SOAN 2120 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Symbolic Interactionism
13 Apr 2016
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What is social science? environment has a large impact on how society acts. Theoretical perspectives: conflict theory- karl marx- groups compete for wealth, power, etc and causes conflict. But everyone should of equality of opportunity - also seen as naive: symbolic interactionism- focuses on individual level. Not interested in analyzing behaviour, but want to know the reason why they do certain things. Sociologists use research methods to determine how the environment influences people. Capitalism: powerful and darknesses, poor got poorer and rich get richer. What is a theory? general assertion about something. Hypothesis: prediction and what is used to evaluate accountability of theories. Quantitative research: experimental - controlled environment, control group,manipulate environment etc, surveys- number of questions through telephone, mail or internet etc. Examples: education (years of schooling) income (dollars) Categorical variables no rank order naturally non- numerical. Variable that is continuous and can be ranked, but there is descriptors.
