Introduction to Sociology

• Sociology focuses on society and everyday life.
• Sociology considers concepts like gender, class, diseases, political systems, sexuality, theory, society, relationships, race, religion, relations, institutions, domestic life, intimacy, and violence.

Learning Outcomes

• Understanding the definition of sociology.
• Differentiating between natural science and social science, including sociology and other social sciences.
• Acquiring knowledge of sociological research methods.
• Outlining the different schools of sociological thought.
• Formulating preliminary ideas within sociological research.

Pre-Class Questions

• Why do you expect certain acts from others?
• Why do find some behaviors unacceptable?
• Why do you have to follow certain manners/rules/regulations that you dislike?
• What kind of person do you want to be (for yourself or in the eyes of others)?

What is Sociology?

• Sociology is the scientific study of the nature and development of society and social behavior (Oxford Dictionary).
• The scientific method involves using empirical data of society and social behaviors to understand society/social phenomena and social behaviors of humans.

Elements of Sociology

• The object of study: Society, people living together in a community at both the individual and societal level.
• The methods: Scientific methods, systematic methods to objectively examine the world, aiming to gain knowledge about the structure and behavior of the natural and physical world, based on facts that can be proven.
• Information: Empirical data/ Empirical evidence, data deriving from observation or experiment used to observe behaviors, patterns, and prove a hypothesis.

Natural Scientific Methods

• Methodological processes used in natural science such as physics, chemistry, geology, or biology.
• Asking a question about the world.
• An observation may come prior to asking a question.
• Developing and testing a hypothesis involves empirical data from observation or experiment to prove/disprove the hypothesis.
• The hypothesis is tested and supported by evidence before any conclusion is reached.
• Conclusions and results are used to create a theory, which in turn is used to explain a natural phenomenon.

Scientific Examples

• Germ Theory: Question: Why does people get ill? Observation: germs found in diseased tissues can be transmitted. Hypothesis: Germs cause diseases, which is then tested (or an experiment) and thus the germ theory of disease was formed (Louis Pasteur and Robert Koch).
• Heliocentric Theory: Question: Is Earth the center of the universe (Geocentric model)? Observation: Earth and other planets like Venus and Mars, varied in brightness, which made more sense if they orbited the Sun by Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543). Hypothesis: The Sun, not the Earth, is the center of the solar system. Theory: In 1543, De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium (On the Revolutions of the Celestial Spheres) proposed the heliocentric theory.

Hypothesis and Theory

• A hypothesis is an educated guess or a proposed explanation.
• It must be testable and subject to experimentation and can be proven wrong (falsifiable).
• The process must be objective.
• Replicated experiments on the same phenomenon, using the same controlled variables, must yield the same results to be valid.
• A consistently confirmed hypothesis across multiple independent experiments, may contribute to the formation of a scientific theory.
• A theory is a well-substantiated explanation of natural phenomena, supported by extensive evidence, but it will never become an absolute fact or truth.
• Theories are always subject to challenge or revision in light of new evidence and is considered the best explanations rather than absolute facts or truths.

Can Sociology be Scientific?

• Sociology employs scientific methods to understand society and human behaviors, but it has certain limitations in comparison with the methods in natural science.
• Experiments are rare in social science, however, there have been well-known examples of sociological experiments, such as the Stanford Prison Experiment and the Robbers Cave Experiment.
• Social scientific hypotheses cannot be tested in isolation from human actions/behaviors, which are complex.
• The subject matter of the social sciences is human beings, who act out of their free wills, and are therefore unpredictable.
• It is difficult to control the environment in sociological experiments.

Dilemmas of Social Experiments

• Without environmental control, there are too many external factors that can affect the results.
• To understand humans and society in the real world, the environment with which humans interact should not be controlled.
• Ethical issues in experiments are significant, especially on vulnerable groups such as young children.
• The conclusions are always tentative and probabilistic.

Stanford Prison Experiment 1971

• Took place in 1971 to measure the effect of role-playing, labeling, and social expectations on behavior.
• University students were assigned to be prisoners or guards in a simulated prison environment with the goal of making subjects live in the simulated environment of a real-life prison.
• On the second day, the prisoners staged a rebellion and the guards then worked out a system of rewards and punishments to manage the prisoners.
• Over the course of the experiment, some of the guards became cruel and tyrannical, while a number of the prisoners became depressed and disoriented. Mistreatment of prisoners escalated to the point that principal investigator Philip G. Zimbardo terminated the experiment after only six days.

Robbers Cave Experiment 1945

• Aimed to answer the question 'Why do conflicts tend to occur between different groups?'
• The experiment involved 22 boys aged between 11 and 12 that believed they were at a summer camp in Robbers Cave State Park in Oklahoma, when the site was actually a controlled environment of a social psychology experiment.
• The boys were separated into 2 groups and spent the first week with only their group members.
• In the second phase, the two groups of boys learned of the other group at the camp too.
• Subsequently, the researchers made the two groups compete with each other which clearly showed that the boys favored their own group members.
• In the final phase, the researchers staged tasks that required the two groups to work together. The boys then get to know members of the other group which eventually led to an agreement between the rivals.

Social Sciences

• Social sciences aim to study and understand the social world and human behavior from different perspectives and focuses.
• The scope of social sciences is broad, including Sociology, Economics, Political science, Legal studies, Psychology, History, Anthropology, Education, Communication studies, Criminology, and Penology.
• Sociology is distinct from other social science disciplines, as it focuses on the examination and understanding of patterns (recurring characteristics, behaviors and events).
• It looks at different patterns of different or similar groups of people at different or similar places and times.
• Sociology attempts to understand a social behavior in a wider social context like class, gender, neighborhood, race, or ethnicity and also tries to notice or point out a peculiar thing in familiar people's lives.

Quantitative and Qualitative Data

• There are two types of data, namely quantitative and qualitative data
• Qualitative data refers to non-numeric data that describes qualities or characteristics.
• Quantitative data refers to numeric data that can be counted or measured.

Schools of Sociology

• Positivist Sociology
• Interpretive Sociology
• Critical Sociology

Positivist Sociology

• Positivist Sociology's study of society is objective and based on systematic observations of facts.
• The observers must be neutral and the study does not give importance to beliefs for a positivist view.
• Only empirical data/information is used to answer a question.
• Social facts, such as social values, social structures, social norms, laws, duties, social activities, subcultures are external and observable to aid this approach.
• Emile Durkheim's study of suicide in 1897 is an example of Positivist Sociology.
• Durkheim based his study on statistical data of suicide rates in different societies, different cultural and social groups, and other factors to explain the phenomenon of suicide.
• He found social patterns that could demonstrate different suicide rates in different social groups.
• He concluded that suicide is not a random individual act, but is affected by social forces or structures, such as cohesiveness within a society, a person's standing within the society, and a person's standing within the religious, social and occupational groups of the society.
• Durkheim identifies that individuals feel socially isolated or disconnected from society or individuals are excessively integrated into society, to the point where their sense of self is overshadowed by the collective.
• Other times, there is a rapid social change or a disruption in the normal functioning of society or individuals feel excessively regulated and oppressed by society, leading them to seek escape through suicide.

Interpretive Sociology

• Studying society from simply objective social facts may not be able to answer all questions, like why people like/hate particular things, pets, persons and activities.
• The answers may be based on personal and individual feelings, impressions, opinions, and experiences, which are subjective.
• Subjectiveness is important and worth exploring for social questions.
• These facets can be examined to see the patterns and understand the structures which make up the society.
• Interpretive sociology focuses on how people make sense, understand and interpret their social world.

Aims of Interpretive Sociology

• Why people act/behave like that.
• Why such social phenomenon/event happens.
• What meaning is behind that.
• Interpretive sociology involves an analysis of the beliefs, norms, and values of the culture of the society in which it takes place.
• The focus is to understand the subjects perspectives rather than the researcher's observation and includes questions of how individual people think, feel, believe, etc.

Critical Sociology

• Critical sociology is the study of a society with a focus on the need for social and political changes.
• It attempts to find reasons for/ causes of certain social problems, as well as to propose solutions to deal with such problems.
• Sociology is not limited to a study of a society to know, but to use the understanding of social phenomena or human's social behaviors to bring changes to the society.