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Sociology

<OpenstaxFigure id="import-auto-id1169034221472" src="https://openstax.org/apps/archive/20240226.174525/resources/574802ad7a7103d744167d28436ffd60d7781ce2" alt="A large group of people surround a body of water. Several people are in the water." mediaType="image/jpg" width="1000" height="667" />
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	Figure 15.3 Functionalists believe religion meets many important needs for people, including group cohesion and companionship. Hindu pilgrims come from far away to Ram Kund, a holy place in the city of Nashik, India. One of the rituals performed is intended to bring salvation to the souls of people who have passed away. What need is this practice fulfilling? (Credit: Arian Zwegers/flickr)
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	Modern-day sociologists often apply one of three major theoretical perspectives. These views offer different lenses through which to study and understand society: functionalism, symbolic interactionism, and conflict theory. Let’s explore how scholars applying these paradigms understand religion.
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<OpenstaxH3>Functionalism</OpenstaxH3>
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	Functionalists contend that religion serves several functions in society. Religion, in fact, depends on society for its existence, value, and significance, and vice versa. From this perspective, religion serves several purposes, like providing answers to spiritual mysteries, offering emotional comfort, and creating a place for social interaction and social control.
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	In providing answers, religion defines the spiritual world and spiritual forces, including divine beings. For example, it helps answer questions like, “How was the world created?” “Why do we suffer?” “Is there a plan for our lives?” and “Is there an afterlife?” As another function, religion provides emotional comfort in times of crisis. Religious rituals bring order, comfort, and organization through shared familiar symbols and patterns of behavior. 
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	One of the most important functions of religion, from a functionalist perspective, is the opportunities it creates for social interaction and the formation of groups. It provides social support and social networking and offers a place to meet others who hold similar values and a place to seek help (spiritual and material) in times of need. Moreover, it can foster group cohesion and integration. Because religion can be central to many people’s concept of themselves, sometimes there is an “in-group” versus “out-group” feeling toward other religions in our society or within a particular practice. On an extreme level, the Inquisition, the Salem witch trials, and anti-Semitism are all examples of this dynamic. Finally, religion promotes social control: It reinforces social norms such as appropriate styles of dress, following the law, and regulating sexual behavior.
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<OpenstaxH3>Conflict Theory</OpenstaxH3>
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	Conflict theorists view religion as an institution that helps maintain patterns of social inequality. For example, the Vatican has a tremendous amount of wealth, while the average income of Catholic parishioners is small. According to this perspective, religion has been used to support the “divine right” of oppressive monarchs and to justify unequal social structures, like India’s caste system.
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	Conflict theorists are critical of the way many religions promote the idea that believers should be satisfied with existing circumstances because they are divinely ordained. This power dynamic has been used by Christian institutions for centuries to keep poor people poor and to teach them that they shouldn’t be concerned with what they lack because their “true” reward (from a religious perspective) will come after death. Conflict theorists also point out that those in power in a religion are often able to dictate practices, rituals, and beliefs through their interpretation of religious texts or via proclaimed direct communication from the divine. 
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<OpenstaxFigure id="import-auto-id1169034221473" src="https://openstax.org/apps/archive/20240226.174525/resources/79be521ee6a51e059e3d8e5a63f929e8b1bebad6" alt="About a half-dozen older men wearing Roman Catholic priestly garb are shown from the shoulders up." mediaType="image/jpg" width="800" height="533" />
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	Figure 15.4 Many religions, including the Catholic faith, have long prohibited women from becoming spiritual leaders. Feminist theorists focus on gender inequality and promote leadership roles for women in religion. (Credit: Wikimedia Commons)
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	The feminist perspective is a conflict theory view that focuses specifically on gender inequality. In terms of religion, feminist theorists assert that, although women are typically the ones to socialize children into a religion, they have traditionally held very few positions of power within religions. A few religions and religious denominations are more gender equal, but male dominance remains the norm of most. 
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	<OpenstaxNoteTitle> Sociology in the Real World </OpenstaxNoteTitle> <OpenstaxH3> Rational Choice Theory: Can Economic Theory Be Applied to Religion? </OpenstaxH3>
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		How do people decide which religion to follow, if any? How does one pick a church or decide which denomination “fits” best? Rational choice theory (RCT) is one way social scientists have attempted to explain these behaviors. The theory proposes that people are self-interested, though not necessarily selfish, and that people make rational choices—choices that can reasonably be expected to maximize positive outcomes while minimizing negative outcomes. Sociologists Roger Finke and Rodney Stark (1988) first considered the use of RCT to explain some aspects of religious behavior, with the assumption that there is a basic human need for religion in terms of providing belief in a supernatural being, a sense of meaning in life, and belief in life after death. Religious explanations of these concepts are presumed to be more satisfactory than scientific explanations, which may help to account for the continuation of strong religious connectedness in countries such as the United States, despite predictions of some competing theories for a great decline in religious affiliation due to modernization and religious pluralism.
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		Another assumption of RCT is that religious organizations can be viewed in terms of “costs” and “rewards.” Costs are not only monetary requirements, but are also the time, effort, and commitment demands of any particular religious organization. Rewards are the intangible benefits in terms of belief and satisfactory explanations about life, death, and the supernatural, as well as social rewards from membership. RCT proposes that, in a pluralistic society with many religious options, religious organizations will compete for members, and people will choose between different churches or denominations in much the same way they select other consumer goods, balancing costs and rewards in a rational manner. In this framework, RCT also explains the development and decline of churches, denominations, sects, and even cults; this limited part of the very complex RCT theory is the only aspect well supported by research data. 
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		Critics of RCT argue that it doesn’t fit well with human spiritual needs, and many sociologists disagree that the costs and rewards of religion can even be meaningfully measured or that individuals use a rational balancing process regarding religious affiliation. The theory doesn’t address many aspects of religion that individuals may consider essential (such as faith) and further fails to account for agnostics and atheists who don’t seem to have a similar need for religious explanations. Critics also believe this theory overuses economic terminology and structure and point out that terms such as “rational” and “reward” are unacceptably defined by their use; they would argue that the theory is based on faulty logic and lacks external, empirical support. A scientific explanation for <OpenstaxEm>why</OpenstaxEm> something occurs can’t reasonably be supported by the fact that it <OpenstaxEm>does</OpenstaxEm> occur. RCT is widely used in economics and to a lesser extent in criminal justice, but the application of RCT in explaining the religious beliefs and behaviors of people and societies is still being debated in sociology today. 
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<OpenstaxH3>Symbolic Interactionism</OpenstaxH3>
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	Rising from the concept that our world is socially constructed, symbolic interactionism studies the symbols and interactions of everyday life. To interactionists, beliefs and experiences are not sacred unless individuals in a society regard them as sacred. The Star of David in Judaism, the cross in Christianity, and the crescent and star in Islam are examples of sacred symbols. Interactionists are interested in what these symbols communicate. Because interactionists study one-on-one, everyday interactions between individuals, a scholar using this approach might ask questions focused on this dynamic. The interaction between religious leaders and practitioners, the role of religion in the ordinary components of everyday life, and the ways people express religious values in social interactions—all might be topics of study to an interactionist. 
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<OpenstaxFigure id="import-auto-id1672555" src="https://openstax.org/apps/archive/20240226.174525/resources/dc692508936b020d5c25c9178726dd7b9eee1471" alt="The symbols of 14 religions are depicted in a circle around the edge of an illustration of Earth, with North America and part of South America visible. The Earth illustration is shown sitting in the middle of a starry sky." mediaType="image/jpg" width="461" height="467" />
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	Figure 15.5 The symbols of fourteen religions are depicted here. In no particular order, they represent Judaism, Wicca, Taoism, Christianity, Confucianism, Baha’i, Druidism, Islam, Hinduism, Zoroastrianism, Shinto, Jainism, Sikhism, and Buddhism. Can you match the symbol to the religion? What might a symbolic interactionist make of these symbols? (Credit: ReligiousTolerance.org)
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15.1.2 Theoretical Perspectives on Religion

1 An Introduction to Sociology

1.1 What Is Sociology?

1.1.1 What Are Society and Culture?

1.1.2 Studying Patterns: How Sociologists View Society

1.1.3 Studying Part and Whole: How Sociologists View Social Structures

1.2 The History of Sociology

1.2.1 Creating a Discipline: European Theorists

1.2.2 Applying the Discipline: American Theorists and Practitioners

1.3 Theoretical Perspectives in Sociology

1.3.1 Functionalism

1.3.2 Conflict Theory

1.3.3 Symbolic Interactionist Theory

1.3.4 Sociological Theory Today

1.4 Why Study Sociology?

1.4.1 Sociology and a Better Society

1.4.2 Sociology in the Workplace

2 Sociological Research

2.1 Approaches to Sociological Research

2.1.1 The Scientific Method

2.1.2 Interpretive Framework

2.1.3 Critical Sociology

2.2 Research Methods

2.2.1 Surveys

2.2.2 Field Research

2.2.3 Experiments

2.2.4 Secondary Data Analysis

2.3 Ethical Concerns

3 Culture

3.1 What Is Culture?

3.1.1 Cultural Universals

3.1.2 Ethnocentrism and Cultural Relativism

3.2 Elements of Culture

3.2.1 Values and Beliefs

3.2.2 Norms

3.2.3 Symbols and Culture

3.2.4 Language and Symbols

3.2.5 Language and Culture

3.3 High, Low, Pop, Sub, Counter-culture and Cultural Change

3.3.1 High, Low, and Popular Culture

3.3.2 Subculture and Counterculture

3.3.3 Cultural Change

3.4 Theoretical Perspectives on Culture

4 Society and Social Interaction

4.1 Types of Societies

4.1.1 Preindustrial Societies

4.1.2 Industrial Society

4.1.3 Postindustrial Society

4.2 Theoretical Perspectives on Society

4.2.1 Émile Durkheim and Functionalism

4.2.2 Karl Marx and Conflict Theory

4.2.3 Max Weber and Symbolic Interactionism

4.3 Social Constructions of Reality

4.3.1 Roles and Status

4.3.2 Presentation of Self

5 Socialization

5.1 Theories of Self-Development

5.1.1 Psychological Perspectives on Self-Development

5.1.2 Sociological Theories of Self-Development

5.2 Why Socialization Matters

5.2.1 Nature versus Nurture

5.3 Agents of Socialization

5.3.1 Social Group Agents

5.3.2 Institutional Agents

5.4 Socialization Across the Life Course

5.4.1 Resocialization

6 Groups and Organization

6.1 Types of Groups

6.1.1 Defining a Group

6.1.2 Types of Groups

6.1.3 In-Groups and Out-Groups

6.1.4 Reference Groups

6.2 Group Size and Structure

6.2.1 Dyads, Triads, and Large Groups

6.2.2 Group Leadership

6.2.3 Conformity

6.2.4 The Bystander Effect and Diffusion of Responsibility

6.3 Formal Organizations

6.3.1 Types of Formal Organizations

6.3.2 The McDonaldization of Society

7 Deviance, Crime, and Social Control

7.1 Deviance and Control

7.1.1 Deviance, Crime, and Society

7.1.2 Social Control

7.2 Theoretical Perspectives on Deviance and Crime

7.2.1 Functionalism

7.2.2 Conflict Theory

7.2.3 Symbolic Interactionism

7.3 Crime and the Law

7.3.1 Types of Crimes

7.3.2 Crime Statistics

7.3.3 Public Perception of Crime

7.3.4 The U.S. Criminal Justice System

8 Media and Technology

8.1 Technology Today

8.1.1 What Is Technology?

8.2 Media and Technology in Society

8.2.1 Categorizing Technology

8.2.2 Types of Media and Technology

8.2.3 Product Advertising and the Attention Economy