Sociological Inquiry Exam 1

Four Basic Approaches to Social Research

(1) formulate a research question, (2) prepare a research design, (3) collect data, (4) analyze/interpret data

Artificial Social Networks

- A simple linear network, everyone is connected in order from left to right - Structural form of organizing people - Ex: passing buckets of water to put out fire

Social networks

- Are about both individuals and groups and how individuals become groups by connecting to each other - Are one particular kind of supra-individual factor that can affect individual choices, that can shape your destiny. Through face-to-face interactions - 2 kinds, artificial and natural

Producer of Research

- Consumers of research can also enable you to pose research questions and answer them yourself, thereby becoming a... - Conduct your own research as a student - Do research in your postgraduate career

Surveys (2)

- Involve asking questions of a relatively large randomly selected group of people - Yield precise statistical estimates of group characteristics - Respondents may not be truthful - What people say may not predict what they do

Experiments (1)

- Involve manipulation and control - Ideal for understanding the causes of human behavior -Limited to what can be manipulated - Often raise questions of ethics

Field Research/Interviews (3)

- Involves observing people in natural settings and/or interviewing them in depth - Provides rich information on social meanings and processes - Often difficult to know the generalizability of research result

Existing Data Analysis (4)

- Involves the analysis of data not produced directly by the researcher who uses them - Well suited to studying the past and social change - Data often are unobtrusive - May be difficult to find data that can adequately address the research question

Sociology

- Is the study of groups and group interactions, societies, and social interactions, from small and personal groups to very large groups. - the scientific study of society and human behavior.

Consumer of Research

- Knowledge of research methods can empower you to become a critical consumer of research findings and other evidence by asking tough questions. - read and understand research reports and articles - Know what questions to ask to evaluate the quality of information - Determine whether information is credible

Low/Popular Culture

- Known as high culture - includes the cultural behaviors and ideas that are popular with most people in a society.

Conflict Theory

- Macro level - The way inequalities contribute to social differences and perpetuate differences in power - looks at society as a competition for limited resources.

Structural Functionalism

- Macro or mid-levels - The way each part of society functions together to contribute to the whole - sees society as a structure with interrelated parts - designed to meet the biological and social needs of the individuals in that society.

Symbolic Interaction

- Micro level - One-to-one interactions and communications - focus on the relationships among individuals within a society. - Communication—the exchange of meaning through language and symbols—is believed to be the way in which people make sense of their social worlds.

Alice Goffman

- She spent six years living in a low-income, crime-ridden neighborhood in West Philadelphia - where she befriended and lived with two young African American men - documented the ways the criminal justice system intersected and disrupted the lives of them, their families, and other members of the neighborhood. - Provided insights that couldn't get by looking at statistics

Non-Material Culture

- The culture of ideas - Creation of human society: values, symbols, customs, ideals

Natural Social Networks

- Uses statistical methods to analyze data ranging from all kinds of statistical models, to network analysis, to experiments - Ex: obesity epidemic

Karl Marx (1818-1883)

- a German philosopher and economist - believed that societies grew and changed as a result of the struggles of different social classes over the means of production. - idea that social conflict leads to change in society is still one of the major theories used in modern sociology

George Herbert Mead (1863-1931)

- a philosopher and sociologist whose work focused on the ways in which the mind and the self were developed as a result of social processes - argued that how an individual comes to view himself or herself is based to a very large extent on interactions with others. - His work is closely associated with the symbolic interactionist approach and emphasizes the micro-level of analysis.

Paradigms

- are philosophical and theoretical frameworks used within a discipline to formulate theories, generalizations, and the experiments performed in support of them. - Three have come to dominate sociological thinking because they provide useful explanations: structural-functionalism, conflict theory, and symbolic interactionism.

Folkways

- are the informal little rules that kind of go without saying. - Slight negative sanctions, weird looks, grounded,

Taboos

- are the norms that are crucial to a society's moral center, involving behaviors that are always negatively sanctioned. - these behaviors are never okay, no matter the circumstance, and they violate your very sense of decency. - Ex: Cannibalism, incest, and child molestation

Analyze/Interpret Data (4)

- consists of the analysis and interpretation of your data - Quantitative and Qualitative, Write Research Report

Prepare a Research Design (2)

- determine how best to answer it, devise a plan, called a research design - Asses Research Ethics, Develop Measures, Select Sample

Emile Durkheim (1858-1918)

- helped establish sociology as a formal academic discipline by establishing the first European department of sociology at the University of Bordeaux in 1895 and by publishing his Rules of the Sociological Method in 1895 - believed that sociologists would study objective "social facts". He also believed that through such studies it would be possible to determine if a society was "healthy" or "pathological.

Symbols

- include anything that carries a specific meaning that's recognized by people who share a culture. - Ex: stop sign or a gesture

Collect Data (3)

- is to carry out your research design by gathering data to answer your research question - Experiments, Field Research, Multiple Methods, Surveys, Existing Data Analysis

Sociological Imagination

- pioneer sociologist C. Wright Mills described it as an awareness of the relationship between a person's behavior and experience and the wider culture that shaped the person's choices and perceptions. - It's a way of seeing our own and other people's behavior in relationship to history and social structure

Culture

- refers to the group's shared practices, values, and beliefs. - encompasses a group's way of life, from routine, everyday interactions to the most important parts of group members' lives. - includes everything produced by a society, including all of the social rules.

Norms

- rules and expectations that guide behavior within a society. - relates to what we think is "normal", whether something is either culturally accepted, or not. - 3 main types: folkways, mores, taboos

How sociologists make sense of the social world

- seeing the general in the particular - seeing the strange in the familiar

Mores

- tend to be codified, or formalized, as the stated rules and laws of a society. - When broken, almost always get a negative sanction - and they're usually more severe than just strange looks. - Aren't universal

Material Culture

- the culture of things - books, buildings, food, clothing, transportation

Steps in the research process

1. Experiments 2. Surveys 3. Field research/Interviews 4. Existing data analysis

Society

A group of people who live in a defined geographic area, who interact with one another, and who share a common culture

Macro Levels of Society

Sociologists analysis looks at trends among and between large groups and societies.

Micro Levels of Society

Sociologists study small groups and individual interactions,

The General in The Particular

Sociology tries to understand social behavior by placing it in a wider social context.

Multiculturalism

a perspective that, rather than seeing society as a homogenous culture, recognizes cultural diversity while advocating for equal standing for all cultural traditions.

Seeing The Strange in The Familiar

approach the everyday world as though you were seeing it for the first time, as if you were from another world.

Beliefs

are specific ideas about what people think is true about the world.

Values

are the cultural standards that people use to decide what's good or bad, what's right or wrong, they serve as the ideals and guidelines that we live by.

Social Facts

are the laws, morals, values, religious beliefs, customs, fashions, rituals, and all of the cultural rules that govern social life that may contribute to these changes in the family.

Max Weber (1864-1920)

believed that it was difficult, if not impossible, to use standard scientific methods to accurately predict the behavior of groups as people hoped to do.

High Culture

cultural patterns that distinguish a society's elite.

Subcultures

cultural patterns that set apart a segment of a society's population.

Cultural Values and Beliefs

help form the guidelines for behavior within that culture

Afrocentrism

historical and sociological study on the contributions of Africans and African-Americans.

Cultural Diffusion

how cultural traits spread from one culture to another.

Ethnocentrism

is the practice of judging one culture by the standards of another.

Micro Study

might look at the accepted rules of conversation in various groups such as among teenagers or business professionals.

Macro Study

might research the ways that language use has changed over time or in social media outlets.

Counter-Cultures

push back on mainstream culture in an attempt to change how a society functions.

Formulate a research question (1)

research begins with a research question.

Qualitative Sociology

seeks to understand human behavior by learning about it through in-depth interviews, focus groups, and analysis of content sources (like books, magazines, journals, and popular media).

Mainstream Culture

the cultural patterns that are broadly in line with a society's cultural ideals and values.

Quantitative Sociology

uses statistical methods such as surveys with large numbers of participants. Researchers analyze data using statistical techniques to see if they can uncover patterns of human behavior.

Cultural Lag

where some cultural elements change more slowly than others.