School of Business Administration IU VNU HCMC BA

School of Business Administration IU – VNU HCMC BA 116 IU Introduction to Sociology Semester 1, 2011 -2012 Instructor: Dr. Truong Thi Kim Chuyen USSH – VNU HCMC 1

Chapter 5 SOCIAL INTERACTION AND SOCIAL STRUCTURE Chapter Outline • Social Interaction and Reality • Elements of Social Structure • Social Structure in Global Perspective • Social Policy and Social Structure: The AIDS Crisis 2 Mc. Graw-Hill 2006

Social Interaction and Reality § Our response to someone’s behavior is based on meaning we attach to his or her actions § Reality is shaped by our perceptions, evaluations, and definitions § Social reality literally constructed from social interactions (Berger and Luckman 1996) 3

Social Interaction and Reality § Defining and Reconstructing Reality – The ability to define social reality reflects a group’s power within society • Members of subordinate groups challenge traditional definitions and begin to perceive and experience reality in a new way 4

Social Interaction and Reality § Defining and Reconstructing Reality – Negotiated Order • Negotiation: attempt to reach agreement with others concerning the same objective. – People reshape reality by negotiating changes in patterns of social interaction • Negotiated order: social structure that derives its existence from the social interactions through which people define and redefine its character 5

Elements of Social Structure § Statuses – Status • Refers to any of the socially defined positions within a large group or society. A person holds more than one status simultaneously. 6

Elements of Social Structure § Statuses – Ascribed and Achieved Status • Ascribed Status: status one is born with • Achieved Status: status one earns Societies deal with inconsistencies by agreeing that – Master Status certain statuses • Status that dominates others and are more important determines person’s general position than others. in society 7

Elements of Social Structure § Figure 5. 1: Social Statuses 8

Elements of Social Structure § Social Roles – Sets of expectations for people who occupy a given status • Significant component of social structure – Role Conflict Occurs when incompatible expectations arise from two or more social positions held by the same person. 9

Elements of Social Structure § Social Roles – Role Strain • Difficulties that arise when the same social position imposes conflicting demands and expectations – Role Exit • Process of disengagement from a role that is central to one’s identity in order to establish a new role and identity 10

Elements of Social Structure § Groups – Any number of people with similar norms, values, and expectations who interact with each other on a regular basis. Every society composed of many groups in which daily social interaction takes place 11

Elements of Social Structure § Social Networks and Technology – Social network: series of social relationships that links person directly to others, and indirectly links them to still more people – Networking: involvement in social network; valuable skill when job-hunting • We can now maintain social networks electronically with advances in technology 12

Elements of Social Structure § Social Institutions – Organized patterns of beliefs and behavior centered on basic social needs • Provide insight into structure of society 13

Elements of Social Structure § Functionalist View – Five major tasks (functional prerequisites) a society or major group must accomplish • Preserving order • Replacing personnel • Providing and • Teaching new recruits maintaining a sense of purpose • Producing and distributing goods and services 14

Elements of Social Structure § Conflict View – Major institutions help maintain privileges of most powerful individuals and groups within society – Social institutions have inherently conservative nature – Social institutions operate in gendered and racist environments 15

Elements of Social Structure § Interactionist View – Social institutions affect our everyday behavior – Social behavior conditioned by roles and statuses 16

Social Structure in Global Perspective § Durkheim’s Mechanical and Organic Solidarity – Mechanical solidarity: refers to collective consciousness that emphasizes group solidarity, implying that all individuals perform the same tasks – Organic solidarity: refers to collective consciousness that hinges on need a society’s members have for one another 17

Social Structure in Global Perspective § Tönnie’s Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft – Gemeinschaft (guh-MINE-shoft): small community in which people have similar backgrounds and life experiences – Gesellschaft (guh-ZELL-shoft): large community in which people are strangers and feel little in common with other community residents 18

Social Structure in Global Perspective Continued… 19

Social Structure in Global Perspective 20

Social Structure in Global Perspective § Lenski’s Sociocultural Evolution Approach – Views human societies as undergoing change according to a dominant pattern, known as sociocultural evolution. “Process of change and development in human societies resulting from growth in their stores of cultural information” (Lenski et al. 2004: 366) 21

Social Structure in Global Perspective § Lenski’s Sociocultural Evolution Approach – Society’s level of technology critical to way it is organized Technology: “Cultural information about how to use the material resources of the environment to satisfy human needs and desires” (Nolan and Lenski 2004: 366) 22

Social Structure in Global Perspective § Lenski’s Sociocultural Evolution Approach – Preindustrial Societies • Hunting-and-Gathering Society: people rely on whatever foods and fibers are readily available Composed of small, widely dispersed groups 23

Social Structure in Global Perspective § Lenski’s Sociocultural Evolution Approach – Horticultural Societies • People plant seeds and crops • Less nomadic – Agrarian Societies: primarily engaged in production of food. Use technological innovations like the plow for dramatic increases in food production 24

Social Structure in Global Perspective § Lenski’s Sociocultural Evolution Approach – Industrial Societies • Depend on mechanization to produce their goods and services – Rely on inventions and energy sources – Change the function of the family as a self-sufficient unit. 25

Social Structure in Global Perspective § Lenski’s Sociocultural Evolution Approach – Postindustrial and Postmodern Societies • Postindustrial Society: economic system is engaged primarily in the processing and control of information • Postmodern Society: technologically sophisticated society preoccupied with consumer goods and media images 26 Continued. . .

Social Structure in Global Perspective 27

Social Policy and Social Structure § The AIDS Crisis – The Issue • While there are encouraging new therapies developed to treat AIDS, there is currently no way to eradicate AIDS by medical means. • How can people be protected and whose responsibility is it? 28

Social Policy and Social Structure § The AIDS Crisis – The Setting • AIDS is on the increase, with an estimated 40 million people infected and over 3 million dying annually. Not evenly distributed Developing nations of sub-Saharan Africa face greatest challenge 29

Social Policy and Social Structure § The AIDS Crisis – Sociological Insights • A dramatic crisis like AIDS epidemic likely to bring about certain transformations in a society’s social structure • Functionalist perspective: If established social institutions cannot meet a crucial need, new social networks are likely to emerge to fill that function 30

Social Policy and Social Structure § The AIDS Crisis – Sociological Insights • Conflict Perspective: Policymakers slow to respond to the AIDS crisis because those in high-risk groups—gays and IV drug users—were comparatively powerless. • Interactionists widely forecast AIDS would lead to a more conservative sexual climate Also concerned about impact of AIDS treatment on daily lives of those stricken with disease. 31

Social Policy and Social Structure § The AIDS Crisis – Policy Initiatives • AIDS has struck all societies, but not all nations can respond in the same manner • High cost of drug treatment generated intensive worldwide pressure on major pharmaceutical companies to lower prices Cultural practices may prevent people from dealing with AIDS epidemic realistically 32

Social Policy and Social Structure § Figure 5. 2: People Living with HIV/AIDS, 2003 33

SUMMARY • Social interaction refers to the ways in which people respond to one another. Social structure refers to the way in which society is organized into predictable relationships. This chapter examines the basic elements of social structure: statuses, social roles groups, networks, and institutions. 34

1. People shape their social reality based on what they learn through their social interaction. Social change comes from redefining or reconstructing social reality. Sometimes change results from negotiation. 2. An ascribed status is generally assigned to a person at birth, whereas an achieved status is attained largely through one’s own effort. 3. In the US, ascribed statuses, such as race and gender, can function as master statuses that have an important impact on one’s potential to achieve a desired professional and social status. 35

4. With each distinctive status – whether ascribed or achieved – come particular social roles, the set of expectations for people who occupy that status. 5. Much of our patterned behavior takes place within groups and is influenced by the norms and sanctions established by groups. Groups serve as links to social networks and their vast resources. 6. The mass media, the government, the economy, the family, and the healthy care system are all examples of social institutions. 7. One way to understand social institutions is to ask how they fulfill essential functions, such as replacing personnel, training new recruits , and 36 preserving order.

8. Conflict theorists argue that social institutions help to maintain the privileges of the powerful while contributing to the powerlessness of others. 9. Integrationist theorists emphasize the idea that our social behavior is conditioned by the roles and statuses we accept, the groups to which we belong, and the institutions within which we function. 10. Emili Durkheim thought that social structure depends on the division of labor in a society. According to Durkheim’s theory, societies with minimal division of labor have a collective consciousness called mechanical solidarity, those with greater division of labor show an 37 interdependence called organic solidarity.

11. Ferdinad Tonnies distinguished the closeknit community of Gemeinschaft from the impersonal mass society known as Gesellschaft. 12. Gerhard Lenski thinks that a society’s social structure changes as its culture and technology become more sophisticated, a process he calls sociocultural evolution. 13. The AIDS crisis has changed our society’s social structure, prompting the creation of new networks to care for the ill and educate the healthy. Policy makers were slow to respond to the crisis at first because the high-risk groups the disease affected were relatively powerless. 38