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A valence issue is a social problem that people uniformly interpret the same way. [3] An example of a valence issue is child abuse, which is condemned across several societies. A position issue is a social problem in which the popular opinion among society is divided. [4]
Social conflict is the struggle for agency or power in society.Social conflict occurs when two or more people oppose each other in social interaction, and each exerts social power with reciprocity in an effort to achieve incompatible goals but prevent the other from attaining their own.
Manifest functions are the consequences that people see, observe or even expect. It is explicitly stated and understood by the participants in the relevant action. The manifest function of a rain dance, according to Merton in his 1957 Social Theory and Social Structure, is to produce rain, and this outcome is intended and desired by people participating in the ritual.
Social conflict theory is a Marxist-based social theory which argues that individuals and groups (social classes) within society interact on the basis of conflict rather than consensus. Through various forms of conflict, groups will tend to attain differing amounts of material and non-material resources (e.g. the wealthy vs. the poor).
Social inequality is shaped by a range of structural factors, such as geographical location or citizenship status, and is often underpinned by cultural discourses and identities defining, for example, whether the poor are 'deserving' or 'undeserving'. [2]
Social polarization is the segregation within a society that emerges when factors such as income inequality, real-estate fluctuations and economic displacement result in the differentiation of social groups from high-income to low-income. It is a state and/or a tendency denoting the growth of groups at the extremities of the social hierarchy ...
Social theories are analytical frameworks, or paradigms, that are used to study and interpret social phenomena. [1] A tool used by social scientists, social theories relate to historical debates over the validity and reliability of different methodologies (e.g. positivism and antipositivism), the primacy of either structure or agency, as well as the relationship between contingency and necessity.
Environmental sociology is the study of interactions between societies and their natural environment.The field emphasizes the social factors that influence environmental resource management and cause environmental issues, the processes by which these environmental problems are socially constructed and define as social issues, and societal responses to these problems.