SOC100H5 Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: Participant Observation, Altruistic Suicide, Social Forces
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SOC100H5 Full Course Notes
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Emile durkheim showed that suicide rates are strongly influenced by social forces rather than just an individual act of desperation. Durkheim discovered that the idea that psychological disorders cause suicide was false: more women in insane asylums but more male suicides, jews had highest rate of psychological disorders but lowest suicide rates. Argued that suicide rates vary as a result of differences in social (cid:1) solidarity (cid:1) exists and the less likely that an individual in the group is to commit suicide. The more a group shares beliefs and values, the more social solidarity. Married adults less likely to commit suicide than unmarried -> marriage creates social ties that bind individuals to society. Altruistic suicide in settings that exhibit very high levels of social. Egoistic suicide results from poor integration into society because of (cid:1) (cid:1) solidarity; results from norms very tightly governing behavior (ex. Soldiers patriotism) (cid:1) weak social ties to others (weak social solidarity unmarried and unemployed) (cid:1)
