Tag Archives: sociology

The sociology knowledge you need to take the MCAT

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I noted last year that the MCAT, the exam for applicants to medical school, was changing to include knowledge about sociology. Since then, I have been curious about what exact sociological knowledge is required for the exam and a report from the American Association of Medical Colleges provides some insights. Here is “Behavioral and Social Science
Learning Outcomes at Graduation” that sociology (and psychology) can fulfill (p.24 of the document):

Accurately describe how social determinants of health influence health outcomes and how physicians can incorporate this knowledge in the care of patients.

Here is how a sociological vantage point can help deal with a particular scenario (p.16):

A woman newly diagnosed with breast cancer is searching for a physician to help her think through her situation, set goals, and develop a “health strategy.” While waiting to meet with a new physician for consultation, she tells a medical student that she has been mostly receiving “treatment options,” instead of health strategies…

Sociology
• How do we conceptualize the difference between a “health strategy” and “treatment options”?
• How is the care of a cancer patient embedded in a network of friends, family, and health care providers?

And here is a more broad statement about what the social sciences can bring to medicine (p.10):

Given the daunting breadth of behavioral and social science, the contributions from this family of sciences can best be understood by attending to three core areas: 1) the use of behavioral and social sciences theory, 2) behavioral and social science research methods, and 3) core behavioral and social science concepts and contributions to the fund of medical knowledge.

On the whole, it seems like sociology is meant to help doctors and health care providers understand the social and cultural context of the patient. Added to an expanded matrix of care, sociology helps provide a more holistic approach to medical care.

It seems like these requirements could be fulfilled by an Introduction to Sociology course though without seeing the particular questions on the MCAT, it is hard to know.

Remembering Pierre Bourdieu

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A little more than ten years after his death, The Guardian takes a look at the influence Pierre Bourdieu has had on sociology and other academic fields:

Ten years after the death of the French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu, we seem a long way from the days when he severely criticised the world of politics and the media. Sociology students the world over are familiar with concepts such as social reproduction, symbolic violence and cultural capital.

Bourdieu is also the second most frequently quoted author in the world, after Michel Foucault, but ahead of Jacques Derrida, according to the ranking produced by Thomson Reuters (previously the Institute of Scientific Information), which counts citations. “Bourdieu has become the name of a collective research undertaking which disregards borders between disciplines and countries,” says Loïc Wacquant, a professor of sociology at University of California, Berkeley…

Could another Bourdieu appear now? Certainly not, says Noiriel: “No single thinker could exert so much influence. Sociological research has gone global, whereas it was only just taking shape in France when Bourdieu established his position.”…

“Bourdieu rarely spoke out on issues with which he was not familiar,” says the sociologist Franck Poupeau, who edited his Political Interventions. From social deprivation to industrial action, his commitment was linked to “a profound understanding of these issues”. So, he believes, “another Bourdieu would be possible now, but he would take a different form, that’s all.”

Despite Bourdieu’s standing in sociology and other academic disciplines, how many Americans have heard of him? Have any major US policies or programs been based on Bourdieu’s work? Of course, perhaps these are silly questions as sociologists tend not to exert the same influence in the United States nor do we have as much space for public intellectuals. Additionally, measuring sociologists in pragmatic terms (how did they tangibly improve society) might be an American sort of question.

A related point: I have a hard time imagining any major US newspaper writing a story like this about a sociologist who had passed away ten years earlier. One explanation for this could be that Bourdieu was heads above many or all other sociologists of his generation and there is no American who could match his theories or breadth. Another is that many journalists have little knowledge about sociology or sociologists. Hence, people who write about society can be labelled a sociologist.

Is Charles Murray really a sociologist?

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I’ve seen a number of news stories about Charles Murray’s latest book and one thing caught my eye: the claim that Murray is a sociologist. (See examples from the Philadelphia Inquirer, BusinessWeek, and the National Catholic Reporter.) Is he really?

Murray’s page at his current scholarly home, the American Enterprise Institute, says he is a “political scientist, author, and libertarian.”

Wikipedia’s main entry for Murray clearly calls him a political scientist and records his PhD in political science but this list of sociologists includes Murray.

Perhaps the confusion comes from the fact that Murray is working with a lot of topics that are commonly covered by sociology such as race, social class, and family life. Even the New York Times describes his work as sociology:

Few people today would dismiss the idea that values, culture and intelligence all play a role in economic success. But it is hard to know what to make of some of Murray’s findings. As with David Brooks’s “Bobos in Paradise,”Murray’s sociology depends a lot on his own, sometimes highly idiosyncratic, fieldwork. To demonstrate that the elite are more likely to drive foreign cars than domestic ones, Murray notes the makes of automobiles in a couple of mall parking lots. In an otherwise persuasive chapter arguing that Ivy League graduates tend to live near one another, Murray quotes a remark by Michael Barone, the conservative commentator, complaining about the profusion of Harvard and Yale graduates on his former block. If Murray believes that wealthy yuppies suffer from creeping nonjudgmentalism, I invite him to spend an hour on UrbanBaby.com.

This quote suggests that Murray’s work is sociology because he is explaining sociological phenomena, not because he is working within the sociological tradition, utilizing sociological theories and methods, or even thinking like a typical sociologist. Practicing sociology (sometimes termed “pop sociology”) is quite different from being a sociologist. Is this simply lazy journalism or a bigger problem in that people don’t know how sociologists actually go about their work?

In a related question, how many sociologists would claim Murray is a sociologist? First, this could be tied to whether he is practicing good sociology. Second, this could be about whether he is espousing ideas that fit with sociological theories and data (and they generally don’t). How many sociologists would want to add libertarian as a descriptor of their image?

Sociology: challenging common sense

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One simple way to view sociology is that it often challenges common sense understandings of the world:

We talk a lot about common sense; as if that’s a good thing. I remember my uncle describing a guy once by saying that he was smart as a whip but didn’t have a lick of common sense. So it has always been something held up as a good thing. The problem is that common sense is sometimes wrong too. In my sociology classes each semester, we take ten common sense statements and prove their error through research, rather than just assuming they’re correct because they sound right.

A few quick thoughts about common sense.

1. Common sense is often cultural. In other words, different cultures have different default or common understanding about how the world works.

2. Common sense is often learned through socialization. Sometimes this happens explicitly, such as when parents talk to a child, but other times it happens through observation. Kids have to learn about common sense and has to know how society “typically” works.

3. Sociology courses are a good place to discuss common sense because we tend to talk about topics that people haven’t thought through before. Why do people live where they do? Why do some occupations get paid more than others? What is behind going to college? Why do we attach certain ideas or statuses to particular objects, like a house or an Apple laptop? Sociology often “pulls the curtain back” on social life, exposing what is really influencing our actions and group behavior.

4. This is not to say common sense is necessarily wrong. But the issue is that many people do not have the time or take the effort to evaluate common sense. College is a good place to learn how to evaluable common sense through critical thinking, reading, and writing.

5. Challenging common sense is not an easy task. We like our typical explanations for how things work. Even when confronted with better evidence, we tend to stick with our accepted ways of thinking. You see this all the time in the political realm: the ideological commitments of each side can trump evaluating the facts.

6. Common sense is a typical foil for much academic work. Here is a typical academic argument: “the accepted wisdom is X but we have research that shows it actually is more like Y.” Or, “there is a typical explanation for this phenomena but we think the real world is more complex or is more nuanced.”

Documentary about sociologist Zygmunt Bauman

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Based on a few stories in the last few days, I have again realized that sociology outside the United States may be quite different. While there is a dance performance in Quebec celebrating the life of a political scientist and sociologist, there is a new Polish documentary examining the life of sociologist Zygmunt Bauman:

“Love Europe World by Zygmunt Bauman”, a film about the world famous Polish-Jewish philosopher and sociologist had its premiere last week.

The documentary was commissioned by the National Audiovisual Institute as a part of the Cultural Program of the Polish EU Presidency in 2011 and directed by Krzysztof Rz?czy?ski.

In the four-parts film (Culture, Europe, The World, and Himself), Bauman reflects upon issues that are central to his work as a sociologist: culture and the times, in which we live.

“The ultimate result of the blossoming of culture, which we have undoubtedly witnessed in the passing years, is a feeling of having gone astray”, says Bauman in the film.

I imagine that European sociologists as public intellectuals might just be considered normal material for documentaries. People like Bauman, Giddens, and Habermas have been quite influential.

What if someone wanted to make a series on the lives of American sociologists? Think of the possibilities: George Herbert Mead, Talcott Parsons, Robert Merton, Peter Berger, Robert Bellah, Robert Wuthnow, William Julius Wilson, and more. (I know I’m leaving a lot of big names out here.) Are there particularly notable paths sociologists took to reach the top of the discipline? Even so, perhaps there is a better question to consider before thinking too much about this: would anyone ever watch these?

Adding sociology to the MCAT

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I’ve wondered recently about sociology in grade schools and here is news that sociology has been added to the MCAT, the entrance exam for medical schools:

The 2015 change marks the fifth major alteration of the MCAT since it was introduced in the 1920s.

The new MCAT will include the addition of an entirely new section titled “Psychological, Social and Biological Foundations of Behavior,” as well as a more intense examination of the biomedical sciences, such as genetics and biochemistry…

Koetje said the addition of psychology and sociology to the test was necessary because of the advances made in health care as well as the sociocultural changes within the health care system.

“Patients are more complex today, and medical schools have to ensure that these students will be capable of treating the whole person and everything that comes with that,” Koetje said.

As the article hints at, will more schools now have pre-med students take courses in sociology and psychology in order to prepare? In response to this question (part of a larger set of FAQs about the change), here is what the AAMC says:

Examinees who would not otherwise take biochemistry, cellular and molecular biology, introductory psychology, and introductory sociology would need to study the concepts tested. We do not anticipate the need for additional coursework in research methods and statistics.

I wonder exactly what sociological concepts will be included on the test. I assume race, social class, and gender are non-negotiable?

This also gives sociology teachers more room to tell undergraduates in Intro to Sociology classes that sociology is helpful for many fields, including medicine.

Why cases of scientific fraud can affect everyone in sociology

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The recent case of a Dutch social psychologist admitting to working with fraudulent data can lead some to paint social psychology or the broader discipline of sociology as problematic:

At the Weekly Standard, Andrew Ferguson looks at the “Chump Effect” that prompts reporters to write up dubious studies uncritically:

The silliness of social psychology doesn’t lie in its questionable research practices but in the research practices that no one thinks to question. The most common working premise of social-psychology research is far-fetched all by itself: The behavior of a statistically insignificant, self-selected number of college students or high schoolers filling out questionnaires and role-playing in a psych lab can reveal scientifically valid truths about human behavior.

And when the research reaches beyond the classroom, it becomes sillier still…

Described in this way, it does seem like there could be real journalistic interest in this study – as a human interest story like the three-legged rooster or the world’s largest rubber band collection. It just doesn’t have any value as a study of abstract truths about human behavior. The telling thing is that the dullest part of Stapel’s work – its ideologically motivated and false claims about sociology – got all the attention, while the spectacle of a lunatic digging up paving stones and giving apples to unlucky commuters at a trash-strewn train station was considered normal.

A good moment for reaction from a conservative perspective: two favorite whipping boys, liberal (and fraudulent!) social scientists plus journalists/the media (uncritical and biased!), can be tackled at once.

Seriously, though: the answer here is not to paint entire academic disciplines as problematic because of one case of fraud. Granted, some of the questions raised are good ones that social scientists themselves have raised recently: how much about human activity can you discover through relatively small sample tests of American undergraduates? But good science is not based on one study anyway. An interesting finding should be corroborated by similar studies done in different places at different times with different people. These multiple tests and observations help establish the reliability and validity of findings. This can be a slow process, another issue in a media landscape where new stories are needed all the time.

This reminds me of Joel Best’s recommendations regarding dealing with statistics. One common option is to simply trust all statistics. Numbers look authoritative, often come from experts, and they can be overwhelming. Just accepting them can be easy. At the other pole is the common option of saying that all statistics are simply interpretation and are manipulated so we can’t trust any of them. No numbers are trustworthy. Neither approaches are good options but they are relatively easy options. The better route to go when dealing with scientific studies is to have the basic skills necessary to understand whether they are good studies or not and how the process of science works. In this case, this would be a great time to call for better training among journalists about scientific studies so they can provide better interpretations for the public.

In the end, when one prominent social psychologist admits to massive fraud, the repercussions might be felt by others in the field for quite a while.

The role of sociology in Illinois learning standards for social science for grades 1-5

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Building on a post from yesterday about textbook errors in sociology textbooks for fifth-graders in Macedonia, I was interested in knowing more about Illinois learning standards for social science for grades 1-5. Here are the five goals related to social science (pgs. 3-6 of the PDF):

Goal 14 – Understand political systems, with an emphasis on the United States.
The preservation and advancement of a free society within a constitutional democracy demands an informed, competent, and humane citizenry. Toward this end, civic education must be provided to students to help them learn, practice, and demonstrate the traits of a responsible citizen. This goal can be accomplished through developmental steps by giving students the knowledge, skills, and opportunities to illustrate their understanding of the following…

Goal 15: Understand economic systems, with an emphasis on the United States.
People’s lives are directly affected by the economies around them. All people engage in economic activity: saving, investing, trading, producing and consuming. By understanding economic systems and learning the economic way of thinking, students will be able to make informed choices and more effectively use resources. Such understanding benefits both individuals and society as a whole…

Goal 16 – Understand events, trends, individuals and movements shaping the history of Illinois, the United States and other nations. History encompasses the whole of human experience, from the earliest times to the present. As such, it provides perspectives on how the forces of continuity and change have shaped human life, both our own and others’. The study of history involves more than knowing the basic names, dates, and places associated with an event or episode. This knowledge is an essential first step to historical interpretation of the past, but historical study also moves on to a methodology that develops a deeper understanding within an individual…

Goal 17: Understand world geography and the effects of geography on society, with an emphasis on the United States. The study of geography is a lifelong learning process vital to the well being of students, the state of Illinois, the United States, and the world. As an integrative discipline that brings together the physical and human dimensions of the world, geography strives to make sense out of the spatial arrangements of people, places, and environments on Earth. Geography is a field of study that enables us to find answers to questions about the world around us. Geographers ask and attempt to answer questions about where something is located, why it is there, how it got there, how it is connected to other things and places, how it is arranged in relation to other things, and the significance of its location…

Goal 18 – Understand social systems, with an emphasis on the United States. Humans belong to groups from the moment of birth. In order to better understand their roles as individuals and group members of a diverse society, students must know and understand how culture has changed and how it is expressed. Students should also understand how and why groups and institutions are formed. When students understand these concepts, they are better able to contribute to their community and society.

I suppose sociology would fit mostly into Goal 18 though anthropology could also fit here with the emphasis on culture. But it is pretty clear in these goals that politics, economics, history, and geography are emphasized and these disciplines are more clearly described.

Before these goals (pg. 3 of the PDF), there is some clarity about the disciplines involved in the social sciences: “Among the integrated social science disciplines are political science, economics, history, geography, sociology, anthropology, and psychology.” And later in the document (pg. 76), in the glossary specifically for Goal 18, here is the definition of sociology: “Sociology: The scientific and positivistic study of society.”

It would be interesting to know more about how these goals were developed. A later portion of the document doesn’t suggest that the forming of Goal 18 was guided by national or state advisory groups; however, two sociology textbooks that are cited in the bibliography.

In practice, is the term sociology ever used with students in connection with these goals? Do common textbooks ever use the term? Is sociology introduced to students regularly before high school or college? The social science standards for grades 6-12 perhaps allow for a little more room (see page 60 of the PDF).

WaPo op-ed suggests sociology degree are the antithesis of Wall Street

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An opinion piece a few days ago in the Washington Post contrasts those working on Wall Street and sociology majors:

How nice it would be if the 99 percent had never heard of Wall Street – perhaps if it didn’t exist at all.

There would be no need to be jealous of your college classmates’ $10 million paydays while you majored in sociology. No egg on your face if, as a hot-shot investment manager, you had poured $100 million of widows’ and orphans’ money into securities called collateralized debt obligations that you didn’t understand. There would be no collapse in the value of the home you bought in 2005. Several million people who lost their houses to foreclosure might still be proudly mowing their lawns. And your retirement savings would not be shattered because of all those high-flying technology firms that your mutual fund bought back in the 1990s.

The rest of the opinion piece goes on to talk about the downside of Wall Street. But the comparison of wealthy Wall Street employees versus sociology majors is interesting. The main point seems to be that sociology majors don’t make much money. My response: sociology majors aren’t at the bottom of the heap for median earnings.

A more latent point might be that sociology majors might be the most recognizable discipline that is opposed to the free-market capitalism represented by Wall Street. Is there any other discipline that would be even close? This animosity between sociology and neoliberalism or free-market economics could come from two areas:

1. Different explanations for human actions. Economists tend to go with rational choice explanations that humans are motivated by incentives and self-interest. Sociologists would suggest things are more complex and include factors like values, emotions, ideology, social networks, and altruism.

2. Different values: money and resources flowing freely versus a greater sense for a need for economic and social equality.

There are ways to bridge these two approaches, perhaps in subfields like economic sociology. At the same time, it is interesting to see the choice to contrast Wall Street and sociology.

It is the best of times for teaching sociology and the worst of times for America

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A minister and adjunct instructor of sociology raises an intriguing question: when times are good for teaching sociology, it may be bad times for society.

This is a great time for teaching sociology, which means it is a bad time.

The study of sociology was born of the Industrial Revolution when the gap between the rich and the poor became the greatest ever known. The two groups which I straddle; the religious community and the academic community, became interested and attempted to study social phenomenon with a scientific approach, replacing social myths with evidence and facts.

Somehow we have managed to return statistically to that time. In our country, the wealthiest one percent of the population own 33 percent of the wealth and the wealthiest 10 percent own 70 percent of “our” wealth. It seems we have returned to the ruling class mode of the 19th century in Russia and France—a time when America was awash with “robber barons.”

No wonder folks are taking to the streets.

I wonder if anyone has researched the relationship between the popularity and of sociology compared to the historical milieu. Sociology did emerge out of turbulent times in the mid 1800s but it also seemed to reach peaks in the United States in the prosperous 1920s (the Chicago School) and the 1960s and 1970s while there was both unrest and prosperity. Might this suggest that when academia thrives, i.e. student populations are increasing as well as budgets, sociology (and perhaps other disciplines) thrive? At the very least, we could look at how figures of undergraduate  majors and student enrolled in sociology graduate programs over the years. Perhaps there simply wouldn’t be many dips in the data as sociology programs expand over time and spread into more schools.

Probably the better argument to make here is that sociology appears more relevant in unsettled times. As society dips toward troubles and chaos, people want answers and explanations. Additionally, perceptions of social problems might be more important here than the scale of actual problems. However, I wonder if this tends to give sociology a bad name as people then equate it only with social problems rather than solutions and thriving societies.