...Connecting Sociological Theory and Social Issues Drug abuse is a topic of sociological significance because it is all around our daily lives whether we want it to be or not. Drug abuse today can influence or impact our family, community, and the economic and political life. Whether the drugs that are being abused are prescribed or recreational it can lead to bad consequences that the abuser may not have intentionally caused. It is also an important aspect to social life which sociologists can analyze with the three main theoretical perspectives of functionalism, conflict, and interactionism. Constructing a clock with its many different cogs and gears together is like the functionalist perspective of sociology because it “emphasizes the way in which the parts of a society are structured to maintain its stability” (Schaefer, 14) because without the various parts the clock or society cannot function. Drug abuse, through a functionalist view, may view it as dysfunctional. “A dysfunction refers to an element or process of a society that may actually disrupt the social system or reduce its stability” (Schaefer, 14). But, some people may view drug abuse as functional because this kind of abuse creates employment for police officers, rehabilitation clinics, some therapies, and medical doctors. So, without the drug abusers there would be a lot of uncreated employment. The functionalist view of drug abuse can be contrasted effectively by the conflict perspective of sociology. Sociologists...
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...Reese 1 Steps in Sociological Research Karl Marx the founder of the sociological perspective quoted, "Opens a window into unfamiliar worlds-and offers a fresh look into familiar ones", his quote peratins to sociology and its ability to research new ideas. So, how does research work? Sociological research is based on the use of Empirical data. . Empirical data are facts that are viewed, measured, and validated by ones senses. which involves demonstrating theories, and concepts, along with evaluating hypothesis. heres how it works. First the concept is introduced, which usually involves some condition of the world. Then a theory is developed. A theory is an official statement that tries to demonstrate an incident by connecting it to a certain relationship with a group of concepts. Then comes the hypothesis,which is a educated guess about how two or more incidents relate to eachother that is stated in a testable form. Once the researcher has a question and some concepts and theories he or she must decide what type of data analysis will be the best. Some some levels analysis are: Units of Analysis- The specific social entiy in which data will be collected. Cross-sectional study- One time point is used for data. Longitudinal study- Several points in time are used for data. Next is the methods of gathering data, this can be done by random sample which includes getting a list of all population you are researching, or a stratified...
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...Topic: Apply the sociological imagination, as well as theories and concepts from this course, to your life or your parents’ life (you can choose yourself, either of your parents or both your parents). In other words, how have important events, experiences, or the life trajectory of you or your parents been shaped by, connected to, and/or reflective of broader societal dynamics, patterns, institutions, or structures? Essay Outline I want to apply sociological imagination to my own life. I want to write about how Asian Americans still encounter discriminations and stereotyping despite being the “model minority”, how being an immigrant can have a negative reputation within the Asain American community. The binary of being FOB and Asian American. Second I want to talk about bamboo ceiling, how it contrast to the glass ceiling. Also I want to talk about what it means to be an Asian female in a scientific field. Discuss the issue of race vs. ethnicity, U.S is a Pluralism society, yet racial discrimination and stereotype still exBU On the surface, sociology is about the study of human behavior within the society. But sociology is much more than that, it correlates seemingly general human behavior with society, using sociological imagination, one can analyze an episode of an individual’s life to border social issues and historical events. It allows oneself to denaturalize from one’s immediate environment, questioning it and connecting it to broader social dynamics. As an Asian...
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...Essay: Evaluate the role of education in society. Consider issue of gender in your response. Also, consider how such factors may impact on a person’s life chances. This essay will examine the role of education in society and an analysis of inequality in relation to Gender. It will discuss briefly education and examine the different theoretical approaches to education followed by an analysis of inequality using information on statistics of inequality in British education in relation to gender and attainment. This essay will Identify and evaluate key policy developments in education provision designed to bridge the gap of gender inequality in British education. The role of education in society has been among the major issues in contemporary sociological and political debate. According to Iannelli and Paterson (2005) education is a major factor that helps determine the jobs and social class positions of individuals in society. As an institution of sociology, education plays a dominant role in transmitting prevalent ideologies of society by providing pupils with the curriculum and hidden curriculum as well as the skills that will prepare them physically, mentally and socially for their life chances (Clark 2005). Educational institutions play a very important role in reducing social inequalities. Over the last century British schools experienced very important changes and moved from a selective system to a comprehensive one in the 1960s and 70s. Much research has shown that the...
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...Mrs. S. In addition, the essay will give a relevant and brief history of the patient. It will also define the term ‘bio-psycho-social’ and its relevance to holistic care. For the point of discussion, the essay will focus on the management of care for patient with gastrointestinal illness resulting in stoma operation and will discuss the biopsychosocial factors affecting the patient and how this changes ‘normal’ biology, psychology and sociology. The individual chosen to focus on is named as Mrs. S. The patient involved in this case study Mrs. S. is a 48 years old lady who works in school as a teacher. She lives with her husband, Mr. S, in a small town. Her husband works as a builder, which has long working hours, leaving him not much time to look after their children. They have two girls and they are aged 12 and 10. They are a loving family. Mrs. S looks after the children, takes them to school and pick them up. Mrs. S is a very active lady with a very active social life, she likes to meet up with her friends during the weekend; she swims four days a week with her children, and she balances her time with family and her job. She is suffering from mild hypertension, drinks minimal amount of alcohol during the weekends and smokes 5-10 cigarettes a day. The term ‘bio-psycho-social’ refers to the relationship amongst biological, psychological and social characteristics of an individual. It implies treatment of pain when medical methods of pain treatment are connected with psychological...
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...Checkpoint: Sociological Research Methods Rhonda Keenum SOC/120 Michelle March November 11, 2011 The article I chose was “Ethical suicide research: A survey of researchers”, and it is about the research that is needed to better comprehend and react efficiently to people who are suicidal. Connecting people who are suicidal in research poses some ethical and practical issues. “The ethical problems and difficulties in obtaining approval to involve people who are suicidal in research have contributed to the current paucity of research that explores the suicidal experience,” (Lakeman & Fitzgerald, 2009). To look at some of these issues, a web-based review of suicide researchers was undertaken. I believe the type of research method used in this article is interpretive sociology. “Interpretive sociology, the study of society that focuses on the meanings people attach to their social world,” (Macionis, 2006). They did this web-based survey to see or get the qualitative data on perceptions of how people comprehend their environments in suicide. They not only wanted to observe people who are suicidal, but also share in their world of significance, coming to understand why they behave as they do. One of the four research methods they used was survey. They chose the web-based survey because it was inexpensive and well-organized methods to get the opinions and responses of researchers and ethics committee members. I also believe that...
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...means of the changes and the subsequent consequences for the individuals and society. These classics generated the basis for the typical sociological type of thinking; seeing the connections between major changes in society and the individual acts and living conditions. In short term - sociology is both the study of individuals and the society as a whole. As a newcomer to the special field of sociology, I find the term of sociological imagination as the most applicable and understandable term to understand the complex and broad field of sociology. Thereby i state my thesis: Is social imagination the best and simplest way to understand the field of sociology? Sociological imagination was coined by C. Wright Mills (1959) as the process of linking individual biographies to the larger social contexts. By this perspective one can say that the sociological imagination can help explain humans and society by seeing "the human in society and the society within humans". According to Peter Berger this connection can be portrayed by thinking that: "Every individual biography is an episode within the history of society" (Berger 1967; 3). "Society is a dialectic phenomenon in that it is a human product, and nothing but a human product, that yet continuously acts back upon its producer" (Berger 1967; 3). By this Berger puts in words the common sociological notion that society is human made (as for the term itself), and how all humans are a part of their own...
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...27 collective effectiveness. This finding illustrates how the impact of social ties on individuals’ perceptions manifests itself in different ways. Moreover, it shows that there is a privileged path (highlighted with bold arrows in Figures 1 and 2) leading to strong participation in social movements. Of all perceptions, individual effectiveness is the factor in the decision process that most closely influences the level of participation in both the Bern Declaration and the WWF. Prospective members with a strong feeling that if they engage in protest, their participation will serve at least to a certain extent to bring about social change will actualize their potential for mobilization at the highest level of involvement. Individual effectiveness is also one of the perceptions of the model that is most influenced by social networks, directly but also indirectly via interest in the political issue and the perception of the organization’s effectiveness . This last result highlights the close interweaving between social ties and individual effectiveness. In other words, it stresses the interconnectedness of relational factors and human agency, and demonstrates that both structuralist and rationalist accounts are indispensable to explanation of individual participation. Conclusion Social networks matter, but they do so by performing various functions in the process of individual participation. They intervene at least three different ways. First, they intervene in the socialization...
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...money passed, which is typically deceived by the money launderer as to the source of the money. The crime victimizes nations in a broader way by distorting national and global financial data. Inaccurate financial data can have many negative macroeconomic consequences, including inexplicable changes in money demand, risks to bank soundness, contamination effects on legal financial transactions, and increased unpredictability of international capital flows and exchange rates due to unanticipated cross-border asset transfers (fatf-gafi.org). 3. Is there a "typical" social background of the offender(s)? Are there any current trends . . . data issues? The typical money launderer is usually wealthy since the person or organization has a large, steady amount of excess money that needs to be “washed” of its illicit origin. However, the “social” characteristics, including the race, college education, vocation, and social position of the person or organization is more diverse. Typical money launderers are criminal organizations, such as the American Mafia or Chinese Triads, which are engaged in black market activities such as controlled substances, gambling, and...
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...Affiliation Sociology of Health The social perspective in sociology of health explains the society's view concerning health. It is a discipline that describes an illness using social factors present in daily activities of life. Sociologists show how wellness and disease, the treatment and explanation of illness production in a social organization can be understood differently from a medical perspective of nature, biology, and lifestyle in an attempt of explaining sickness (Bahar, 2013). It is a significant facet of interpreting biological information that shows the creation of health and disease in a political, social, and cultural environment. In describing various social phenomena, sociologists examine how social life impacts morbidity and mortality rates and how it alternatively influences the society. Medical sociology uses sociological theory to explain the relationship between social factors and health to define this issue and its systems (Amzat & Razum, 2014). Amzat and Razum (2014) demonstrate that it tends to separate nature from the community. It means that it illustrates how scientific knowledge mediates social relations. Moreover, medical sociology shows how the technical realm of medical practice is inconsistent with social processes in nature. It is a claim of understanding constructivism through an objective in natural science. Various studies identify the inconsistencies between current medical practice and social relations. Therefore, this paper will answer...
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...Background The question of path dependency arises very frequently in socio-scientific discourses especially on institutional evolution.This concept of path dependency establishes a dynamic relationship between power,actors and institutions which compels any research to study institutions and their corresponding developments from critical theory perspective to understand mechanics behind such institutional metamorphosis and its impact on human environment and subsequent responses to such changes.Such theories also make bold attempts to explain institutional stagnancy; why actors may intentionally or unintentionally fail to respond to changes in the environment even when such responses would yield better results directly countering those economic...
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...Bryant-45099 Part I.qxd 10/18/2006 7:42 PM Page 36 5 FEMINIST METHODOLOGIES AND EPISTEMOLOGY ANDREA DOUCET Carleton University, Canada NATASHA S. MAUTHNER University of Aberdeen, Scotland O ver the past 10 years of teaching courses on research methods and feminist approaches to methodologies and epistemologies, a recurring question from our students concerns the distinctiveness of feminist approaches to methods, methodologies, and epistemologies. This key question is posed in different ways: Is there a specifically feminist method? Are there feminist methodologies and epistemologies, or simply feminist approaches to these? Given diversity and debates in feminist theory, how can there be a consensus on what constitutes “feminist” methodologies and epistemologies? Answers to these questions are far from straightforward given the continually evolving nature of feminist reflections on the methodological and epistemological dimensions and dilemmas of research. This chapter on feminist methodologies and epistemologies attempts to address these questions by tracing historical developments in this area, by considering what may be unique about feminist epistemologies and feminist methodologies, by reviewing some of sociology’s key contributions to this area of scholarship and by highlighting some key emergent trends. The chapter begins with a brief overview of the theoretical and historical development of feminist epistemologies, followed by a similar overview...
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...Online Faculty of Business - Papers Faculty of Business 2014 Actor Network Theory Karin Garrety University of Wollongong, karin@uow.edu.au Publication Details Garrety, K. (2014). Actor Network Theory. In H. Hasan (Eds.), Being Practical with Theory: A Window into Business Research (pp. 15-19). Wollongong, Australia: THEORI. http://eurekaconnection.files.wordpress.com/2014/02/p-15-19-actor-network-theorytheori-ebook_finaljan2014-v3.pdf Research Online is the open access institutional repository for the University of Wollongong. For further information contact the UOW Library: research-pubs@uow.edu.au Actor Network Theory Abstract Actor-Network Theory (ANT) emerged from science and technology studies, though it was inspired by grounded theory and semiotics. In the 1970s, Bruno Latour (a French anthropologist and social scientist) and Steve Woolgar (a British sociologist) undertook ethnographic field work at the Salk Institute in California. This research was inspired by grounded theory and Latour and Woolgar approached their study of work in the endocrinology laboratory as if they were anthropologists observing a hitherto unknown and strange set of practices. In other words, they did not fit their observations into any preconceived notions of scientific method, or how science 'should' be done. The resulting, highly influential book Laboratory Life: The Social Construction of Scientific Facts(1979, re-released in 1986 with additional commentary)...
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...from and what its primary focus is. The Chicago School, Lombrosian Theory, Positivist and Classical criminology, are discussed. Other disciplines namely Sociology, Psychology, and the Criminal Justice Sector are examined and applied to the broad subject of criminology, to show the network of how this subject came to be recognised as such a discipline. Exposed are main issues that occur for the likes of criminologists and other social scientists when challenged with defining criminology; and the problems that definition’s carry with themselves. This essay will look in to the birth of criminology as a new discipline and how it has evolved in what it is known today as an applied social science. Explanation of what an ‘applied social science’ will be detailed and collectively the answer to the meaning and validity of the label of ‘rendezvous discipline’ will be provided. Topics that criminology is weaved into for instance are Globalisation, Capital Punishment, Serial Killing, Media, and Genocide. Used to demonstrate the importance that this discipline provides, in a range of contexts Media is the focus later in the essay. Criminology can be studied on its own as a subject, and also applied and used in determining why certain acts of criminality occur in society, referring often to patterns in crime using Criminological Statistical Analysis. In the opinion of Maguire et al (2012) ‘the study of the various social practices associated with criminal justice is currently divided into...
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...Trung Vu Roxanne Ezzet Sociological Theory 375 30 April 2015 Utopia: Work in Process For as long as the human species has been living on this earth, it has always pondered with a question of whether or not a perfect place where there is forever peace, harmony, and happiness. The concept of heaven reflects this worldly desire for such dreamland. But does one have to die to live in this uncertain utopia after living morally on earth? Many argue that with the right combination of certain social and economical policies, we actually don’t have to wait till afterlife to live in an ideal society. This paper will present the classic theories and contemporary arguments circulating the essential elements of societies and from these arguments, construing what elements are most important that could be used to create an ideal society. In order to part away from the religious view that heaven can only exist in the hereafter, we try to establish a scientific explanation of how we as human beings have come to existence through the process of evolution. This theory appeals significantly to us for at least two reasons. First, it gives some of us who aren’t as religious a more satisfying validation of our origin and our destination. This view opposes Max Weber’s description of a Calvinist who always suffers great inner loneliness due to his ambiguous predestined fate. Second, the theory of evolution is in alignment with our positive and pre-established perception of progress and improvement...
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