Glossary

Absolute poverty	A standard of poverty based on a minimum level of subsistence below which families should not be expected to exist. (See 198)



Achieved status	A social position attained by a person largely through his or her own efforts. (See 110, 190)



Activity theory	An interactionist theory of aging that argues that elderly people who remain active will be best-adjusted. (See 276)



Adoption	In a legal sense, a process that allows for the transfer of the legal rights, responsibilities, and privileges of parenthood to a new legal parent or parents. (See 303)



Affirmative action	Positive efforts to recruit minority group members or women for jobs, promotions, and educational opportunities. (See 233, 371)



Ageism	A term coined by Robert N. Butler to refer to prejudice and discrimination against the elderly. (See 279)



Agrarian society	The most technologically advanced form of preindustrial society. Members are primarily engaged in the production of food but increase their crop yield through such innovations as the plow. (See 121)



Alienation	The condition of being estranged or disassociated from the surrounding society. (See 141)



Amalgamation	The process by which a majority group and a minority group combine through intermarriage to form a new group. (See 236)



Anomie	Durkheim's term for the loss of direction felt in a society when social control of individual behavior has become ineffective. (See 10, 168)



Anomie theory of deviance	A theory developed by Robert Merton that explains deviance as an adaptation either of socially prescribed goals or of the norms governing their attainment, or both. (See 169)



Anticipatory socialization	Processes of socialization in which a person "rehearses" for future positions, occupations, and social relationships. (See 89)



Anti-Semitism	Anti-Jewish prejudice. (See 247)



Apartheid	The former policy of the South African government designed to maintain the separation of Blacks and other non-Whites from the dominant Whites. (See 237)



Argot	Specialized language used by members of a group or subculture. (See 67)



Ascribed status	A social position "assigned" to a person by society without regard for the person's unique talents or characteristics. (See 109, 190)



Assimilation	The process by which a person forsakes his or her own cultural tradition to become part of a different culture. (See 237)



Authority	Power that has been institutionalized and is recognized by the people over whom it is exercised. (See 356)



Bilateral descent	A kinship system in which both sides of a person's family are regarded as equally important. (See 294)



Bilingualism	The use of two or more languages in particular settings, such as workplaces or educational facilities, treating each language as equally legitimate. (See 70)



Birthrate	The number of live births per 1,000 population in a given year. Also known as the crude birthrate. (See 384)



Black power	A political philosophy promoted by many younger Blacks in the 1960s that supported the creation of Black-controlled political and economic institutions. (See 240)



Bourgeoisie	Karl Marx's term for the capitalist class, comprising the owners of the means of production. (See 193)



Bureaucracy	A component of formal organization in which rules and hierarchical ranking are used to achieve efficiency. (See 140)



Bureaucratization	The process by which a group, organization, or social movement becomes increasingly bureaucratic. (See 143)



Capitalism	An economic system in which the means of production are largely in private hands and the main incentive for economic activity is the accumulation of profits. (See 193, 354)



Castes	Hereditary systems of rank, usually religiously dictated, that tend to be fixed and immobile. (See 191)



Causal logic	The relationship between a condition or variable and a particular consequence, with one event leading to the other. (See 31)



Census	An enumeration, or counting, of a population. (See 384)



Charismatic authority	Max Weber's term for power made legitimate by a leader's exceptional personal or emotional appeal to his or her followers. (See 357)



Class	A term used by Max Weber to refer to a group of people who have a similar level of wealth and income. (See 193)



Class consciousness	In Karl Marx's view, a subjective awareness held by members of a class regarding their common vested interests and need for collective political action to bring about social change. (See 193)



Classical theory	An approach to the study of formal organizations that views workers as being motivated almost entirely by economic rewards. (See 146)



Class system	A social ranking based primarily on economic position in which achieved characteristics can influence mobility. (See 191)



Closed system	A social system in which there is little or no possibility of individual mobility. (See 205)



Coalition	A temporary or permanent alliance geared toward a common goal. (See 139)



Code of ethics	The standards of acceptable behavior developed by and for members of a profession. (See 39)



Cognitive theory of development	Jean Piaget's theory explaining how children's thought progresses through four stages. (See 88)



Cohabitation	The practice of living together as a male-female couple without marrying. (See 308)



Colonialism	The maintenance of political, social, economic, and cultural dominance over a people by a foreign power for an extended period of time. (See 207)



Communism	As an ideal type, an economic system under which all property is communally owned and no social distinctions are made on the basis of people's ability to produce. (See 355)



Community	A spatial or political unit of social organization that gives people a sense of belonging, based either on shared residence in a particular place or on a common identity. (See 415)



Concentric-zone theory	A theory of urban growth that sees growth in terms of a series of rings radiating from the central business district. (See 418)



Conflict perspective	A sociological approach that assumes that social behavior is best understood in terms of conflict or tension between competing groups. (See 14)



Conformity	Going along with one's peers, individuals of a person's own status, who have no special right to direct that person's behavior. (See 160)



Contact hypothesis	An interactionist perspective that states that interracial contact between people of equal status in cooperative circumstances will reduce prejudice. (See 235)



Content analysis	The systematic coding and objective recording of data, guided by some rationale. (See 38)



Control group	Subjects in an experiment who are not introduced to the independent variable by the researcher. (See 37)



Control theory	A view of conformity and deviance that suggests that our connection to members of society leads us to systematically conform to society's norms. (See 165)



Control variable	A factor held constant to test the relative impact of an independent variable. (See 34)



Correlation	A relationship between two variables whereby a change in one coincides with a change in the other. (See 32)



Correspondence principle	A term used by Bowles and Gintis to refer to the tendency of schools to promote the values expected of individuals in each social class and to prepare students for the types of jobs typically held by members of their class. (See 337)



Counterculture	A subculture that deliberately opposes certain aspects of the larger culture. (See 68)



Creationism	A literal interpretation of the Bible regarding the creation of man and the universe used to argue that evolution should not be presented as established scientific fact. (See 344)



Crime	A violation of criminal law for which formal penalties are applied by some governmental authority. (See 174)



Cult	Due to the stereotyping, this term has been abandoned by sociologists in favor of new religious movements. (See 331)



Cultural relativism	The viewing of people's behavior from the perspective of their own culture. (See 69)



Cultural transmission	A school of criminology that argues that criminal behavior is learned through social interactions. (See 171)



Cultural universals	General practices found in every culture. (See 56, 321)



Culture	The totality of learned, socially transmitted behavior. (See 55)



Culture lag	Ogburn's term for a period of maladjustment during which the nonmaterial culture is still adapting to new material conditions. (See 58, 455)



Culture shock	The feeling of surprise and disorientation that is experienced when people witness cultural practices different from their own. (See 68)



Death rate	The number of deaths per 1,000 population in a given year. Also known as the crude death rate. (See 384)



Defended neighborhood	A neighborhood that residents identify through defined community borders and through a perception that adjacent areas are geographically separate and socially different. (See 424)



Degradation ceremony	An aspect of the socialization process within total institutions, in which people are subjected to humiliating rituals. (See 90)



Deindustrialization	The systematic, widespread withdrawal of investment in basic aspects of productivity such as factories and plants. (See 367)



Demographic transition	A term used to describe the change from high birthrates and death rates to relatively low birthrates and death rates. (See 385)



Demography	The scientific study of population. (See 381)



Denomination	A large, organized religion not officially linked with the state or government. (See 328)



Dependency theory	An approach that contends that industrialized nations continue to exploit developing countries for their own gain. (See 209)



Dependent variable	The variable in a causal relationship that is subject to the influence of another variable. (See 31)



Deviance	Behavior that violates the standards of conduct or expectations of a group or society. (See 165)



Differential association	A theory of deviance proposed by Edwin Sutherland that holds that violation of rules results from exposure to attitudes favorable to criminal acts. (See 171)



Diffusion	The process by which a cultural item is spread from group to group or society to society. (See 57)



Discovery	The process of making known or sharing the existence of an aspect of reality. Discrimination 230 The process of denying opportunities and equal rights to individuals and groups because of prejudice or other arbitrary reasons. (See 57)



Disengagement theory	A functionalist theory of aging introduced by Cumming and Henry that contends that society and the aging individual mutually sever many of their relationships. (See 275)



Domestic partnership	Two unrelated adults who have chosen to share one another's lives in a relationship of mutual caring, who reside together, and who agree to be jointly responsible for their dependents, basic living expenses, and other common necessities. (See 309)



Dominant ideology	A set of cultural beliefs and practices that helps to maintain powerful social, economic, and political interests. (See 65, 195)



Downsizing	Reductions taken in a company's workforce as part of deindustrialization. (See 368)



Dramaturgical approach	A view of social interaction, popularized by Erving Goffman, under which people are examined as if they were theatrical performers. (See 16, 86)



Dyad	A two-member group. (See 138)



Dysfunction	An element or a process of society that may disrupt a social system or lead to a decrease in stability. (See 14, 141)



Ecclesia	A religious organization that claims to include most or all of the members of a society and is recognized as the national or official religion. (See 328)



E-commerce	Numerous ways that people with access to the Internet can do business from their computers. (See 369)



Economic system	The social institution through which goods and services are produced, distributed, and consumed. (See 353)



Education	A formal process of learning in which some people consciously teach while others adopt the social role of learner. (See 321)



Egalitarian family	An authority pattern in which the adult members of the family are regarded as equals. (See 295)



Elite model	A view of society as ruled by a small group of individuals who share a common set of political and economic interests. (See 363)



Endogamy	The restriction of mate selection to people within the same group. (See 298)



Environmental justice	A legal strategy based on claims that racial minorities are subjected disproportionately to environmental hazards. (See 435)



Equilibrium model	Talcott Parsons's functionalist view of society as tending toward a state of stability or balance. (See 451)



Esteem	The reputation that a particular individual has earned within an occupation. (See 196)



Ethnic group	A group that is set apart from others because of its national origin or distinctive cultural patterns. (See 225)



Ethnocentrism	The tendency to assume that one's culture and way of life represent the norm or are superior to all others. (See 69, 229)



Ethnography	The study of an entire social setting through extended systematic observation. (See 36)



Evolutionary theory	A theory of social change that holds that society is moving in a definite direction. (See 450)



Exogamy	The requirement that people select mates outside certain groups. (See 298)



Experiment	An artificially created situation that allows the researcher to manipulate variables. (See 37)



Experimental group	Subjects in an experiment who are exposed to an independent variable introduced by a researcher. (See 37)



Exploitation theory	A Marxist theory that views racial subordination in the United States as a manifestation of the class system inherent in capitalism. (See 234)



Expressiveness	A term used by Parsons and Bales to refer to concern for maintenance of harmony and the internal emotional affairs of the family. (See 263)



Extended family	A family in which relatives-such as grandparents, aunts, or uncles-live in the same home as parents and their children. (See 293)



Face-work	A term used by Erving Goffman to refer to the efforts of people to maintain the proper image and avoid embarrassment in public. (See 86)



False consciousness	A term used by Karl Marx to describe an attitude held by members of a class that does not accurately reflect its objective position. (See 193, 449)



Familism	Pride in the extended family, expressed through the maintenance of close ties and strong obligations to kinfolk. (See 301)



Family	A set of people related by blood, marriage (or some other agreed-upon relationship), or adoption who share the primary responsibility for reproduction and caring for members of society. (See 291)



Fertility	The amount of reproduction among women of childbearing age. (See 381)



Folkways	Norms governing everyday social behavior whose violation raises comparatively little concern. (See 62)



Force	The actual or threatened use of coercion to impose one's will on others. (See 356)



Formal norms	Norms that generally have been written down and that specify strict rules for punishment of violators. (See 61)



Formal organization	A special-purpose group designed and structured for maximum efficiency. (See 140)



Formal social control	Social control carried out by authorized agents, such as police officers, judges, school administrators, and employers. (See 163)



Functionalist perspective	A sociological approach that emphasizes the way that parts of a society are structured to maintain its stability. (See 13)



Gemeinschaft	A term used by Ferdinand Tönnies to describe close-knit communities, often found in rural areas, in which strong personal bonds unite members. (See 119)



Gender roles	Expectations regarding the proper behavior, attitudes, and activities of males and females. (See 91, 259)



Generalized others	A term used by George Herbert Mead to refer to the child's awareness of the attitudes, viewpoints, and expectations of society as a whole that a child takes into account in his or her behavior. (See 85)



Genocide	The deliberate, systematic killing of an entire people or nation. (See 236)



Gentrification	The resettlement of low-income city neighborhoods by prosperous families and business firms. (See 437)



Gerontology	The scientific study of the sociological and psychological aspects of aging and the problems of the aged. (See 275)



Gesellschaft	A term used by Ferdinand Tönnies to describe communities, often urban, that are large and impersonal with little commitment to the group or consensus on values. (See 120)



Glass ceiling	An invisible barrier that blocks the promotion of a qualified individual in a work environment because of the individual's gender, race, or ethnicity. (See 232, 268)



Goal displacement	Overzealous conformity to official regulations within a bureaucracy. (See 142)



Group	Any number of people with similar norms, values, and expectations who interact with one another on a regular basis. (See 113, 135)



Growth rate	The difference between births and deaths, plus the difference between immigrants and emigrants, per 1,000 population. (See 384)



Hawthorne effect	The unintended influence that observers or experiments can have on their subjects. (See 38)



Health	As defined by the World Health Organization, a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being, and not merely the absence of disease and infirmity. (See 391)



Health maintenance organizations (HMOs)	Organizations that provide comprehensive medical services for a preestablished fee. (See 407)



Hidden curriculum	Standards of behavior that are deemed proper by society and are taught subtly in schools. (See 336)



Holistic medicine	A means of health maintenance using therapies in which the health care practitioner considers the person's physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual characteristics. (See 402)



Homophobia	Fear of and prejudice against homosexuality. (See 125, 260)



Horizontal mobility	The movement of an individual from one social position to another of the same rank. (See 205)



Horticultural societies	Preindustrial societies in which people plant seeds and crops rather than subsist merely on available foods. (See 121)



Human ecology	An area of study concerned with the interrelationships between people and their spatial setting and physical environment. (See 418)



Human relations approach	An approach to the study of formal organizations that emphasizes the role of people, communication, and participation within a bureau-cracy and tends to focus on the informal structure of the organization. (See 146)



Hunting-and-gathering society	A preindustrial society in which people rely on whatever foods and fiber are readily available in order to live. (See 121)



Hypothesis	A speculative statement about the relationship between two or more variables. (See 31)



Ideal type	A construct or model that serves as a measuring rod against which specific cases can be evaluated. (See 10, 141)



Impression management	A term used by Erving Goffman to refer to the altering of the presentation of the self in order to create distinctive appearances and satisfy particular audiences. (See 86)



Incest taboo	The prohibition of sexual relationships between certain culturally specified relatives. (See 298)



Incidence	The number of new cases of a specific disorder occurring within a given population during a stated period of time. (See 396)



Income	Salaries and wages. (See 190)



Independent variable	The variable in a causal relationship that, when altered, causes or influences a change in a second variable. (See 31)



Industrial city	A city characterized by relatively large size, open competition, an open class system, and elaborate specialization in the manufacturing of goods. (See 417)



Industrial society	A society that depends on mechanization to produce its economic goods and services. (See 122, 353)



Infant mortality rate	The number of deaths of infants under one year of age per 1,000 live births in a given year. (See 384)



Influence	The exercise of power through a process of persuasion. Informal norms 61 Norms that generally are understood but are not precisely recorded. (See 356)



Informal social control	Social control carried out by people casually through such means as laughter, smiles, and ridicule. (See 163)



In-group	Any group or category to which people feel they belong. (See 136)



Innovation	The process of introducing new elements into a culture through either discovery or invention. (See 57)



Institutional discrimination	The denial of opportunities and equal rights to individuals and groups that results from the normal operations of a society. (See 232, 266)



Instrumentality	A term used by Parsons and Bales to refer to emphasis on tasks, focus on more distant goals, and a concern for the external relationship between one's family and other social institutions. (See 263)



Interactionist perspective	A sociological approach that generalizes about fundamental or everyday forms of social interaction. (See 16)



Interest group	A voluntary association of citizens who attempt to influence public policy. (See 363)



Intergenerational mobility	Changes in the social position of children relative to their parents. (See 205)



Interview	A face-to-face or telephone questioning of a respondent to obtain desired information. (See 36)



Intragenerational mobility	Changes in a person's social position within his or her adult life. (See 205)



Invention	The combination of existing cultural items into a form that did not previously exist. (See 57)



Iron law of oligarchy	A principle of organizational life developed by Robert Michels under which even democratic organizations will become bureaucracies ruled by a few individuals. (See 144)



Issei	The early Japanese immigrants to the United States. (See 244)



Kinship	The state of being related to others. (See 294)



Labeling theory	An approach to deviance that attempts to explain why certain people are viewed as deviants while others engaging in the same behavior are not. (See 172)



Laissez-faire	A form of capitalism under which people compete freely, with minimal government intervention in the economy. (See 354)



Language	An abstract system of word meanings and symbols for all aspects of culture. It also includes gestures and other nonverbal communication. (See 58)



Latent functions	Unconscious or unintended functions; hidden purposes. (See 14)



Law	Governmental social control. (See 61, 164)



Legal-rational authority	Max Weber's term for power made legitimate by law. (See 357)



Liberation theology	Use of a church, primarily Roman Catholicism, in a political effort to eliminate poverty, discrimination, and other forms of injustice evident in a secular society. (See 325)



Life chances	Max Weber's term for people's opportunities to provide themselves with material goods, positive living conditions, and favorable life experiences. (See 202)



Life expectancy	The average number of years a person can be expected to live under current mortality conditions. (See 384)



Looking-glass self	A concept used by Charles Horton Cooley that emphasizes the self as the product of our social interactions with others. (See 84)



Luddites	Rebellious craft workers in nineteenth-century England who destroyed new factory machinery as part of their resistance to the industrial revolution. (See 455)



Machismo	A sense of virility, personal worth, and pride in one's maleness. (See 301)



Macrosociology	Sociological investigation that concentrates on large-scale phenomena or entire civilizations. (See 13)



Manifest functions	Open, stated, and conscious functions. (See 14)



Master status	A status that dominates others and thereby determines a person's general position within society. (See 110)



Material culture	The physical or technological aspects of our daily lives. (See 58)



Matriarchy	A society in which women dominate in family decision making. (See 295)



Matrilineal descent	A kinship system that favors the relatives of the mother. (See 294)



McDonaldization	The process by which the principles of the fast-food restaurant have come to dominate certain sectors of society, both in the United States and throughout the world. (See 135)



Megachurches	Large worship centers affiliated only loosely, if at all, with existing denominations. (See 329)



Megalopolis	A densely populated area containing two or more cities and their surrounding suburbs. (See 418)



Microsociology	Sociological investigation that stresses study of small groups and often uses laboratory experimental studies. (See 13)



Minority group	A subordinate group whose members have significantly less control or power over their own lives than the members of a dominant or majority group have over theirs. (See 225)



Modernization	The far-reaching process by which a society moves from traditional or less developed institutions to those characteristic of more developed societies. (See 211)



Modernization theory	A functionalist approach that proposes that modernization and development will gradually improve the lives of people in peripheral nations. (See 211)



Monogamy	A form of marriage in which one woman and one man are married only to each other. (See 293)



Monopoly	Control of a market by a single business firm. (See 354)



Morbidity rates	The incidence of diseases in a given population. (See 396)



Mores	Norms deemed highly necessary to the welfare of a society. (See 62)



Mortality rate	The incidence of death in a given population. (See 396)



Multilinear evolutionary theory	A theory of social change that holds that change can occur in several ways and does not inevitably lead in the same direction. (See 451)



Multinational corporations	Commercial organizations that are headquartered in one country but do business throughout the world. (See 209)



Multiple-nuclei theory	A theory of urban growth that views growth as emerging from many centers of development, each of which may reflect a particular urban need or activity. (See 421)



Natural science	The study of the physical features of nature and the ways in which they interact and change. (See 6)



Negotiated order	A social structure that derives its existence from the social interactions through which people define and redefine its character. (See 109)



Negotiation	The attempt to reach agreement with others concerning some objective. (See 108)



Neocolonialism	Continuing dependence of former colonies on foreign countries. (See 207)



New religious movement (NRM) or cult	A generally small, secretive religious group that represents either a new religion or a major innovation of an existing faith. (See 331)



New social movements	Organized collective activities that promote autonomy and self-determination as well as improvements in the quality of life. (See 450)



New urban sociology	An approach to urbanization that considers the interplay of local, national, and worldwide forces and their effect on local space, with special emphasis on the impact of global economic activity. (See 421)



Nisei	Japanese born in the United States who were descendants of the Issei. (See 244)



Nonmaterial culture	Cultural adjustments to material conditions, such as customs, beliefs, patterns of communication, and ways of using material objects. (See 58)



Nonverbal communication	The sending of messages through the use of posture, facial expressions, and gestures. (See 16)



Normal accidents	Failures that are inevitable, given the manner in which human and technological systems are organized. (See 461)



Norms	Established standards of behavior maintained by a society. (See 61)



Nuclear family	A married couple and their unmarried children living together. (See 291)



Obedience	Compliance with higher authorities in a hierarchical structure. (See 160)



Objective method	A technique for measuring social class that assigns individuals to classes on the basis of criteria such as occupation, education, income, and place of residence. (See 196)



Observation	A research technique in which an investigator collects information through direct participation in and/or observation of a group, tribe, or community. (See 36)



Open system	A social system in which the position of each individual is influenced by his or her achieved status. (See 205)



Operational definition	An explanation of an abstract concept that is specific enough to allow a researcher to measure the concept. (See 30)



Organized crime	The work of a group that regulates relations between various criminal enterprises involved in the smuggling and sale of drugs, prostitution, gambling, and other activities. (See 175)



Out-group	A group or category to which people feel they do not belong. (See 136, 175)



Patriarchy	A society in which men dominate family decision making. (See 295)



Patrilineal descent	A kinship system that favors the relatives of the father. (See 294)



Personality	In everyday speech, a person's typical patterns of attitudes, needs, characteristics, and behavior. (See 81)