Table 1.1 Sociological Theories or Perspectives Different sociological perspectives enable sociologists to view social issues through a variety of useful lenses. Three paradigms have come to dominate sociological thinking because they provide useful explanations: structural functionalism, conflict theory, and symbolic interactionism. Paradigms are philosophical and theoretical frameworks used within a discipline to formulate theories, generalizations, and the experiments performed in support of them. In sociology, a few theories provide broad perspectives that help explain many different aspects of social life, and these are called paradigms. Classic sociological theories are still considered important and current, but new sociological theories build upon the work of their predecessors and add to them (Calhoun, 2002). Sociological theory is constantly evolving and should never be considered complete. Grand theories attempt to explain large-scale relationships and answer fundamental questions such as why societies form and why they change. Macro-level theories relate to large-scale issues and large groups of people, while micro-level theories look at very specific relationships between individuals or small groups. Theories vary in scope depending on the scale of the issues that they are meant to explain. His work supports the utility of theory in sociological research.

Durkheim gathered a large amount of data about Europeans and found that Protestants were more likely to commit suicide than Catholics. He studied social solidarity, social ties within a group, and hypothesized that differences in suicide rates might be explained by religious differences. In sociology, a theory is a way to explain different aspects of social interactions and to create a testable proposition, called a hypothesis, about society (Allan 2006).įor example, although suicide is generally considered an individual phenomenon, Émile Durkheim was interested in studying the social factors that affect it. Sociologists study social events, interactions, and patterns, and they develop theories to explain why things work as they do. Figure 1.7 Sociologists develop theories to explain social occurrences such as protest rallies.

Structural function theory