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Samenvatting Introduction to Sociology - Inleiding sociologie ()
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Dit document bevat een beknopte samenvatting van het boek 'Introduction to Sociology'. Met mijn samenvatting heb ik een 8,1 gehaald.
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0HV80 HTI in social context summary of the book and the articles 2023-2024
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Chapter 1Types of perspectives:
• Individual perspective: type of explanation of human behaviour which focuses on individual
causes
• Sociological imagination/ sociological perspective: type of explanation of human behaviour
which focuses on social causes
These two types of perspectives could be used in explaining phenomena, such as obesity and depression.
Sociologists preferably use the sociological perspective in explaining phenomena.
Ultimate and proximate cause:
• Ultimate cause: factors that underlie proximate causes
• Proximate cause: factors that are close to the phenomena (ex. obesity) to be explained
Consequences are mostly phenomena on the macro level (obesity), whereas the proximate causes are on the
micro level (negative self-image). This does not mean that ultimate causes are on the meso level.
Three levels:
• Micro level: the level at which individuals operate i.e., individuals and their behaviour
• Meso level: social context at the intermediate level i.e., families, schools and organizations
• Macro level: social contexts that are broader than meso level units i.e., countries and cultures
The two features of social problems (public issue):
1. The ‘problem’ affects many people/ goes beyond personal troubles
2. The problem concerns many people
Three aims of sociology:
1. Describe: describing why a social phenomenon is a
problem and to what extent.
2. Explain: explaining what the causes are of the social
problem
3. Apply: applying the gathered knowledge by developing
social interventions
,Four types of questions in sociology:
• Normative questions: question that entails value judgements’
o Ex. Should the rich pay more tax?
o Normative questions are not really used by sociologist because of the fact that the answer
to this type of question is subjective (which makes it unimportant)
• Descriptive questions: questions targeted towards describing phenomena
o Ex. How high is the crime rate in Canada?
o This type of question come up when there is a need for basic knowledge about social
phenomena. Answers to these types of questions could be found on websites that provide
statistics (CBS, WEF, etc.)
• Theoretical questions: question targeted towards understanding phenomena
o Ex. Why is the crime rate increasing in Canada?
o A theoretical question is mostly asked when there probably is a deeper laying cause for
social phenomena. The questions mostly start with: why is….. how is it that…
• Application questions: questions targeted towards applying knowledge
o Ex. How will the crime rate develop in Brazil after the usage of more police force?
o Application questions are used to get to answers which give information about
developments that occur when social interventions are used
The last 3 type of questions could be referred to as scientific questions.
Other type of questions:
o False theoretical question: a question wherein the given information is statistically/ scientifically
not true
o Comparative case question: a question wherein a group of people, multiple moments, etc. are
compared to each other
4 ingredients that are used to make good sociological questions:
• The human behaviour that you are interested in
o This could be homicide, depression, etc.
• The social context
o This could be England, London, etc.
• The period
• The population
o This could be ‘the male population’ or ‘people from the age of 20 to 30’
A good scientific question would be: ‘How high was the homicide rate in London among the male
population in 2015?’
Different types of sociologists:
Private sociology: with this type of sociology, humans try to make sense of the social world. While doing
this, they develop incoherent and vague ideas. Those ideas are kept secret and not published.
Academic sociology: with this type of sociology, academic institutions describe and explain the social
world. This is done in a systematic way. The explanations are public, so others may criticize them. This
eventually leads to better theories and background knowledge, which then could be used by others.
Social context social environment in which people are embedded
Social phenomena Collective human behaviour
Personal trouble Problem related to the person life of an individual
Societal relevance Relevance of sociological work for the understanding of social problems
Scientific question Questions that do not entail value judgements
, Ill-defined question Question which is vague and ambiguous
precise question Question which has clear interpretation
Scientific relevance Relevance of sociological work for the accumulation of sociological
knowledge
Literature review Systematic overview of the theories and observations that are known
(background knowledge), typically in a certain specialized field of research
Cumulative science The practice that theories and observations of earlier studies are incorporated in
the work of successive studies
Background the theories and observations that are known before the study commences.
knowledge
Because of the fact that sociology is a cumulative science, most of the work that is done is being reused in
other studies. When people find that a theory (which was once considered to be true) is not valid anymore
(after extensive research) they replace it with a better theory. This happens repeatedly, so all the knowledge
is cumulating.
Principles chapter 1
1. Sociology is the scientific study of social phenomena. This means that, if you want to give a
sociological explanation of human behaviour, you need to consider the influence of social contexts
and study the resulting collective human behaviour.
2. Sociologists study the scientific aspects to social problems. This means that, rather than asking
normative questions, they address scientific questions about social phenomena.
3. Precise questions Formulate sociological questions as precisely as you can. In developing more-
precise questions, specify the following question ingredients: (1) the human behaviour you want to
describe, (2) social context, (3) period and (4) population.
4. Relevant questions Formulate sociological questions to be as relevant as you can. In developing
more-relevant questions, pay attention to their (1) societal relevance and (2) scientific relevance.
Chapter 2
Theory schema: type of theory tool in which propositions, conditions, hypotheses and observations are written
out as a coherent set of verbal statements.
Theory schemas are made up of:
• Propositions: universal statement, i.e., statement about the causal relations between two or more
concepts
• Conditions: assumption about the specific setting which relates propositions to observations and
hypotheses
• Observations: a phenomenon which has been observed
Characteristics of useful sociological theories:
• They are true/ empirically successful: the degree of empirical confirmation of a theory
• They contain a high information content: the degree of theoretical precision and theoretical scope
of a theory
o Theoretical precision: the degree to which the theory excludes possibilities of what could
happen with respect to a particular case
o Theoretical scope: the degree to which a theory is applicable to a wider rang of cases
Theories preferably have high theoretical precision and a broad theoretical scope.
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