Test #1 study questions:

  1. What does society consist off? What do, from sociological point of view, individuals consist off?
     
  2. What is the subject of sociology? How is the subject of sociological investigation different from the subject of psychological investigation?
     
  3. Can properties of groups be explained by characteristics of individuals that make up these groups? Provide an example of patterns of interaction specific to groups.
     
  4. Why it is important to engage in/generate sociological knowledge?
     
  5. Why did sociology as a discipline emerge in the 18th century? Why not earlier or later?
     
  6. What factors characterize transition from traditional to modern societies?
     
  7. August Comte is regarded as a founder of sociology because he proposed that a "positive method" should be used in a study of society. What is a positive method or positivism? Why the early sociologists preferred to use natural sciences research model to study society?
     
  8. Herbert Spencer’s views of the evolution of societies are known as social Darwinism. How does social Darwinism characterize the evolution of a society? What are its major flaws?
     
  9. Marx views on human history were based on economic determinism perspective. Explain, what is economic determinism. How would economic determinism explain emergence of civil rights movement in the US during the 1960s? Why this does not happened earlier or later?
     
  10. Marx is considered a founder of a conflict perspective in sociology. Who, according to Marx are engaged in a conflict and what this conflict is about? Define bourgeoisie and proletariat.
     
  11. Explain, why according to Durkheim among Protestants/unmarried males suicide rates are higher than among Catholics/married men? Why suicide rates tend to be stable for a long periods of time?
     
  12. Define mechanical and organic solidarity. Provide an example of groups integrated via mechanical and organic solidarity. In which type of a group/society there are more possibilities for expressions of individuality?
     
  13. Weber argued that there are no laws that govern human societies. What, according to Weber, is the most important factor that defines emergence, reproduction and change of "social forms"? How, according to Max Weber, did the change of meaning of work under Protestantism make capitalism possible?
     
  14. How do conflict, functionalist and symbolic interactionist perspectives explain social order/social forms? Use these three perspective to explain (a) high divorce rates in a contemporary US; (b) teenager pregnancies; (c) gang violence.

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