar strange" or to question habits or customs that seem "natural" to us.

Sociological Imagination

the study of human society; to reveal which is hidden—Pierre Bourdieu

Sociology

the effects of culture, values, and ideas on others' behavior—has experienced a backlash recently, in part due to negative reactions to certain American foreign policy measures

Soft Power

Networks of structures in society that work to socialize of people within them

The legal system The labor market The educational system The military (total institution- controls every aspect of life) The family Prison (also total institution)

does the study measure what it is intended to measure?

Validity

Understanding, in German

Verstehen

Culture = Superior man - inferior man

Viewing all cultures from your own culture's perspectives

Researchers must meet _______ ________, which are often set by professional associations, academic institutions, or research centers, when conducting studies

codified standards

Participant observation, interviews, survey research, historical methods, comparative research, experimentation, and content analysis are all types of _____ ______used in social research

data collection

Modern sociological theories include

functionalism, conflict theory, feminist theory, symbolic interactionism, postmodernism, and midrange theory