Sociology 200 - Chapter 21

Motivational Framing

A call to action.

Crowd

A fairly large number of people who share close proximity.

Flash Mob

A large group of people who gather together in a spontaneous activity that lasts a limited amount of time.

Collective Behavior

A noninstitutionalized activity in which several people voluntarily engage.

Emergent Norm Theory

A perspective that emphasizes the importance of social norms in crowd behavior.

Mass

A relatively large group with a common interest, even if they may not be in close proximity.

Diagnostic Framing

A the social problem that is stated in a clear, easily understood manner.

New Social Movement Theory

A theory that attempts to explain the proliferation of postindustrial and postmodern movements that are difficult to understand using traditional social movement theories.

Assembling Perspective

A theory that credits individuals in crowds as behaving as rational thinkers and views crowds as engaging in purposeful behavior and collective action.

Social Change

Collective behavior and social movements are just two of the forces driving social change, which is the change in society created through social movements as well as external factors like environmental shifts or technological innovations. Essentially, any disruptive shift in the status quo, be it intentional or random, human-caused or natural, can lead to social change. Changes to technology, social institutions, population, and the environment, alone or in some combination, create change.

Acting Crowds

Crowds of people who are focused on a specific action or goal.

Expressive Crowds

Crowds who share opportunities to express emotions.

Social Institutions

Each change in a single social institution leads to changes in all social institutions. For example, the industrialization of society meant that there was no longer a need for large families to produce enough manual labor to run a farm. Further, new job opportunities were in close proximity to urban centers where living space was at a premium. The result is that the average family size shrunk significantly. A shift in one area, such as industrialization, means an interconnected impact across social institutions.

Technology

In The World Is Flat, Thomas Friedman (2005) argues that technology is a driving force behind globalization, while the other forces of social change (social institutions, population, environment) play comparatively minor roles. He suggests that we can view globalization as occurring in three distinct periods. First, globalization was driven by military expansion, powered by horsepower and wind power. The countries best able to take advantage of these power sources expanded the most, and exert control over the politics of the globe from the late fifteenth century to around the year 1800. The second shorter period from approximately 1800 C.E. to 2000 C.E. consisted of a globalizing economy. Steam and rail power were the guiding forces of social change and globalization in this period. Finally, Friedman brings us to the post-millennial era. In this period of globalization, change is driven by technology, particularly the Internet.

Modernization

Modernization describes the processes that increase the amount of specialization and differentiation of structure in societies resulting in the move from an undeveloped society to developed, technologically driven society (Irwin 1975). By this definition, the level of modernity within a society is judged by the sophistication of its technology, particularly as it relates to infrastructure, industry, and the like.

Conventional Crowds

People who come together for a regularly scheduled event.

Casual Crowds

People who share close proximity without really interacting.

Population

Population composition is changing at every level of society. Births increase in one nation and decrease in another. Some families delay childbirth while others start bringing children into their folds early. Population changes can be due to random external forces, like an epidemic, or shifts in other social institutions, as described above. But regardless of why and how it happens, population trends have a tremendous interrelated impact on all other aspects of society. Globally, often the countries with the highest fertility rates are least able to absorb and attend to the needs of a growing population. Family planning is a large step in ensuring that families are not burdened with more children than they can care for. On a macro level, the increased population, particularly in the poorest parts of the globe, also leads to increased stress on the planet's resources.

Alternative Movements

Social movements that limit themselves to self-improvement changes in individuals.

Electronic Aggression (Cyberbullying)

The U.S. Center for Disease Control (CDC) uses the term "electronic aggression" to describe "any type of harassment or bullying that occurs through e-mail, a chat room, instant messaging, a website (including blogs), or text messaging" (CDC, n.d.) We generally think of this as cyberbullying. A 2011 study by the U.S. Department of Education found that 27.8 percent of students aged twelve through eighteen reported experiencing bullying. From the same sample 9 percent specifically reported having been a victim of cyberbullying.

Crowdsourcing

The process of obtaining needed services, ideas, or content by soliciting contributions from a large group of people.

Environment

Turning to human ecology, we know that individuals and the environment affect each other. As human populations move into more vulnerable areas, we see an increase in the number of people affected by natural disasters, and we see that human interaction with the environment increases the impact of those disasters. Part of this is simply the numbers: the more people there are on the planet, the more likely it is that some will be affected by a natural disaster.

Frame Alignment Process

Using bridging, amplification, extension, and transformation as an ongoing and intentional means of recruiting participants to a movement.