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Social Structure
Chapter 4
Truth or Fiction?
 An individual’s statuses and roles are limited an
unchanging
 TRUE: Individuals cannot affect the statuses and roles
into which they are born
 FALSE: Individuals will take on many different statuses
and roles throughout the course of their lives
Truth or Fiction
 Informal interaction has little effect on the
functioning of formal organizations
 TRUE: There are few or no informal interactions in
formal organizations
 FALSE: Although formal organizations are dominated by
formal interactions, informal interactions have a strong
influence on these organizations as well
Building Blocks of Social Structure
 Society is made up of
interrelated parts
 Social structure gives us
enduring characteristics
 Makes patterns of human
activity predictable
Building Blocks
 Social Structure: network of
interrelated statuses and roles
that guide human interaction
 Status: socially defined
position in a group or in a
society
 Role: the behavior-the rights
and obligations-expected of
someone occupying a
particular status
Status
 We can hold multiple statuses
 Male, on, brother, teacher, American, etc.
 Statuses help define where we fit in society and how
we relate to each other
Ascribed and Achieved Status
 We can control some statuses, some we cannot
 Ascribed status: assigned status according to
qualities beyond a person’s control
 Not based on abilities, efforts, or accomplishments
 Inherited traits or assigned at an age
 Teenager/adult/retired
 Achieved status: status through direct efforts
 Skills, knowledge, or abilities
Master Status
 We all have many statuses…but we rank one the
most important
 Master status: status that plays the greatest role in
shaping our life and determines social identity
 Achieved or ascribed
 Changes over lifetime
Roles
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Statuses serve as social categories
Roles bring statuses to life
You occupy a status, you play a role
You play roles associated with your status
Reciprocal roles: roles that define the patterns of
interaction between related statuses
 In order to be a husband…you need a wife
 Doctor/patient, athlete/coach, boss/employee, etc.
Role Expectations and Performance
 Role Expectations: socially determined behaviors
expected of a person performing a role
 Parents: love and protect their children
 Doctor: treat patients with care
 Role performance: actual role behavior
 Doesn’t always match expected behavior
Role Conflict/Strain
 It’s possible we have multiple roles to play in one
status
 Different roles attached to a single status is a role set
 Possible contradictory expectations within/between
role sets
 Role conflict: occurs when fulfilling the role
expectations of one status makes it difficult to fulfill
the role expectations of another.
 Doctor/Parent
Role Conflict/Strain
 Role strain: occurs when a person has difficulty
meeting the role expectations of a single status
 Coach making team practice long hours to win
Social Institutions
 When statuses and roles are organized to satisfy one
or more of the basic needs of society, the group is
called a social institution
 Providing physical and emotional support, transmitting
knowledge, producing goods and services, and
maintaining social control
4.2 Types of Social Interaction
 Name some ways we interact
 5 common ways we interact: exchange, competition,
conflict, cooperation, and accommodation
Exchange
 When we interact to receive a reward or return for
our actions that is an exchange
 Suggested as the most basic and common interaction
 Reciprocity: the idea that if you do something for
someone, they owe you something in return
 Basis for exchange
 Rewards may be material and nonmaterial
 Exchange theory: ppl are motivated by self-interest
in their interactions with other people
Competition
 What is competition?
 Competition: occurs when 2 or more ppl or groups
oppose each other to achieve a goal that only one
can attain
 Promotes many advancements; business, school, gov’t
 As long as comp follows accepted rules of
conduct…mostly seen as positive
 Negative aspects: stress, inequality, conflict, lack of
cooperation
Conflict
 Competition we focus on achieving the goal
 Conflict we focus on defeating the opponent
 Conflict: deliberate attempt to control a person by
force, oppose someone, or to harm someone
 Few rules of conduct, most are ignored anyway
 4 sources of conflict: wars, disagreements w/in
groups, legal disputes, and clashes over ideology
 Religion, ideology, politics
 Businesses, loyalty, social change
Cooperation
 What does it mean to cooperate?
 Football team, fans, band…shared win
 Cooperation: 2 or more people or groups work
together to achieve a goal that will benefit multiple
people
Accommodation
 Many of our interactions we neither cooperate nor
have conflict.
 What do you think we do^^^^^^^^^^?
 Accommodation: state of balance between
cooperation and conflict
 Hotel stay
 Compromise
 Mediation
4.3 Types of Societies
 Role behavior often takes place in
groups
 Group: set of people who interact on
the basis of shared expectations and
who possess some degree of common
identity
 Largest/complex groups are societies
 Sociologists classify societies according
to:
 Subsistence strategies: the way a
society uses technology to provide for
the needs of its members
Preindustrial Societies
 Preindustrial: food prod. carried out by
human and animal labor, is the main
economic activity
 Subdivisions of preindustrial societies
 Hunting & gathering: collection of wild
plants and hunting wild animals
 Nomads, small societies, relatively equal
Preindustrial Societies
 Pastoral society: rely on domesticated herd animals
to meet food needs
 Nomadic, larger societies
 Division of labor: specialization of individuals or
groups in the performance of specific economic
activities
 Craft workers, weapons, jewelry, farmer, smith
 Promotes trade = inequality
Preindustrial Societies
 Horticultural societies: fruits and vegetables grown
in a garden specifically cleared
 Crop rotation = semi/permanent settlements (villages)
 Surplus food = complex division of labor
 Craftspeople, religious leaders, traders
 Large amount of artifacts
 Economic and political systems
Preindustrial Societies
 Agricultural societies: animals are used to pull plows
to till the fields
 Plant more crops, irrigation, terracing
 High crop yields = very large populations
 Even more specialized roles
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Development of cities, power to single people
Building of armies, construction of roads, more trade
Abandon barter: exchange of good for a service
$ invented, system of writing, statuses
Industrial Societies
 Industrial societies: shift
from food production to
manufactured goods
 Machines instead of
humans
 Advanced technologies
 More food = ^ pop.
 More industry = < farmers
(focus more on goods)
Industrial Societies
 The advancements in technology make it possible to
manufacture a wider variety of goods
 Changes the location of work
 Rural farm to the cities. Urbanization: concentration of
the population in cities
 More productivity, less skill required
 Religion is challenged by science
 Freedom to compete for social positions
Postindustrial Societies
 Postindustrial: much of the economy is involved in
providing information and services
 (73% of U.S. workforce)
 2% agricultural
 25% goods production
 Standard of living is greater along with wages
 Emphasis on science and education
 Individual rights and personal fulfillment
Contrasting Societies
 Durkheim believed preindustrial societies were held
together by mechanical solidarity: when ppl share
the same values and perform the same tasks, they
become united as a common whole
 As division of labor becomes more complex, MS gives
way to organic solidarity: individuals can no longer
provide for all their own needs, they depend on
others to survive
Contrasting Societies
 Ferdinand Tönnies (German) interested in
simple/complex societies
 Gemeinschaft: close relat. Activities center around
family/community
 Gesellschaft: based on need rather than emotion.
Impersonal relationships. Individual goals > group
4.4 Groups Within Society
 Every individual in society participates in a group
 What is a group?
 A group has 4 major features:
1. 2+ people
2. Interaction among members
3. Shared expectations
4. Posses sense of common identity
 The last 3 distinguish a group from an aggregate or
social category
Groups Within Society
 Aggregate: when ppl gather in the same place at the
same time but lack organization or lasting patterns
 Ppl on an airplane, waiting for tickets, checkout
 Social Category: means of classifying people
according to a shared trait or common status
 Students, women, teenagers, left-handed people
 Groups differ in size and length of time they’re
together
Size
 Dyad: smallest group possible, 2 members
 Triad: 3 person group
 Small group: few enough members to interact face
to face
 Sociologists have found 15 is the largest #
Time
 Some groups meet once, then never again
 Some exist for many years (who would?)
 Interaction is not continuous (not 24 hours a day)
Organization
 2 types of organization
 Formal: structure, goals, and activities are clearly
defined
 Student council
 Informal: no official structure or est. rules of conduct
 Your circle of friends
Types of Groups
 Primary group: small group of people who interact
over a relatively long period of time on a direct
personal bias
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entire self of the individual is taken into account
Intimate relationships, often fact-to-face
Deep communication, often informal
Family is probably most common
Types of Groups
 Secondary group: interaction is impersonal and
temporary in nature
 Only part of the individual is involved
 Casual and limited in personal involvement
 Classroom, factory, political party
Types of Groups
 Reference group: any group with whom individuals
identify and whose attitudes and values they adopt
 Students: Friends or school clubs
 Adults: members of a particular occupation
 As we grow we change our reference groups
 Both positive and negative effects on behavior
Types of Groups
 When a groups boundaries are clearly marked, we
think in terms of in-groups and out-groups
 In-groups: group that a person belongs to and
identifies with
 Have 3 things: separate from other groups through
symbols, members view themselves positively and outgroups in negative terms, and in-groups compete with
out-groups
 Out-groups: any group a person does not belong to
or identify with
Types of Groups
 Social network: the web of relationships that is
formed by the sum total of a person’s interactions
with other people
 Direct and indirect relationships
 Unlike groups, social networks don’t have clear
boundaries and no common sense of identity
 Sense of community
Group Functions
 Must determine boundaries to determine who
belongs and who doesn’t
 Must select a leader: ppl who influence the attitudes
and opinions of others
 2 types of leaders:
 Instrumental: task-oriented. Find means that will
help the group reach its goals
 expressive: emotion-oriented. Find ways to keep the
group together and maintain moral
 Other group functions: goals, tasks, decisions
Structure of Formal Organizations
 Formal organization: large, complex, secondary
group est. to achieve specific goals
 School, business, gov’t, religious & political orgs, unions
 Bureaucracy: ranked authority structure that
operates according to specific rules and procedures
 Most formal organizations work under one
 Rationality: subjecting every feature of human
behavior to calculation, measurement and control
Weber’s Model of Bureaucracies
 According to Weber, bureaucracies have these charact.
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Division of labor
Ranking of authority
Employment based on formal qualifications
Rules and regulations
Specific lines of promotion and advancement
 Voluntary association: non-prof to purse common
interest
Effectiveness of Bureaucracies?
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Create order, define tasks/rewards, stability
Lose sight of original goals
Abandon them for self-continuation (EPA)
Strict adherent to rules/regs “Red Tape”
Tendency to end up like oligarchies
 Peter Principle