Читать книгу Our Social World - Kathleen Odell Korgen - Страница 99

Most early sociologists—including Lester Ward, the first president of the American Sociological Association—promoted sociology as a means for improving society (Calhoun 2007). As the discipline of sociology grew from its early days and became an acknowledged social science, some sociologists advocated for “pure” research disconnected from social policy issues and the public sphere. Throughout the history of the discipline, sociologists have debated their proper role in society.

However, like physicists, chemists, and geologists, many sociologists believe that, in addition to pure research, there are both important practical applications of the discipline and many policy issues that need to be informed by good social science. Today, there is a movement to recall the roots of sociology and make sociology more public, that is, of use to society. Public sociologists use sociological tools to understand and inform citizens about how society works and to improve society. Some help create and advocate for social policies that their research indicates will have a positive impact on society. Public sociologists—whether professors or those in a variety of professions outside academia—share a common goal: to better understand how society operates and to make practical use of their sociological findings to better society (Pickard and Poole 2007).

Some public sociologists work outside of academia and use sociological knowledge and research skills to address organizational needs or problems in government, education, health care settings, social service agencies, and businesses. They work for clients or organizations that often determine the research questions they will address. Depending on their positions, they may be known as sociological practitioners, applied sociologists, clinical sociologists, policy analysts, program planners, or evaluation researchers, among other titles. They focus on pragmatic ways to improve organizations or society, sometimes recommending major changes and sometimes proposing modest policy proposals.

Some sociology professors build a public sociology emphasis into their courses, hoping not only to work with students to improve the social environment in which they live but also to foster important skills for students entering the job market. The next Sociologists in Action feature (page 50) describes one such effort.

Sociologists in Action

Kristin Kenneavy Using Sociology to Improve Campus Life and Gain Marketable Skills

I did not become a sociologist to live in an ivory tower. Rather, I envisioned busting down the castle gate and doing work that would have a positive impact. As a result of my orientation to sociology, I created a Public Sociologies course in which students learn skills relevant to their careers and lives—gathering and analyzing data to understand and address social issues on our campus and in the wider community. One issue my students have worked on is interpersonal violence on campus. Students can play an important role in preventing such violence through a variety of strategies. For example, they might personally intervene if they see a couple arguing, call a resource who can diffuse the situation (such as a resident assistant or campus safety officer), or simply state their discomfort when a friend talks about women in a sexist way.

A number of bystander intervention training programs now attempt to teach these skills. Our campus chose to use the Green Dot program, a violence prevention program that focuses on peers and culture. My students and I agreed that we would help our Women’s Center to evaluate the effectiveness of the Green Dot program. To do this, my students had to learn and then use research and evaluation skills.

My students designed the initial survey instrument and tested the survey with a diverse sample of their fellow students so that they could refine the measures. The following spring, my class fielded the baseline wave of the survey. They came up with a sampling strategy (using randomly selected course sections) and went through the approval process with our Institutional Review Board (IRB) to make sure that we protected our human subjects. The students distributed the surveys and entered all of the data into a computer program. Finally, we did statistical analysis of the data and prepared a report for our Women’s Center and the Public Prevention and Education Committee of the New Jersey Governor’s Advisory Council Against Sexual Assault.

Students in the sociology major worked on this project for over 3 years, eventually gathering three waves of data from over 1,000 students about their experiences with interpersonal violence, as well as their intentions to intervene to prevent violence. An important finding was that 1 in 5 of our female students and 1 in 10 of our male students had experienced interpersonal violence. Even more striking, two thirds of our students knew someone who had experienced interpersonal violence. We were also able to provide evidence that students who had received Green Dot training were more likely to intervene as active bystanders than students who had not. Being able to show the prevalence of the issue and the effectiveness of our prevention strategy were important for securing institutional resources to expand the program.

Through this experience, Public Sociologies students were able to engage in an important evaluation project that helped them develop real-world research skills. A number of my students have gone on to work in jobs that require them to consume and produce research, and to bridge theory and practice (e.g., social workers, police officers, and market researchers, to name a few). You can too!

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Kristin Kenneavy is an associate professor of sociology at Ramapo College of New Jersey where she works closely with the Center for Student Involvement to promote community-based learning and scholarship, and continues to research interpersonal violence prevention.

So far, we have focused on what sociology is and how sociologists know what they know and do the research they do. The rest of the book examines our social world as informed by methods and theory discussed in this chapter. The next chapter explores how you can understand your culture and society at the various levels of analysis in our social world.