Social Change: Technology & Communication

• Social movements can cause social change by attempting to change the social order or resist change.

Technology

• Technology is the information about how to use tools, machines, and sources of power to make work easier and more productive.
• It is a potent source of social change for better living conditions, but can also be a tool for manipulation.
• Modern scientific and technological inventions have led to prosperity and material development.
• Sociologist William Ogburn argued technology is a significant factor in social change.
• Ogburn observed that agrarian societies valued large families for farm labor, but this changed with industrialization as machines replaced manual labor.
• Technological change requires modifications in values and beliefs, affecting social and cultural orientations.

Communication Technology

• New technology can alter attitudes, beliefs, values, and behaviors.
• Technologies like television, computers, DVDs, and cellular phones have changed family lives, moral values, and personal privacy.
• One major effect of communication technologies is information overload, where a large amount of information is transmitted from other cultures.
• Cultural values may decline due to this transmission of information, a phenomenon called "cultural imperialism" by Baran (1999).
• Shenk (1997) identifies specific results of information overload
  • It hinders critical thinking by making it difficult to separate useful from useless information.
  • It promotes indecisiveness.
• Coping with information overload involves:
  • Screening information
  • Deleting unimportant information
  • Limiting exposure to technology.
• Years ago, cellular phones were a status symbol, indicating an important position.
• Now, cellular phones are no longer just for the wealthy.
• "Self-identification" through "affordable luxury" remains an important factor in mobile phone ownership.
• People want wireless communication for easy, immediate contact with family, friends, and for job-related needs.
• The need to "keep in touch" is the most important factor driving mobile phone ownership.

Social Change

• Social change is a process that alters patterns of social behavior, social relationships, social institutions, and systems of stratification.
• It involves significant changes in people's behavior patterns and cultural ideas. Changes in culture can lead to changes in social behavior and vice versa.
• The rate of social change varies across societies.

Sources of Social Change

• Discovery is finding something that has always existed but was previously unknown.
  • The discovery of electricity improved human conditions.
• Invention is the creation of something new by combining existing elements using imagination and creativity.
  • Many modern inventions are technological, like cell phones and computers.
  • Inventions often arise from necessity and can change existing patterns of social behavior.
  • The Internet has reduced homesickness for overseas workers by facilitating communication.
• Diffusion is the transmission of elements from one culture to another.
  • Occurs when a lower culture copies elements from a complex culture or when lower social classes imitate higher classes.
  • Fast food centers have altered food preparation, preferences, and eating habits.
• Population growth can lead to competition for resources and unsanitary conditions, increasing tension and influencing social behavior.
• Economic factors and conflicts also cause social change.
  • Wealth and poverty have a significant impact on our social behavior.
• Physical environment changes require adjustments to social life.

Urbanization and Social Change

• Urbanization involves the transfer of rural lifestyles to urban lifestyles.
• This process can affect social institutions like family, politics, religion, and education.
• Rural migrants remain "ruralites" if they maintain rural values, but become "urbanites" if they adopt urban lifestyles.

Impact of Urbanization on Social Change and Modernization

• Urbanization acts as an agent of transformation and innovation
  • Cities are centers of scientific and technical knowledge, improving the quality of life and spreading innovations to rural areas.
• Urbanization expands the communication system
  • It connects different places through transport and communications, improving local, national, and international contacts.
  • Systems like air and sea transport, road networks, and mobile phones have made the world smaller.
  • Travel time is shorter and communication is faster.

Urban Ecological Processes

• Urban ecology studies the connection between the physical and social characteristics of cities.
• Dominance refers to an area with a controlling social and economic position. For example, a central business district has higher land values.
• Gradient is the diminishing dominance of an area.
  • An area may be losing its social and economic position.