Common Sense Approach Vs Sociological Approach

# What is the main differences between a sociological approach and a common sense approach?

Sociology refers to the study on society and the world we live today, we may often see ourselves as a free agent, however, we are often influenced by the things surround us, such as the clothes we wear, the lifestyle we choose or the country we live. Sociologists try to understand human actions, social patterns and social structures; they are interested in what human actions are influenced by our interactions with other people and the external contexts. The same actions can be explained in different implications or aspects like economic, political, emotional etc. In order to understand social patterns and social structures, sociologists suggest a system of interaction between people that have a continuing influence on us. Differing from sociological approach where it uses research and evaluation to understand the society, a common sense approach refers to when people assume that they understand the world and the events taking place with it without having a deeper understand from different perspectives.
There are different sociological views that explain society in various ways, such as functionalism, where they see the society as a complex system with different parts in order to produce stability in the society.
Functionalists like Durkhiem claims that the parts of society work together, just as the various parts of human body do, for the benefit of the society as a whole. Whereas Marxists argue society is not a harmonious or positive as functionalists sociologist view. They believe that it is based on exploitation and division of social classes (the working class and the middle class) with conflicting interests and unequal power. Therefore, they view stability is the result of the dominant class being able to prevent change by using coercion or ideological
manipulation. By doing a sociological approach, researchers should consider the alternative influences of the topic they are looking for. For instance, if sociologists are doing a sociological approach on gender inequality, it would give a detailed analysis if they look at both genders in several cultures, eras and different sociological perspectives in order to have a better understanding of gender inequality in a whole and to make comparisons from now and then. Moreover, sociologists should not just simply give a single perspective to support the topic, they should give several relevant viewpoints and also critical perspectives that question the other views in order to give an integrity evaluation for the research. In conclusion, by using a sociological research is to try to understand the society by studying human actions, which we can refer to C. Wright Mills’ ‘Sociological Imagination’ that a sociological mindset in regards to be able to connect individual experiences and societal relationships, in other words, to put ourselves away in order to observe and study human actions and social structures. Whereas a common sense approach is just simply based on a person’s point of view of the society unlike a sociological approach where they see society in various ways.