Sunday, February 15, 2009

Methods of Sociology

Here are the methodies of Sociology and some definitions for them

Methodologies of Sociology:

Anthropology: is the study of humanity. Anthropology has origins in the natural sciences, and the humanities.

Criminology: is the social science approach to the study of crime as an individual and social phenomenon. Criminological research areas include the incidence and forms of crime as well as its causes and consequences. They also include social and governmental regulations and reactions to crime. Criminology is an interdisciplinary field in the behavioral sciences, drawing especially on the research of sociologists and psychologists, as well as on writings in law.

Political science is a social science concerned with the theory and practice of politics and the description and analysis of political systems and political behavior. It is often described as the study of politics defined as "who gets what, when and how “Political science has several subfields, including: political theory, public policy, national politics, international relations, and comparative politics

Psychology: is an academic and applied discipline involving the scientific study of mental functions and behavior. Psychologists study such phenomena as perception, cognition, emotion, personality, behavior, and interpersonal relationships. Psychology also refers to the application of such knowledge to various spheres of human activity, including issues related to everyday life (e.g. family, education, and employment) and the treatment of mental health problems. Psychologists attempt to understand the role of these functions in individual and social behavior, while also exploring the underlying physiological and neurological processes. Psychology includes many sub-fields of study and applications concerned with such areas as human development, sports, health, industry, media, and law. Psychology incorporates research from the natural sciences, social sciences, and humanities.

Social psychology is the study of how people and groups interact. Scholars in this interdisciplinary area are typically either psychologists or sociologists, though all social psychologists employ both the individual and the group as their units of analysis.

Social Sciences comprise academic disciplines concerned with the study of the social life of human groups and individuals including anthropology, communication studies, economics, human geography, history, political science, psychology and sociology

Socioeconomics or socio-economics is the study of the relationship between economic activity and social life. The field is often considered multidisciplinary, using theories and methods from sociology, economics, history, psychology, and many others. It has emerged as a separate field of study in the late twentieth century. In many cases, however, socioeconomists focus on the social impact of some sort of economic change. Such changes might include a closing factory, market manipulation, the signing of international trade treaties, new natural gas regulation, etc. Such social effects can be wide-ranging in size, anywhere from local effects on a small community to changes to an entire society.

Sociological imagination is a sociological term, coined by the American sociologist C. Wright Mills in 1959, describing the process of linking individual experience with social institutions and one's place in history. By this perspective, people in poverty might link their personal circumstances to the social forces relevant to their present condition.
There are three key questions that constitute the core of Mills' sociological imagination:
(1) What is the structure of a particular society and how does it differ from other varieties of social order?
(2) Where does this society stand in human history and what are its essential features?
(3) What varieties of women and men live in this society and in this period, and what is happening to them?
Sociophysiology is the “interplay between society and physical functioning” (Freund 1988: 856) involving “collaboration of two neighboring sciences: physiology and sociology” (Mauss 1936: 373). In other words, sociophysiology is physiological sociology, a special science that studies the physiological side of human (and other animals') interrelations

Statistical surveys are used to collect quantitative information about items in a population. Surveys of human populations and institutions are common in political polling and government, health, social science and marketing research. A survey may focus on opinions or factual information depending on its purpose, and many surveys involve administering questions to individuals. When the questions are administered by a researcher, the survey is called a structured interview or a researcher-administered survey. When the questions are administered by the respondent, the survey is referred to as a questionnaire or a self-administered survey.

No comments:

Post a Comment