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62 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
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Social institutions |
they regulate behavior of individuals in core areas of society ex. FamilyEducation systemsReligionGovernment/politicsEconomy/labor forceHealthcare & medicine |
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Educational system as a social institution |
The goal of an educational system is to arm population with information – facts, figures & cognitive skills Creates Social mobilitySocial reproduction |
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“hidden curriculum” |
transmits social norms, attitudes & beliefs to students |
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Social Reproduction |
we are educated into the roles of expectations — wealthy parents who provide for their kids and send them to good college— personal resources allows people to use structure to their advantage |
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Blau & Duncan’s status attainment model |
Social stratification that shows the reproduction and mobility ascribed and achieved characteristics Parents occupation and education affect kids future occupation |
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DeParle’s NYT article |
discusses the challenges faced by three women – Angelica, Melissa & Bianca –attempting to “get off the island” tried to get out of their home town where aspirations where not high Didn't have finances and lack of communication between the university Financial responsibility affects attention to classes interpersonal relationships are affected and complicated |
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Roadblocks to mobility for first gens |
When first generation students and those from low income families get to college they face more obstacles to success and fewer “safety nets” |
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DeParle and factors affecting educational attainment |
Family issues Work for pay more hours per weekLack of cultural capital & social capital to navigate what is a new social environment, new networksDifficulties managing bureaucratic proceduresReluctance to ask for assistance |
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So what do sociologists think education system does? |
Improves knowledge & affords opportunities for later life achievement & mobility – but unequally across pupils & schools Form of social control & socialization Maintains & justifies social roles & positions: producing citizens of various statuses Educational access for all (and requirements to attend) a key component in our general acceptance of inequality in outcomes |
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Kozol - “educational apartheid” |
the communities are segregated in themselves and this perpetuates the segregation of schools still separate and still unequal |
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Kozol: Still Separate, Still Unequal |
argues that schools still extremely racially-stratified in the US, poor educational outcomes are concentrated & probably nearly inevitable in these schools Family SESSchool funding modelSchool infrastructure & conditionsStyle of instruction, teacher quality & courses offeredInvestments in children from birth through college from families & school districtsAccountability metrics |
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Downey & Gibbs |
can’t blame only schools for lack of social mobility in US, though addressing inequalities in schools would help even more |
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Fundamental causes of health & disparities |
A structural, upstream approach that explains inverse association between socioeconomic status (SES) & mortality/morbidity – the “gradient” |
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“multiplicity of mechanisms” |
important to health – knowledge, money, power, prestige, beneficial social connections that can flexibly be used to garner health advantage in a variety of contexts & situations |
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Paid work |
being paid to carry out tasks that require mental & physical effort to produce goods & services that cater to human needs |
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Unpaid work |
also produces needed goods & services but is not paid – key examples are unpaid housework & volunteering |
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economy |
which consists of institutions that provide for the production & distribution of goods & services |
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Why is work so socially significant? What does it provide? |
Activity level, acquisition of skills & use of themVariety Temporal StructureSocial ContactsPersonal IdentitySocial status / prestige |
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Unemployment |
being unable to find a job when one is wanted – creates material & psychosocial stress, because these resources are lost or lessened |
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economic interdependence |
created between people, firms, even national economies because production of goods & services has been decomposed into component steps bc of specialized occupations |
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Historical trends in occupational structure |
Peasant farmersIndustrializationEmergence of clerical work, sales and service occupationsDeindustrialization |
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Ehrenreich: Nickled and dimed |
Ehrenreich began fieldwork in 1998 to see if new welfare reform requirements could help women succeed in paid labor force |
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Fighting for better work: The labor movement |
Major players in class struggle have been labor unions (of workers) & business owners and organizationsEarly working condition in mid-1800s US & elsewhere terrible by today’s standardsLong hoursExtremely dangerous workChild labor |
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Employers fight back against early labor union organizing |
Used unskilled immigrant laborers & African Americans to lower costs, break strikesNational guard & others used to control striking workersRedesign of division of labor – deskilling – who controls the labor process?Assembly lineBureaucracy Made some concessions: welfare capitalism – including employee representation plans – kept workers from demanding more |
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consequences for union membership decline |
Loss of social mobility ladder for Hispanic Americans (earlier unions helped European American immigrants to join middle class, this route no longer available)Increasing earnings inequality between African American & white women, not just losses for blue collar menLoss of political engagement of working classTrouble protecting currently unionized workers |
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Young, sick and part time |
Young adults are vulnerable to years of lacking or piecing together coverage in part time jobs, long periods of schooling, and delayed work and family formationYoung adulthood involves high rates of pregnancy, initial diagnoses of depression, and injuries, all needing costly care |
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family |
a group of persons directly linked by kin connections, the adult members of which assume responsibility for caring for the children |
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Kinship ties |
connections between individuals, established either through marriage or through the lines of descent that connect blood relatives (mothers, fathers, offspring, grandparents, etc.) |
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Nuclear family |
two adults living together in a household with their own or adopted children – this was traditionally part of a larger kin network |
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What do families do? Changes a bit with macroeconomic conditions |
Originally unit of both economic production and sustenance, as well as child-rearing and socializationAs families move away from agriculture & self-sustenance, family becomes less important as unit of economic production, but still key to creating next generation of workers and socializing them |
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Marriage |
a socially acknowledged and approved sexual union between two adults – when people marry, they become kin with each other, but also with each others’ families (“in-laws”) |
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What does marriage do? Benefits and implications |
Sanctioned space for reproduction Ritualistic or symbolic significance (to religion, community, etc.)Consolidate wealth & establish lines of inheritance (property)Turn outsiders into community-membersCreate political ties between/among different communities from individuals to villages to whole kingdoms;Establishing or increasing social capital for the family Route to social mobility (i.e., “marrying up”)MUCH MORE RECENTLY: Personal satisfaction derived from an intimate relationship |
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Deinstitutionalization |
weakening of social norms that define people’s behavior in a social institution (like marriage) – often happens in times of social and economic change |
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Breadwinner & homemaker |
Social constructed concept of key roles in “companionate” marriage of emotionally bonded but distinct (and unequal) partners |
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“Individualized” marriage |
more women worked for pay, divorce became simpler, more frequent, roles of spouses became more flexible, negotiable, each individual’s satisfaction with marriage more central |
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Why still marry? |
Rationally, “enforceable trust” – public commitment to lifelong relationship – means partner less likely to renege on promises, eases join investment in property, differential investment in caregiving – but divorce no longer such a big deal, so difference from cohabitation eroding |
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Cherlin arguments on why still marry |
Cherlin argues marriage retains symbolic value, as it evolved from marker of conformity to one of prestige, and something achieved after career established, savings started, spouse chosen, perhaps cohabitation |
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Cherlin: Possible futures for marriage |
Reinstitutionalized, or More of the same – marriage remains deinstitutionalized by is common & distinctive, or fading away of marriage |
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Coontz: The way we wish we were |
Imagined visions of “traditional family” of the past are oversimplified – realities were harsher & more complexCalling back to these while blaming erosion or lack of “family values” for contemporary social problems is erroneous nostalgia |
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Victorian era: high inequality supported genteel family life image (of only some) |
Household production gives way to wage work with industrialization, changing gender roles Middle/Upper-class family structures depended on domestic labor – slaves and the poor Extensive child labor for poor children, versus more nurtured childhood for wealthy children |
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Hochschild: The work-family struggle is real |
Big changes have rocked the work-family nexusMore mothers work for payThey work in jobs built for “one-breadwinner” familyBoth men & women have increased the hours they work |
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Cool modern stance |
rationalizing home time, only do key things, don’t change the system (at work, or gendered arrangements at home) |
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Traditional stance |
mothers should return to the home, or take a “mommy track” – don’t change system |
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Warm modern stance |
more flexibility needed in workplace (e.g., flex time, job share), more gender egalitarianism at home |
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Hochschild findings |
Instead of the model of the family as haven from work, more of us fit the model of work as haven from home. In this model, the tired parent leaves the world of unresolved quarrels, unwashed laundry and dirty dishes for the atmosphere of engineered cheer, appreciation and harmony at work. |
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Parsons on the role of the physician (1950s) |
Medical profession “collectivity oriented:” physicians should follow one another’s actions & not go rogue or compete with one another |
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Stone: Doctoring as business |
New regime of managed care health insurance an epic reversal – now, insurers deliberately try to influence doctors’ clinical decisions with $$ contemporary profit-driven medical decision-making seen by policymakers as path to socially-responsible, efficient use of resources & even medical excellence |
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Socializing Risk |
Bureaucratic/social arrangement for inducing people to “save” for life’s regular crises by constantly paying into a collective fund |
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Insurance as organized generosity |
it redistributes from those who don’t get sick to those who do.” This works if generally there are more well people than sick people at any given time |
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Intended impacts of current health insurance |
physicians do not consider expenses, but can focus on treatment effectiveness |
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Unintended impacts of current health insurance |
fraud & abuse by physicians billing for unnecessary care, well-insured patients demanding costly care because it seems “free” |
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Managed care organizations: what do they do? |
intended to reduce unnecessary health care costs through a variety of mechanisms, including: economic incentives for physicians and patients to select less costly forms of care; programs for reviewing the medical necessity of specific services; increased beneficiary cost sharing; controls on inpatient admissions and lengths of stay; the establishment of cost-sharing incentives for outpatient surgery; selective contracting with health care providers; and the intensive management of high-cost health care cases. |
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National health care systems |
plan technology acquisition by hospitals, limit supply of doctors/specialists, restrict doctors’ geographical locations, have global budget cap & make medical tradeoffs within cap based on general guidelines – doctors have weaker profit motive because generally salaried |
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US system |
distinctive because relies on market competition of providers & insurers & personal patient economic incentive (shop for best plan)– most incentives controlled by insurers, who have far more power than in any other wealthy country & insert financial incentives into every medical decision (providers incented to use resources economically based on cost-effectiveness analysis) |
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Golden Age of Medicine |
(~late 1930s-early 60s) fee-for-service and only self-regulation meant physicians had greatest degree of autonomy & authority in history of the profession |
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era of managed care |
led to major changes in relative power of provider, insurer, patient – contractual arrangements between insurers & providers exert pressure to do less (increasing profits for insurers) |
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Changes in physicians practices |
how doctors & patients choose each other, how many patients are accepted, how much time is spent with them, what diagnostic tests are ordered, what referrals are made, what procedures, therapies, drugs chosen, how long they are hospitalized & when to stop treating a severely ill person |
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Stone’s argument: perverse incentives |
but they are rewarded for selling fewer services, not more. Thus do the financial incentives under managed care spoil doctors’ relationships to illness and to people who are ill. |
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Physicians go from provider to... |
Businessperson (hopefully rational & ethical)AdministratorEntrepreneur (employing own “experience rating” of patients)Gatekeeper to sick role but also to treatment |
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Patients become... |
Consumer – hopefully one savvy in cost-effectiveness calculationsSource of revenue for providers & insurersPotential financial burden for providers |
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Gawande: The Cost Conundrum |
differences in decision-making emerged in only some kinds of cases. In situations in which the right thing to do was well established…physicians in high and low-cost cites made the same decisions. But, in cases in which the science was unclear, some physicians pursued the maximum possible amount of testing and procedures |
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inequalities in healthcare access & quality |
Low income groups & some racial/ethnic minority groups receive worse care than white AmericansBiases against overweight/obese patients linked to less preventative care & fewer screeningsWomen have better access on average & utilize more healthcare resources than menLGBT individuals may have barriers to care due to prejudices, discrimination & homophobia |
