Sociology (copy)
Chapter 1
Terms
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- Master Status
- A status that has special importance for social identity, often shaping a person's entire life
- Sensorimotor
- Piaget's term for the level of human development at which individuals first see causal connections in their senses
- Rationality
- A way of thinking that emphasizes deliberate, matter-of-fact calculation of the most efficient way to accomplish a particular task
- Social Structure
- Any relatively stable pattern of social behavior
- Concrete Operational Stage
- Piaget's term for the level of human development at which individuals first see causal connections in their surroundings
- Transsexuals
- People who feel they are one sex even though biologically they are the other
- Micro-Level Orientation
- A close up focus on social interaction in specific situations
- Sexual Orientation
- A person's romantic and emotional attraction to another person
- Status
- A social position that a person holds
- Cultural Lag
- The fact that some cultural elements change more quickly than others, disrupting a cultural system
- Critical Sociology
- The study of society that focuses on the need for social change
- Criminal Recidivism
- Later offenses by people previously convicted of crimes
- Proletarians
- People who sell their labor for wages
- Division of Labor
- Specialized economic activity
- Interpretive Sociology
- The study of society that focuses on the meanings people attach to their social world
- Generalized Other
- George Herbert Mead's term for widespread cultural norms and values we use as a reference in evaluating ourselves
- Social Functions
- The consequence of any social pattern for the operation of society as a whole
- Variable
- A concept whose value changes from case to case
- Role Set
- A number of roles attached to a single status
- Plea Bargaining
- A legal negotiation in which a prosecutor reduces a charge in exchange for a defendant's guilty plea
- Organic Solidarity
- Durkheim's term for social bonds, based on specialization and interdependence, that are strong among members of industrial
- Anomie
- Durkheim's term for a condition in which society provides little moral guidance to individuals
- False Consciousness
- Marx's term for explanations of ocial problems as the shortcomings of individuals rather than as the flaws of society
- Correlation
- A relationship in which two (or more) variables change together
- Validity
- Actually measuring exactly what you intend to measure
- Class Conflict
- Conflict between entire classes over the distribution of a society's wealth and power
- Primary sex characteristics
- The genitals, organs used for reproduction
- Social Construction of reality
- The process by which people creatively shape reality through social interaction
- Spurious Correlation
- An apparent but false relationship between two (or more) variables that is caused by some other variable
- Theoretical Approach
- A basic image of society that guides thinking and research
- Socialization
- The lifelong social experience by which people develop their human potential and learn culture
- Theory
- A statement of how and why specific facts are related
- Capitalists
- People who own and operate factories and other businesses in pursuit of profit
- Ego
- Freud's term for a person's conscious efforts to balance innate pleasure seeking drives
- Reference Group
- A social group that serves as a point of reference in making evaluations and decisions
- Bureaucracy
- An organizational model rationally designed to perform tasks efficiently
- Social Group
- Two or more people who identify and interact with one another
- Independent Variable
- The variable that causes the change
- Social- Conflict Approach
- A framework for building theory that sees society as an arena of inequality that generates conflict and change
- Heterosexuality
- Sexual attraction to someone of the other sex
- Community-Based Corrections
- Correctional programs operating within society at large rather than behind prison walls
- Looking-glass Self
- Cooley's term for a self-image based on how we think others see us
- Structural-Functional Approach
- A framweork for building theory that sees society as a complex system whose parts work together to promote solidarity and stability
- Thomas Theorem
- W.I. Thomas's statement that situations defined as real are real in their consequences
- In-Group
- A social group toward which a member feels respect and loyalty
- Rehabilitation
- A program for reforming the offender to prevent later offenses
- Preoperational Stage
- Piaget's term for the level of human development at which individuals first use language and other symbols
- Scientific Sociology
- The study of society based on systematic observation of social behavior
- Ascribed Status
- A social position a person receives at birth or takes on involuntarily later in life
- Dyad
- A social group with two members
- Social Dysfunction
- Any social pattern that may disrupt the operation of society
- Cultural Relativism
- The practice of judging a culture by its own standards
- Dependent Variable
- The variable that changes
- Popular Culture
- Cultural patterns that are widespread among a society's population
- Instrumental Leadership
- Group leadership that focuses on the completion of tasks
- Latent Functions
- The unrecognized and unintended consequences of any social pattern
- Status Set
- All the statuses a person holds at a given time
- Reliability
- Consistency in measurement
- Self
- George Herbert Mead's term for the part of an individual's personality composed of self-awareness and self-image
- Macro-Level Orientation
- A broad focus on social structures that shape society as a whole
- Sex
- The biological distinction between males and females
- Incest Taboo
- A norm forbidding sexual relationships sexual relations between certain relatives
- Objectivity
- Personal neutrality in conduction research
- Societal Protection
- Rendering an offender incapable of further offenses temporarily through imprisonment or permanently by execution
- Gender- Conflict Approach
- A point of view that focuses on inequality and conflict between men and women
- Crimes against property
- Crimes that involve theft of property belonging to others, also know as property crimes.
- Achieved Status
- A social position a person takes on voluntarily that reflects personal ability and effort
- Superego
- Freud's term for the cultural values and norms internalized by an individual
- Triad
- A social group with three members
- Manifest Function
- The recognized and intended consequences of any social pattern
- Replication
- Repetition of research by other investigators
- Eurocentrism
- The dominance of Euopean (especially english) cultural patterns
- Out-Group
- A social group toward which a person feels a sense of competition
- Personality
- A person's fairly consistent patterns of acting, thinking, and feeling
- Social Conflict
- The struggle between segments of society over valued resources
- Retribution
- An act of moral vengeance by which society makes the offender suffer as much the suffering caused by the crime
- Ethnomethodology
- Harold Garfinkle's term for the study of the way people make sense of their everyday surroundings
- Ethnocentrism
- The practice of judging another culture by the standards of one's own culture
- Concept
- A mental construct that represents some part of the world in a simplified form
- Id
- Freud's term for the human being's basic drives
- Multiculturalism
- A perspective recognizing the cultural diversity of the United States and promoting equal standing for all cultural traditions
- Four Justifications for Punishment
- Retribution, Deterrence, Rehabilitation, and Societal Protection
- Measurement
- A procedure for determining the value of a variable in a specific case
- Crimes against the person
- Crimes that direct violence or the threat of violence against against others, also known as violent crimes.
- Symbolic-Interaction Approach
- A framework for building theory that sees society as the product of the everyday interactions of individuals
- Network
- A web of weak social ties
- Primary Group
- A small social group who members share personal and lasting relationships
- Social Institutions
- The major spheres of social life, or societal subsystems, organized to meet human needs
- Expressive Leadership
- Group leadership that focuses on the group's well being
- Cultural integration
- The close relationships among various elements of a cultural system
- Role Conflict
- Conflict among the roles connected to two or more statuses
- Formal Operational Stage
- Piaget's term for the level of human development at which individuals think abstractly and critically
- Subculture
- Cultural patterns that set apart some segment of a society's population
- Deterrence
- The attempt to discourage criminality through the use of punishment
- Counterculture
- Cultural patterns that strongly oppose those widely accepted within a society
- Intersexual People
- People whose bodies have both female and male characteristics
- Alienation
- The experience of isolation and misery resulting from powerlessness
- Control
- Holding constant all variables except in one order to see clearly the effect of that variable
- Class Consciousness
- Marx's term for workers' recognition of themselves as a class unified in opposition to capitalists and ultimately to capitalism itself
- High Culture
- Cultural patterns that distinguish a society's elite
- Feminism
- Support of social equality for women and men
- Tradition
- Values and beliefs passed from generation to generation
- Race-Conflict Approach
- A point of view that focuses on inequality and conflict between people of different racial and ethnic categories
- Rationalization of Society
- Weber's term for the historical change from tradition to rationality as the main type of human thought
- Groupthink
- The tendency of group members to conform, resulting in a narrow view of some issue
- Social Interaction
- The process by which people act and react in relation to others
- Ideal Type
- An abstract statement of the essential characteristics of any social phenomenon
- Cause and Effect
- A relationship in which change in one variable causes change in another
- Victimless Crimes
- Violations of law in which there are no obvious crimes
- Role
- Behavior expected of someone who holds a particular status
- Asexuality
- A lack of sexual attraction to people of either sex
- Secondary sex characteristics
- Bodily development, apart from the genitals, that distinguishes males and females
- Mechanical Solidarity
- Durkheim's term for social bonds, based on specialization and interdependence, that are strong among members of industrial societies
- Oligarchy
- The rule of the many but the few
- Secondary Group
- A large and impersonal social group whose members pursue a specific goal or activity
- Role Strain
- Tension among the roles connected to a single status
- Operationalize a variable
- Specifying exactly what is to be measured before assigning a value to a variable
- Afrocentrism
- Emphasizing and promoting African cultural patterns