Émile Durkheim applied Spencer's theory to explain how societies change and survive over time. These parts of society were social institutions, or patterns of beliefs and behaviors focused on meeting social needs (e.g., government, education, family, health care, religion, the economy). He argued that just as various organs of the body work together to keep the body functioning, various parts of society work together to keep society functioning (Spencer, 1898). Functionalism grew out of the writings of English philosopher and biologist Herbert Spencer, who saw similarities between society and the human body. Functionalismįunctionalism, also called structural-functional theory, sees society as a structure with interrelated parts designed to meet the biological and social needs of the individuals in that society. In sociology, three theories provide broad perspectives that help explain many different aspects of social life: structural functionalism, conflict theory, and symbolic interactionism. Classic sociological theories are still considered important and current, but new sociological theories build upon the work of their predecessors and add to them (Calhoun, 2002). Sociological theories are constantly evolving and should never be considered complete. Grand theories attempt to explain large-scale relationships and answer fundamental questions, such as why societies form and why they change. Macro-level theories relate to large-scale issues and large groups of people, while micro-level theories look at specific relationships between individuals or small groups. Theories vary in scope depending on the scale of the issues that they are meant to explain. His work demonstrates how theory is useful in sociological research. Durkheim gathered a large amount of data about people living in Europe and found that Protestants were more likely to commit suicide than Catholics. He studied social solidarity-social ties within a group-and hypothesized that some differences in suicide rates might be explained by religious differences. In sociology, a theory is a way to explain different aspects of social interactions and to create a testable proposition, called a hypothesis, about society (Allan, 2006).įor example, although suicide is generally considered an individual phenomenon, Émile Durkheim was interested in studying the social factors that affect it. Sociologists study social events, interactions, and patterns, and they develop theories to explain why things work as they do.
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