Social Science Concepts Quiz

Social Science Introduction

• Social science attempts to study people, their activities, behaviors, and customs.
• Humanities study aspects of human society and culture.
• Anthropology studies human lives and cultures, both living and deceased.
• Psychology studies behavior and mental processes.
• Sociology examines human social life, groups, and societies.
• Positivism believes scientific evidence is the most reliable method for understanding society.

Social Mind Concepts

• Class conflict involves struggles between social classes.
• The conscious mind refers to memories that can be recalled.
• The unconscious mind contains memories that cannot be recalled but is a powerful tool for studying the human mind.
• Free association is a method where patients express whatever comes to mind during relaxation, revealing hidden unconscious elements.
• The id operates on the pleasure principle, seeking immediate satisfaction.
• The ego adheres to reality principles, emerging early in life, and guides the id.
• The superego is society's moral compass, aiming to do what's right.
• Archetypes are universal symbols or patterns found in the collective unconscious of all humans, explored by Carl Jung.
• Individual Psychology explores individuals' personal goals and values.
• Analytical Psychology, founded by Carl Jung, distinguishes between the personal and collective unconscious (shared ancestral memories).
• Unconditional stimulus automatically triggers a response, for example, food smell leading to hunger.
• Conditioned stimulus eventually triggers a learned response (e.g., a bell associating with food).

Learning Theories

• Unconditioned response: instinctive reaction to stimuli.
• Conditioned response: learned reaction after training to a previously neutral stimulus.
• Hierarchy of Needs: basic needs must be met before higher-level needs become relevant, Maslow's idea.
• Classical conditioning emphasizes the relationship between stimulus and response.
• Operant conditioning examines how desired behaviors elicit reinforcement.
• Ethnography involves observing a community.
• Ethnocentrism is the belief that one's culture is superior.
• Culturally constructed concepts are influenced by cultural norms.
• Reflexivity is reflecting one's own bias in research on a culture.
• Subcultures are smaller groups within a wider culture, with distinct values and lifestyles.

Research Methods

• Case studies: observation of a group over time.
• Experiments: determining how one factor affects another.
• Surveys: gathering opinions from a larger population.
• Interviews: dialogue between interviewer and interviewee.
• Unstructured observation: studying without a predetermined hypothesis.
• Structured observation: planned, focused observations.
• Participant observation: observing participants within a society.
• Correlation studies: examining relationships between variables.
• Historical analysis: studying past events to learn from them.
• Content analysis: analyzing documents for their themes, concepts, and biases.

Sociological Schools of Thought

• Functionalism: how social structures work together to support a society.
• Conflict theory: how power disparities influence relationships between groups/communities.
• Symbolic interactionism: individuals' roles within a society and how they interpret their world through these interactions.
• Feminist theory: analyses conflicts arising from gender differences.

Psychological Schools of Thought

• Psychoanalysis explores the unconscious mind.
• Behavioral psychology examines observable behaviors and responses (like rewards and punishments).
• Cognitive psychology focuses on learning and the brain/cognitive processes (like memories).
• Humanistic psychology emphasizes helping people understand themselves through therapy.

Anthropological Schools of Thought

• Cultural relativism: understanding cultures on their own terms, not through any biased lens.
• Functional theory: the elements of culture meet the needs of individuals.
• Cultural materialism: looks at how the physical environment impacts a culture.
• Feminist anthropology: analyses conflicts based on gender.
• Postmodernism: the idea that knowledge is culturally dependent and there is no single objective truth.

Subfields of Anthropology

• Cultural Anthropology: studying how cultures function and develop.
• Linguistic Anthropology: studying how people communicate.
• Archaeology: examining the past through excavations.
• Physical Anthropology: studying human remains and variation.
• Paleoanthropology: examining human evolution.
• Primatology: studying primates.

Sociological Key Figures

• Auguste Comte: coined the term "sociology"
• Emile Durkheim: studied societal functions, solidarity, and forces that unite societies.
• Karl Marx: discussed class conflict and capitalism.
• Max Weber: believed human actions are influenced by values and beliefs; explored how society functions.

Psychological Key Figures

• Sigmund Freud: explored the unconscious mind through psychoanalysis.
• Carl Jung: explored archetypes and the collective unconscious.
• Alfred Adler: developed individual psychology, focusing on people's goals.
• Ivan Pavlov: discovered classical conditioning.
• Edward Thorndike: explored the "law of effect" in learning behavior.
• B.F. Skinner: studied operant conditioning.
• Jean Piaget: developed a theory of cognitive development (stages) for children.
• Albert Bandura: researched how behaviors are learned by observing others.
• Abraham Maslow: developed the theory of self-actualization.

Anthropological Key Figures

• Charles Darwin: explored the evolutionary origins of humans, impacting anthropological theory.
• Raymond Dart: researched early human ancestors in South Africa.
• Mary and Louis Leakey: made critical discoveries about the evolution of humans.
• Jane Goodall, Dian Fossey, Birute Galdikas: researched primates, understanding their behaviors and social dynamics.
• Franz Boas: proposed cultural relativism, crucial to anthropological perspectives.
• Margaret Mead: studied how cultures shape gender roles, leading to debates on her methodologies.
• Noam Chomsky: provided insights into human language and its basis in universal grammar.

Additional Topics

• Social Influence: examining how individuals' thoughts and feelings are influenced by others, directly and indirectly.
• Primary socialization: learning basic skills within society.
• Secondary socialization: learning appropriate behaviors in particular environments.
• Anticipatory socialization: learning how to behave in future social situations.
• Resocialization: adapting to new social norms.
• Feral children: children who develop outside of societal norms.
• Isolated children: children who have been neglected.
• Agents of socialization: institutions and relationships that teach humans norms and values of a culture impacting identity (how to think/act).
• Social Identity: the characteristics and norms individuals identify with within or outside a particular culture, defining themselves in relation to their surroundings.
• Social Roles, norms, sanctions: society's expectations, unwritten rules to behave and possible consequence for breaching them.
• Social inequality: ability of some individuals and groups to access resources, privileges, and status that are denied to others, impacting social outcomes.
• Groupthink: the pressure towards conformity within a group, impacting decision-making.
• Social Institutions (family, religion, education, government, economy): societal structures that shape norms, values. and behaviors to ensure a cohesive and working society.
• Social Institutions functions: satisfy needs, maintain social order, define roles, and ensure social unity.
• Conformity - individuals adapting to their environment and the expectations of the group.
• Conformity's positive and negative aspects - positive aspect is that individuals learn and integrate to the norms and values of a certain group that can support them, the negative aspect can be that individuals lose their own identities or perspectives due to pressure within a group or society.
• Factors influencing conformity: group size, unanimity (agreement among members), public vs. private response, self-esteem.
• Breaching Experiments: studying how people react when existing norms are broken.
• Groupthink: when a group agrees at the expense of critical thinking.
• The cost of conflict within a community: poor decisions, lost opportunity, broken trust, and diminished relationships/quality of work.
• Marriage in different cultures: variations in marriage practices, legal changes, and cultural influences on marriage norms.
• Race v. Ethnicity: differences in categorizing people based on physical appearance v. cultural identity, social construction of categories.
• Cultural differences/influences on gender and behavior: varying interpretations and expectations within different social groups and communities on roles based on gender.
• Challenges faced by marginalized groups within a dominant culture: issues like cultural identity loss (social assimilation), language barriers, and discrimination.
• Rites of passage: significant life events, often marked by ceremonies.
• Stages of Development Models (Piaget and Erikson): stages of cognitive and psychosocial growth, important for understanding how humans develop.
• Psychosexual Stages (Freud): describes the main growth points of a human in their life, from infancy to adulthood, exploring needs, desires, and aspects of the desires.
• Neuroses and psychoses: understanding mental health conditions, differentiating between mild/severe issues.
• Motivation, attitude, and social thinking: influence on behavior.
• Case studies in different cultures highlight societal expectations impacting gender roles, marriage practices, and other important aspects of social life.