MATSEC IM Sociology flashcards

32 cards. Read the term and the definition here. The deck at the top of this page is optional.

Norms

Shared expectations of behaviour in a society or group. They range from everyday folkways through strongly held mores to formal laws enforced by the state.

Values

General beliefs about what is good, right or desirable. Values are broader than norms and underlie the specific rules a society enforces.

Cultural relativism

The principle that beliefs and practices should be understood within their own cultural context rather than judged by the standards of another culture.

Ethnocentrism

Judging another culture by the standards of one's own and treating it as inferior. It often accompanies racism and impedes understanding of cultural difference.

Primary socialisation

Early socialisation in infancy and childhood, usually within the family. It establishes language, basic identity and fundamental values before wider social institutions become influential.

Secondary socialisation

Socialisation occurring later through school, peers, media, religion and work. It transmits specific skills, norms and identities beyond the family.

Looking-glass self

Cooley's concept that self-image develops by imagining how others perceive us, imagining their judgement, and reacting emotionally with pride or shame.

Generalised other

Mead's term for the internalised attitudes of the wider community. Taking the role of the generalised other marks the mature self capable of social cooperation.

Role conflict

A situation in which the demands of two or more different roles clash, for example when paid work obligations conflict with caring responsibilities at home.

Social stratification

The hierarchical arrangement of social groups with unequal access to valued resources. Main forms are slavery, caste, estate and class systems.

Social mobility

Movement between social positions. Intergenerational mobility compares children with parents; intragenerational mobility occurs within one person's lifetime.

Meritocracy

A system in which social position and reward are allocated according to ability and effort rather than inherited status. Functionalists claim education supports it.

Relative poverty

Poverty defined against the living standards of a particular society, usually as income below a set proportion of median income.

Absolute poverty

Poverty defined against a fixed minimum needed for basic survival, such as food, shelter and clean water, independent of wider societal standards.

Patriarchy

Systematic male dominance over women, embedded in institutions such as the family, labour market, law and state rather than only in individual attitudes.

Nuclear family

A household consisting of two parents and their dependent children. Functionalists treat it as a standard family form; critics note its historical and cultural variability.

Hidden curriculum

The unofficial lessons of schooling such as punctuality, deference to authority and competition. Marxists argue these transmit values that serve capitalist work discipline.

Cultural capital

Bourdieu's term for knowledge, tastes, qualifications and styles valued by dominant groups. Its unequal distribution helps explain class differences in educational achievement.

Meritocracy in education

The functionalist claim that schools select and reward pupils by ability and effort. Evidence of class and ethnic attainment gaps challenges this claim.

Secularisation

The decline in the social significance and practice of organised religion in modern societies, measured by attendance, belief and institutional influence.

Civil religion

Collective rituals and symbols that bind a nation, such as flags, anthems and national commemorations, functioning like religion without supernatural belief.

Protestant ethic

Weber's argument that ascetic Protestant values of hard work and delayed reward encouraged rational capitalist accumulation and the spirit of modern capitalism.

Reliability

The consistency and repeatability of a research instrument. A reliable measure produces similar results when repeated under the same conditions.

Validity

The extent to which a method or measure captures what it claims to measure. Qualitative methods often claim high validity but lower reliability.

Representativeness

The degree to which a sample reflects the characteristics of the wider population, allowing findings to be generalised beyond the studied group.

Triangulation

Using two or more methods, data sources or investigators to cross-check findings and compensate for the weaknesses of any single approach.

Covert participant observation

Research in which the observer joins a group without revealing their research identity. It gains access to hidden behaviour but raises serious ethical problems.

Informed consent

Participants agree to take part after being told the purpose, procedures and risks of research. Deception and covert studies generally violate this principle.

Dark figure of crime

The volume of crime that is not reported to or recorded by the police. Victim surveys are used to estimate its size.

Strain theory

Merton's explanation of deviance as a gap between culturally approved goals and legitimate means, producing adaptation by conformity, innovation, ritualism, retreatism or rebellion.

Labelling theory

Becker's view that deviance is behaviour labelled as such by powerful groups, and that labels can create a self-fulfilling master status.

Legitimate authority

Weber's term for power accepted as rightful. Its types are traditional, charismatic and legal-rational, the last resting on rules and office rather than persons.