Everything I needed to know for my AQA A2 Sociology Crime and Deviance (2011) Part 2/3
Is Sociology a Science and the Suicide Studies
My Completed Notes 2011
Is Sociology a Science?
1. Positivism
Induction e.g. Durkheim
Should be done as a science because same objective process used
2. Popper
Deduction
Should be done as a science but different to Durkheim because don’t believe in predictive laws because it is the future and so is not falsifiable
3. Interpretivists (Weber)
Shouldn’t be done the same because both aktuelles verstehen (understanding from observation) and erklarendes verstehen (understanding meaning and motives) is needed
4. Phenomenology (philosophical view)/Ethnomethodology (method)
Not the same because life has no meaning, we just impose meanings via categorization
Garfinkel made students act in strange ways to disrupt social order, presumed crazy, and gave random yes/no answers at counselling and it helped
5. Paradigms (Kuhn)
Not the same because they are different types of knowledge
6. Scientific Realism
The same because no research is value-free and they should be aware of limitations
Triangulation (objectivity and subjectivity) is the worst of both worlds
Can only compare theories e.g. Taylor and eating disorders
The Suicide Studies
1. Durkheim
Regulation is control of the culture’s norms and values, integration is how well socialized people are and so the extent to which they share the same norms and values
Too much integration-altruistic suicide because society’s rules more important than own life e.g. Suti-Hindu widows commit suicide
Too little intergration-egiostic suicide because too individualistic e.g. married men have less suicides
Too much regulation-fatalistic suicide e.g. slaves commit suicide
Too little regulation-anomic suicide because of a lack of anomie/lack of norms e.g. the economic depression because of the Paris exchange collapse
2. Other Positivists
Theory right, method wrong e.g. didn’t differentiate between variable so extraneous
3. Popper-followers Gibbs and Martin
Concepts too vague to test and account for all possibilities
4. Interactionists
Statistics actually due to the meanings and motives of the coroner e.g. may not want to harm family
5. Phenomenology (Atkinson)
Rates created by coroners e.g. 5 Danish and 4 English coroners saw same 40 case studies and Danes-29 suicides, UK-19
6. Scientific Realism (Taylor)
Coroners created due to history of mental illness, social failure and court representation
Could have been inner directed e.g. submissive (give-up) or thanitation (leave it to chance to decide) or alternatively directed e.g. an appeal for attention (parasuicide-didn’t mean to kill self) or a sacrifice, for revenge
