Summary Boek henslin social problems a down to earth approach

H1 how sociologists view social problems:
the abortion dilemma
Sociological imagination
 Looking at people’s actions and attitudes in the context of the social forces that
shape them
 Understanding how our personal troubles are connected to the conditions of society
 Growing up in a different society with different understandings  different view on
dilemmas in our society
 The sociological imagination makes sure our focus on the social context
 There are 3 levels on how it shapes us:
1. Broad social context  historical events
2. The narrow social context  includes gender, race-ethnicity, religion, and social
class
3. The personal context  refers to relationships these shape your vision on life
 Social location: where you are located in society
 Not only physical but also personal characteristics
 This does not determine our actions, but shape them

Social problems
 Aspects of society that a lot of people are concerned about and would like changed
 Objective condition  can be measured or experienced
 Subjective concern  a concern that people have about the objective
condition
 Social problems are dynamic  they change when society changes
 Social problems are relative  people consider it a problem, depending on their
values
 Value: a belief about whether something is good or bad
 They are socially constructed
 We are exposed to competing, contrasting, and conflicting views of life
 but eventually which view and definition of a social problem wins?
 the view of the ones who have the most power
 Central characteristics of social problems:
 Objective conditions
 Subjective concerns
 Dynamism
 Relativity
 Competing views

The natural history of problems
Social problems go through four stages called the natural history of problems
 The first stage  defining the problem
 People must become upset about some objective condition in society and
their perspective changes
 The emergence of leaders  leaders emerge who help to crystallize the issue

,  Organizing around the issue  organizing in every aspect, concentrating on
influential people
 The second stage  Crafting an official response
 First and second stage intertwine often
 One official response stimulates others
 The third stage Reacting to the official response
 Inspiring new opposition
 Stimulates efforts at bringing more change
 The fourth stage Developing alternative strategies
 Alternative strategies of the antiabortionists:
 Eliminating health insurance for abortions
 Establishing crisis pregnancy centers  encouraging them to give birth
 Strategies of moderate antiabortionists
 Mild actions, to encourage people not to proceed with abortion
 Strategies of radicals
 Extreme acts
 Alternative strategies of the proabortionists:
 Campaigning, lobbying lawmakers, publicizing their position
 Using women’s stories to warn the public
 Making mutual accusations is a big thing
 The controversy continues: the supreme court
o Supreme court remains the final arbiter
o Anti- and proabortionists try to influence the supreme court nominees
o Hard decisions
 Anti-abortionists want; federal right to life law  human life begins at
conception  it would be classified as murder
 Proabortionists want; federal freedom of choice law  all restrictions
removed regarding abortion

The role of sociology in social problems
 Sociology: the systematic and objective study of human groups
 Five contributions sociologists make in having an objective understanding of social
problems:
1. Sociologists can measure objective conditions  information on numbers and
why decisions are being made
2. Sociologists can measure subjective concerns  determine people’s attitude and
views  social location is very significant
3. Sociologists can apply the sociological imagination  placing social problems into
their broad social context
4. Sociologists can identify possible social policies  suggesting potential courses of
action
5. Sociologists can evaluate likely consequences of social policies  estimating social
effects
 Sociology cannot dictate that one set of values is superior to another, it provides no
basis for making value decisions
 Common sense: the ideas common to our society to get through daily life

,  Common sense is not adequate for solving social problems, because some of our
ideas are based on faulty assumptions

Methods for studying social problems
 Which method sociologists choose depends on three factors:
 The question they want to investigate
 The matter of practicality
 Ethics
 Four basic research designs:
1. Case studies  used to gather in-depth information on a specific situation
(cannot generalize from them)
2. Surveys  to overcome limitation knowing if experiences are similar between the
people in the research
 Focusing on a sample of the group
 Population to refer to the target group
 Surveys allow you to generalize what you find
 Best sample  random sample
3. Experiments  randomly dividing people with certain characteristics into two
groups
 Exposing one to some experience (experience group)
 The other group is the control group  without the experience
 Rare in studies of social problems
4. Field studies  (participant observation) researchers go into the setting
 Four methods for gathering information:
1. Interviews  asking people questions on the topic
 Structured interview  everyone is asked the same questions
 Unstructured interview  letting people talk in depth about their
experiences and covering the topic
2. Questionnaires  you ask people to answer written questions
 Open or closed ended
3. Documents  written sources or records
4. Observation  observing what is occurring in some setting
 Overt observation  you are identified as a researcher
 Covert observation  people in setting are not aware they are being
studied
 Sociologists often combine these methods

Should sociologists take sides?
 Sociology has no basis to judge whether someone’s ideas are right or wrong
 Taking the side of the oppressed
 Sociologists have the obligation to objectively do research  but they should
side with the ones that are being hurt/exploited
 Some say they have a moral obligation to help the oppressed
 Cannot provide the basis for choosing values
 Should sociologists promote extreme point of views? Sociologists too uncover values
 Sociologists sometimes take sides as professionals
 Battle between two opinions: