Research Project Overview

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Research Project Step by Step Overview

I.  Introduction. 
Expectations include:

• Explain what you are attempting to study and why.
• Explain your research in the form of a question.
• Explain how the topic connects to sociology (1b)

1a. Identify what you’d like to study.  Brainstorm topic ideas.  What topics are you interested in?  Can you frame your interest into the form of a question?  Why are you interested in this topic?  Were you inspired by research that we read in class or some other source or something from your own life?   Brainstorm ideas.

1b. Focus the topic sociologically:   What group/people are you attempting to study?  Are you interested in studying how this creates and reinforces social norms and stability?  Are you interested in how this creates social inequality?  Are you interested in how this creates meaning between people – either values, norms, etc.? 

II.  Literature review.   
Expectations for your literature review include:

• Citing sociological sources
• Consulting several sources
• Explaining the distinct claims that the authors make 

In order to exceeding expectations, students should structure the literature review around different concepts/ideas by writing about an idea and then explaining how various sources connect to the idea  (This is as opposed to structuring the literature review around the sources and simply writing about each source and the ideas in it).

2a. Key terms/words/phrases.

Make a list of search terms for your topic. 

2b. Search the terms

Methodically research what has been published about your topic already. Keep track of which search terms reveal which results.  This is a gathering info phase - you should not be spending too much time reading articles yet.

    

1.  Also use the “The Society Pages,” a website of sociology resources, especially Discoveries page, and on the Contexts page, the In Brief section.

2.  Use academic sociology journal articles.  The SHS ILC database JSTOR will be especially helpful here.JSTOR, an online database that you can search by subject. Go to the SHS Library online where you can login to JSTOR under "Academic Journals". Click here to go directly to JSTOR Advanced search. Once you are logged on, scroll down to select "sociology" then search any subject you would like.

3.  Google search “sociology” and the relevant terms.  Carefully select sources from here based on the source info.

Make a list of the sources that seem relevant which you find with each set of search terms.

2c.  Review the Literature

Once you have gathered the research that is available, read through the most relevant sources.  Note the citation information for each relevant article you study. You should add each article to a bibliography and annotate/summarize these articles.  What does the source say about your topic? 

2d.  Write your literature review. 

In your research project, you should make sense of the background research you find.  You might want to start with an outline that organizes what you found.  How does the research fit together?  What story does the research tell?  What information is left out of the previous literature?

III.  Conclusion or Hypothesis 
Expectations include:
Having a thorough conclusion or hypothesis that addresses your original question(I) in light of the research you find in your background literature review (II).

After making sense of the literature review, write either a conclusion or hypothesis about what the answer to your original question is.  Your conclusion or hypothesis should include operational definitions.  What exactly was the conclusion?  What exactly did the research study?  For example, if you are studying "violence" in the "media", how did the researchers define "violence"?  What counts as violence?  What counts as media?  What was specifically studied?

3a.  Conclusion:  If you find research that answers your question, explain what what did you conclude?  Why?  And what sources were most helpful?

3b.  Hypothesis: If it is a hypothesis, include an explanation about what you think the answer to your question might be and how the research supports that, even if it is indirectly supporting it.

IV. Moving Forward: Propose Research, Do Research or Propose Policy Changes.

This last section should explain, based on your research, what to do next to understand your topic.  You can explain what research still should be done and why and how.  This can be considered a research proposal.  Basically, you are suggestion what research should be done next.   Second, you may actually conduct research using some of the accessible data on my blog page or even gather your own research through surveys or interviews or qualitative methods.  A third option for this section is proposing policy changes for addressing your topic.  What should be done by individuals or institutions to address the problem that your research studied.  

V.  Citations: Have a Bibliography (or footnotes if you prefer).
You should cite your research in your document.  Do not be afraid to cite other research.  This is the point of the literature review!  You can cite either within your writing or in parenthesis after the research you cite.  These citations might be either direct quotes or just ideas that are paraphrased.  Either way, you should be sure to cite these both.  Citations should include author and date within the paper and then in a bibliography at the end, include the whole citation.  There is an ASA format, but I don't mind if you use MLA or whatever you are familiar with, just be consistent.  Below is a picture of in-text citations and the bibliography page.

Here is an example of a literature review from one of my students.



Here is a second example.

Hello Class; Introducing Social Class

Last unit we saw that people are shaped by the structures of society.  Family, school, peers, media all have profound effects on who we become.  This unit, we will see that these structures also create inequalities.  Often, these inequalities are overlooked because the dominant groups and structures look past these inqualities.  The first type of inequality we will examine is social class.

Brief Background of Social Class in Sociology

As sociology began to coalesce as a discipline in the 1800s, the changes of the industrial revolution created large disparities in health and income.  As we learned about the sociological perspective in unit 1, we saw the examination of inequalities was the focus for early scholars of sociology.

Karl Marx and the Inequalities of Capitalism

Marx studied these disparities and wrote about them.  For example, Marx points out that middle-class persons lived an average of 38 years, but laborers only made it 17 years.  Marx also wrote about earlier class systems such as feudalism and slavery.  His paradigm was focused on who owned the industries of the 1800s and who were the workers in those industries.  

Max Weber and Three-Component Social Class

Following Marx, Weber wrote about social class just before WWI.  Weber argued that social class was composed of multiple components, namely wealth, prestige and power.

Pierre Bourdieu and the Cultural and Social Reproduction of Class

Later still, in 1977 Pierre Bourdieu wrote "Cultural Reproduction and Social Reproduction" which was a study of French educational system.  Bourdieu made the claim that social class involves hidden assets that sustain one's class such as education, style of speech, how to dress, as well as how to conduct oneself to fit into a class system.   

Annette Lareau and Social Class, Race and Education 

In 1989, Annette Lareau published a seminal study that examined American education and social class and race. Here is an explanation from Lareau's publisher,

Class does make a difference in the lives and futures of American children. Drawing on in-depth observations of black and white middle-class, working-class, and poor families, Unequal Childhoods explores this fact, offering a picture of childhood today. Here are the frenetic families managing their children's hectic schedules of "leisure" activities; and here are families with plenty of time but little economic security. Lareau shows how middle-class parents, whether black or white, engage in a process of "concerted cultivation" designed to draw out children's talents and skills, while working-class and poor families rely on "the accomplishment of natural growth," in which a child's development unfolds spontaneously―as long as basic comfort, food, and shelter are provided. Each of these approaches to childrearing brings its own benefits and its own drawbacks. In identifying and analyzing differences between the two, Lareau demonstrates the power, and limits, of social class in shaping the lives of America's children.

Here is Lareau from the Stanford Center for Inequality:



And here is an Atlantic article (2012) explaining Lareau's research.

Summary
So this is the background with which sociologists approach social class.  Social class is complex and made up of various components that interconnect with each other.  These various components create opportunities and obstacles for the members of a society.  Not only does social class affect people's life chances, it also affects how people experience the world; it constructs their reality.

Social Class (inequality) in the USA by comparison

Sometimes we forget how fortunate we are relative to the rest of the world because the media is saturated with stories of the super wealthy. Here is a website that will rank you among the WORLD's population. That should provide some perspective as to how lucky we are.

However, relative to other Westernized modern countries, the US does not look so equal.  In fact, the inequality in the USA is closer to China, Mexico, Venezuela and Argentina and even Cuba!

This map shows the inequality present in countries around the world. The bluer countries are more equal and the more red are less equal:Notice how many countries are more equal than the United States.

And here is a post showing that the US has gotten more unequal over the past several decades.

 Here is another blog's post about the growing inequality in the U.S.

Here is a post from the Society Pages about the damaging effects of income inequality.

Here are a host of facts about inequality from inequality.org

Implicit Bias

Besides being explicit, biases can be implicit too.  Prejudices and stereotypes exist in our subconscious.  These hidden biases are called implicit bias.  Although implicit bias can be about myriad topics (gender, occupation, age), it can also promote racism.  Here is an explanation from Teaching Tolerance:

While the brain isn’t wired to be racist, it uses biases as unconscious defensive shortcuts.
As human beings, we are not naturally racist. But because of the way our brains are wired, we are naturally "groupist." The brain has a strong need for relatedness.
This wiring for “groupism” usually leads the dominant culture (the in-group) in a race-based society to create “out-groups” based on race, gender, language and sexual orientation. A system of inequity is maintained by negative social messages that dehumanize people of color, women and LGBT people as “the other.” For folks in the in-group, the brain takes in these messages and downloads them like software into the brain’s fear system. This leads to implicit bias: the unconscious attitudes and beliefs that shape our behavior toward someone perceived as inferior or as a threatening outsider.

Look at the following pictures and captions which both appeared in the press after Hurricane Katrina.

How does this represent implicit bias from the editor?

How does this promote implicit bias in society?


Police Surveillance and Implicit Bias from the Sociologist Toolbox
Here are a number of other examples (A NY Police Lt., Harvard U. President, State Senator Obama)


A Girl Like Me

Watch the following video and explain what evidence it provides that explicit bias exists and promotes racism and implicit bias exists and promotes racism.



What evidence does the video provide that explicit bias exists and promotes racism?

What evidence does the video provide that implicit bias exists and promotes racism?

The Police Officer's Dilemma from University of Colorado at Boulder

And another example of implicit bias is from the University of Chicago's Joshua Corell who showed how people react in a split second when they confront someone with a weapon. Soc Images explains it here.  See here for a link to the game and conclusions.

The Kirwan Institute from The Ohio State University

The Ohio State University does extensive research on implicit bias through their Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity.

The institute publishes a yearly review of the state of implicit bias research.  You can find that here.

Kirwan Institute and Medicine

Kirwan's 2017 research shows that even doctors and patient health are affected by implicit bias.  The research is supported by the American Association of Medical Colleges.  You can download it here.










University of Chicago School of Economics and Labor Market

Marianne Bertrand and Sendhil Mullainathan published a study of implicit bias and the labor market in The American Economic Review called Are Emily and Greg More Employable Than Lakisha and Jamal? A Field Experiment on Labor Market Discrimination?

Labor Market and Felonies
From the NY Times, When a Dissertation Makes a Difference shows not only how unconscious bias can play a role in hiring in a most inequitable way, but also how sociology can make a difference that influences policy.

As a graduate student at the University of Wisconsin, Devah Pager studied the difficulties of former prisoners trying to find work and, in the process, came up with a disturbing finding: it is easier for a white person with a felony conviction to get a job than for a black person whose record is clean.

Sociology of Education and School Discipline

Edward Morris and Brea Perry's research found that discipline in school for subjective offenses might be shaped by implicit bias.  See their research published in the ASA's journal here or here.


What Would You Do? 
And this video showing how people are more quick to be suspicious and to call the police if they see a black man committing the same crime as a white man.

Explicit Bias

As you enter, please read this:

Over the last few years, the  United States has elected its first black/ mixed-race President, there are more black actors and actresses on network television, and the cultural norm is that it’s wrong to be racist, so,

 Is racism still relevant? Should we still be concerned about racism or have we moved past racism? 

(Please jot down a response to this)

Even though race does not exist biologically, it does exist as a social construction. This means that people believe in it and act on it even though it is not real (Thomas Theorem).  One of the ways the social construction of race affects people is by creating and ideology that a dominant group is superior than other groups without power, or minority groups.  This is called racism.  Racism is often used to justify unequal social arrangements between those in power and minorities.

One type of racism is explicit racism - directly and consciously believing that one's own "racial" group is superior to others. Another way that Americans have been shaped by "race" is prejudice and discrimination.  Prejudice is having a predetermined attitude about a group of people usually based on a stereotype.  Discrimination is an action or behavior that results in unequal treatment of individuals because of his or her perceived "race."


Checkout these recent events in our country:

Miss America 2013, Nina Davluri came to SHS. But when she won the pageant, there was a flurry of tweets about her race.

Here is a post about tweets from the 2013 Miss America pageant.
Is this racism?
Is this prejudice?
Is this discrimination?


Here is a post  about a 2013 racist incident in an unlikely place.


Racism in College

Fraternities and sororities hold racial-themed parties that display very directly the racialized stereotypes that persist in the United States. Does this surprise you?  How would you feel/react to a party like this when you go to college?
Here is a post about why dressing up in this way is not okay.

The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education has an ongoing list of racist incidents.


Racism in Sports





In 2018, Racism at Wrigley in the bleachers.

The stakes of the moment are made clear by a Latino female fan who security rescues from physical and verbal harm. She stands on the bleachers and points at each member of the white security team.
“You and you and you will never know what it’s like,” she says.
A few seconds later, a Latino fan involved in the altercation accuses security of “taking the white people’s side.” The fight appears to be ending when the non-Latino fan bellows the same slurs, putting his hands on either side of his mouth to amplify his voice and ensure he’s heard. It’s only then that he realizes he’s being recorded. (If you feel the need to fully absorb these words, you can watch the videos here.)
It’s a telling moment. He feels safe enough to shout those words next to security personnel. But when he realizes his actions might be seen outside of the stadium, he accosts the person recording the fight. Security also instructs this person to “put your phone away” and says “you’re on private property, you don’t have permission to videotape anyone.”

In 2017, Fans at Fenway made news numerous times over there racist taunts of opposing teams'  players.

In 2017, Yu Darvish was taunted and mocked for looking Asian.

In 2012, Joel Ward, a black NHL player scored the winning goal in the NHL playoffs and he became the target of racial slurs.


Racism in the Marketplace
A college student from Queens got more than he bargained for when he splurged on a $350 designer belt at Barneys — when a clerk had him cuffed apparently thinking the black teen couldn’t afford the pricey purchase, even though he had paid for it, a new lawsuit alleges.
“His only crime was being a young black man,” his attorney, Michael Palillo, told The Post.


Racism in Politics


During the Healthcare debate in 2009, Representative David Scott of Georgia had a 4foot swastika painted over his office sign.


The Southern Poverty Law Center identifies hate groups in America. This link will show you a map of all the hate groups in the United States.   Is this surprising?  Is this concerning?


This article from the Mail Online, A British online newspaper:

And with Mr Obama reportedly receiving more death threats than any other American president - 400 per cent more than those against his predecessor George Bush, according to a new book...A black U.S. Congressman had a swastika painted over his office sign after he yelled at allegedly racist protesters at a Southern town hall meeting, it emerged today.

Racism in the Media

Jeremy Lin is an example of the racial stereotypes in sports and how stereotypes can be more or less permissible for different groups within a society. Here is a post explaining that dynamic from the society pages.  Here is a clip of the skit from the daily beast.  Have you seen or heard any explicit racism in your own life?

Explicit Racism Backstage

Sociologists Leslie Picca and Joe Feagin explain in their book Two-faced Racism that racism can be explicit even if it is not always shared publicly.  Read an excerpt here.  Watch a video of Leslie Picca here:



SOCHE Talks: Two-Faced Racism: Whites in the Backstage and Frontstage from SOCHE on Vimeo.


Takeaway (for more info see Ferris and Stein pages 219 - 222)

What is the difference between racism, prejudice and discrimination?

What is explicit racism? 

What evidence is there that the U.S. is not post-racial and explicit racism exists?

Racial Construction and Racism in US history

Click here to do an activity from PBS's Race Power of an Illusion where you have to categorize people like a census taker would have.  (Use Safari or a browser that enables Flash)

After you do the sorting people activity above, click here to learn about traits.

This subjective, visual categorization of people is how the US Census operated until 1970.

Not only was racial classification based on this subjective, visual categorization of people, but also the categories have changed over time.

This is just one way that institutional policies constructed race differently throughout US history.


Read one of these posts to examine how a group changed over time:

How Jews became white.

How Asians became "model minorities."

How whites learn to not think about race. (Bonilla-Silva)

Doing Gender

From Soc Images,  Male Models Display Clothes; Female Models Display Themselves,

From Instagram Brosbeingbasic

From Bored Panda,   Man Or Woman? Androgynous Model Poses As Both To Challenge Gender Stereotypes

Also from Bored Panda, When Guys Try To Parody Women Photos And The Result Beats The Original

Men-Ups, Men Posing like Classic Female Pin-Up Models

 


What if male Avengers posed like the female one?

If Fashion Ads Posed Men Like Women

Cross-cultural Evidence of Gender as Social Construct

Our class (and sociology in general) is usually focused on the ways that men and women are treated differently and the implications of that different treatment.  Sometimes, students think that gender differences are simply an innate part of our nature (DNA, biology).  However, a cross-cultural look at gender reveals how widely these cultural norms vary.  It is our culture (or cultures) that surround us with these ideas and norms so they color how we see the world.  This makes it difficult to see the social construction of gender.

In Are men natural born criminals? The prison numbers don't lie (2015), Telegraph reporter Jessica Abrahams explores the academic theories that account for the social construction of higher criminality among males.  Among her claims are:

• The vast majority of crimes are nonviolent and men commit those too, so it is not simply that men's biology makes them more violent.
• Women may commit as many crimes as men, but they are better at not being held accountable and males may be deferential to holding women accountable.
• Women hold fewer positions in which they can commit crime and males feel pressure to succeed which motivates them to commit crime.
• Hypermasculinity may be the key to breaking the cycle of male crime.

Even with the generalizations about gender and crime, there are still wide variations in gender norms among cultures.  This provides evidence that gender is not built-in biologically.
 Here are some cross-cultural studies that demonstrate how gender can vary:

From the World Economic Forum (2017), the Global Gender Gap Report:
https://www.undispatch.com/heres-every-country-world-ranks-gender-equality/

And here is a pdf of the 2017 Global Gender Gap Index.

Here are 6 cultures that still exist today which are matriarchal.

And here are some ways that matriarchal cultures exhibit different norms:

Marriage
Marriage in matriarchal societies are typically non-binding, and various types of romantic relationships are embraced. 
In the mostly matrilocal tribe of Khasi in India, because children live with the mother's family side of the family or clan, there is little to no stigma and hardship when women divorce and have to move. "No matter how many times the woman marries, her children will always remain with her," editor of The Shillong Times and a Khasi, Patricia Mukhim, told Dame magazine. "And even if a man abandons a woman he has impregnated, the children are never 'illegitimate.' "
Crime
In mainstream society, men overwhelmingly commit more crimes — and more serious ones at that — than women. Jennifer Schwartz of Washington State University's Department of Sociology told Dame magazine:  "In more gender-egalitarian societies, there is much less crime by both women and men. And in those societies, the crime gap between women and men is somewhat larger, that is, women participate even less in crime."
Sex
Generally, people who live in matriarchal societies have much more sex and face much less stigma. In the Mosuo tribe, for example, men and women can take as many sexual partners as they pleaseand bearing children with different people is accepted. 

Domestic Violence
Domestic abuse is an epidemic in mainstream society; an estimated 3-4 million women are battered each year in the U.S. alone. On the opposite end of the spectrum, there are indications that domestic violence is close to absent in matrilineal societies.

Here is a 2004 book by anthropologist Peggy Reeves Sanday, professor at University of Pennsylvania:

Contrary to the declarations of some anthropologists, matriarchies do exist. Peggy Reeves Sanday first went to West Sumatra in 1981, intrigued by reports that the matrilineal Minangkabau—one of the largest ethnic groups in Indonesia—label their society a matriarchy. Numbering some four million in West Sumatra, the Minangkabau are known in Indonesia for their literary flair, business acumen, and egalitarian, democratic relationships between men and women.

Continuing on...

First, for today, please be mindful of yourselves.  There is plenty of research about how to take care of yourself.

Allow yourself to experience a range of emotion.  This can be difficult especially for males. It is okay to experience different emotions. 

Talk to someone about your feelings. There are people here at school who are willing and want to help you.  Seek them out.  Maybe a social worker, teacher, or a friend.   

Get out into nature.  There are myriad benefits to spending time in nature.  If you live near a nature preserve, take a hike, get some fresh air.  If not, simply a walk in your neighborhood being mindful of nature can be restorative. 

Exercise.  There are many forms of exercise.  Choose something that is pleasurable to you.  Maybe it is a sport, but it also might be weight lifting or simply hiking/walking. 

Lastly, know that you matter.  Just like there is no telling how far the bell resonates, there is no telling how far your influence goes.  

HW:  Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's essay, We Should All Be Feminists.  Also if you want to print it, a cleaner copy is here.

Today:  We are continuing on with the video called Killing Us Softly 4.  (Click here to watch it on mediacast).