Soc 100 Final Sg

Soc 100 Final Study Guide 1. What is demography?
The study of the size, composition, growth or shrinkage, and distribution of human populations. (pg 568) 2. Be familiar with the Malthus theorem.
Thomas Malthus was an English economist. Wrote a book called An Essay on the Principle of Population – theorized that although the food supply increases arithmetically (1,2,3,… etc.), population grows geometically (exponentially) (2,4,8,16,…etc). (pg 568) 3. From the beginning of time, how long did it take the earth to gain the first billion people?
From the beginning of time until 1800 to reach the first billion people. (pg 569) 4. What is demographic freefall?
A prediction of some anti-malthusians who believe that as more nations enter stage 4 of the demographic transition, the world’s population will peak at about 8-9 billion, then begin to grow smaller. Two hundred years from now, we will have a lot fewer people on earth. (pg 571) 5. What impact does a declining standard of living create in a country?
Conflict theorists point out that a declining standard of living poses the threat of political instability – protests, riots, even revolution – and in response, repression by the government. (pg 576) 6. What is the fertility rate?
The number of children that the average woman bears. The world’s overall fertility rate is 2.5. (pg 577) 7. What is fecundity?
The number of children that women are capable of bearing. (pg 577) 8. How do demographers determine a country’s growth rate?
Add and subtract the three demographic variables – fertility, mortality, and net migration. The country’s growth rate is the net change after people have been added to and subtracted from a population. (growth rate equals births minus deaths plus net migration). (pg 579) 9. What two nations employ female infanticide most often?
China and India (pg 581) 10. Today what % of americans live in cities vs. rural
79% (pg 586) 11. According to William Wilson, what transformed the inner cities into ghettos?
Suburbanization (pg 596) 12. Define collective behavior.
Extraordinary activities carried out by groups of people; includes lynchings, rumors, panics, urban legends, fads, and fashions. It is actions by a group of people who bypass the usual norms governing their behavior and do something unusual. (pg 604) 13. Who is Lebon? What he had to say about the collective mind. What he was about.
Gustave LeBon was a French psychologist that built on Charles Mackay’s idea of “herd mentality”. He stated in a book in 1895 and stressed how people feel anonymous in crowds, and less accountable for what they do. Some even develop feelings of invincibility and come to think that they can do almost anything. A collective mind develops and people are swept up by almost any suggestion. (pg 604) 14. Yamaguchi and Horowitz, how did they say people behave in crowds?
In a rational manner (pg 606 ??) 15. Turner and Killian (2 questions) i) How do people react in abonormal situations (novel situations)?
People are predictive and usual norms are adequate for dealing with everyday events. When this is disrupted, ordinary norms may not cover the new situation, and theremore new norms may emerge. People develop novel definitions of right and wrong, feeling that the new circumstances justify actions otherwise considered wrong. (pg 606) ii) They define different groups – what are exploiters?
Ego involved: feel a personal stake in the unusual event.
Concerned: also have personal interest in the event but less so than the ego involved.
Insecure: care little about the matter. Join the crowd to give them a sense of power, security and belonging.
Curious spectator: care little about the issue. Simply curious about what is going on.
Exploiters: don’t care about the event. Use it for personal gain such as selling food or T-shirts. (example: during OJ Simpson trial, people were selling T-shirts outside of Simpson’s house) (pg 606-607) 16. Riots – people loot during riots
Violent crowd behavior directed at people and property. Also participating in riots are opportunists – people who feel neither rage at their situation in life nor outrage at the precipitating event. These people are the ones who do the looting. (pg 608) 17. What is it called when a sense of excitement, what is it called when it is passed from one person to another?
Emotional contagion (found on internet) 18. What is the most common background condition of urban riots?
Frustration and anger. Center around being denied jobs and experiencing other injustices. (pg 608) 19. In riots, who are opportunists?
People who feel neither rage at their situation in life nor outrage at the precipitating event. These people are the ones who do the looting. (pg 608) 20. With regards to Cantril, why do people react with panic and crowd situations? (war of the worlds)
Panic occurs when people become so fearful that they cannot function normally and may even flee a situation they perceive as threatening. Cantril attributed the reaction to widespread anxiety about world conditions. (We were on the brink of entering WWII when they aired the radio program and people already had war jitters which made them more susceptible to panic.) (pg 609) 21. Compare and contrast fads and fashions
Fads are a novel form of behavior that briefly catches people’s attention. Appears suddenly and spreads by imitation and identification with people who are already involved. Mass media help to spread the fad but it has a short life and fades away although it may reappear from time to time. (ie: tickle me elmo, beanie babies, planking). When a fad lasts, it becomes a fashion. Can be clothing, furniture, hairstyles, and common expressions. (pg 614) 22. Social movements: Define and examples: (decide which one the KKK is)
A large group of people who are organized to promote or resist some social change.
Reformative – seek to reform some specific aspect of society. (Animal rights movement wants to reform the ways in which society views and treats animals.) Targets society.
Redemptive – a social movement that seeks to change people and institutions totally, to redeem them. Targets the individual.
Transformative – a social movement that seeks to change society totally, to transform it. Targets society.
Alternative – seeks to alter only some specific aspects of people and institutions. Targets the individuals.
KKK are part of a reactive social movement. (pg 616) 23. Are some social movements reactive? (something happened they don’t like so started a social movement)
Yes. Some feel threatened because some condition of society is changing and they react to resist that change. (pg 616) 24. First social revolution, second and third? When did they occur and what happened in those revolutions?
First: Hunting and gathering societies develop into horticultural and pastoral societies.
Second: Agricultural – invention of the plow
Third: Industrial – steam engine. Harnessing machines powered by fuels. 1765.
Fourth: Post Industrial – information, services and high tech. Advancement of the computer and microchip. (pg 630) 25. What sociologist traced the invention of capitalism to the protestant reformation? Define protestant reformation.
Max Weber (pg 631)
Protestant reformation was when protestants realized that church membership would not save them. As they agonized over this, they concluded that God did not want them to live in uncertainty and He would give them a sign that they were predestined for heaven. That sign was prosperity. (pg 631) 26. What was it called when there was a shift from gemeinshaft to gesellshaft? Personal vs. impersonal. What is difference between the two?
Modernization (?) Gemeinshaft is a traditional society where society is small, rural, and slow changing. Men dominate, division of labor between sexes is rigid, little formal education, use the past as a key for dealing with the present. Gesellschaft is a modern society where society is large, urbanized, and fast changing. Division of labor is fluid, prize formal education, future oriented, and have higher incomes. Gemeinshaft is more focused on personal relationships whereas Gesellschaft is more impersonal. (pg 630) 27. When the group of 8 became a group of 9, who will be the 9th country in this group?
China (pg 632) 28. What historian hypothesized that all societies reached a peak and a decline?
Historian Arnold Toynbee (pg 634) [other person is Oswald Spengler but he is not a historian] 29. According to Marx, what are dialectical processes?
Each arrangement of power (thesis) contains contradictions (antithesis) which make the arrangement unstable and must be resolved. The new arrangement of power (a synthesis) contains its own contradictions; this process of balancing and unbalancing continues throughout history as groups struggle for power and resources. Each ruling group sows the seeds of its own destruction. (pg 635) 30. What is necessary for discovery to bring about the most extensive change?
Timing (pg 635) 31. Discovery, diffusion, and invention – how do each cause social change? Know them.
Invention – the combination of existing elements and materials to form new ones. Also includes social inventions such as capitalism, bureaucracy, and socialism. These social inventions have far reaching consequences on people’s relationships and material inventions could also affection social life deeply.
Discovery – a new way of seeing reality. A discovery brings about social change when it comes at the right time.
Diffusion – the spread of an invention or a discovery from one area to another. This can produce extensive effects on people’s lives. (pg 635-36) 32. What term did Marx use to describe what happens when workers become dissatisfied when they are separated from the ownership of their work? (the term)
Alienation (pg 638) 33. Define and give examples of corporate welfare.
The financial incentives (tax breaks, subsidies, and even land and stadiums) given to corporations in order to attract them to an area or induce them to remain. Some examples are oil companies, and Borden chemicals and plastics in Louisiana. (pg 648)
Blue skies 1. What was said about young people’s abilities to establish and maintain good relationships vs. old people.
Younger ones have healthier ideas of what makes a good relationship vs. the elderly. Older generation chose to marry because it was what society expected of them, whereas the younger generation has learned it is not society that has to deal with it. (pg 202) 2. What was said about abstinence alone being the solution to teen pregnancy?
Who are they fooling? The hope is that young peole look to their futures and understand the need to exercise caution and behave more responsibly. (pg 202) 3. How viable is the American family today?

4. What was said to be the fastest decreasing form of family today?

Nuclear family (pg 204)

5. What impact has the industrial revolution had on interpersonal interaction?
Interpersonal relationships have lessened with the industrial revolution. Alienation has become commonplace and interpersonal interaction has become increasingly difficult. (pg 204) 6. How have some people perceived the downgrading stigma of divorce?
At one point, pretty heavy stigma, not anymore.
With concern. (pg 204) 7. How possible is it to survive in our society today without being a dual income family?
It is possible and in a lot of ways, beneficial. (pg 205) 8. Compare/contrast a dysfunctional 2 parent family and a function single parent family.

9. What is the history of curiosity of human sexuality in our society?
It is not a new concept. (pg 205) 10. What is the relative importance of the accumulation of personal resources in our society?