Chapter 2
The Structure of Social Groups
In Conflict and Order:
Understanding Society, 11th edition
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The Micro Level
• Social Organization
– The ways in which the human conduct
becomes socially organized
• Social conditions that constrain behavior:
– Social Structure
• The structure of behavior in groups and society
– Culture
• The shared beliefs of group members that unite
them and guide behavior
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The Micro Level
• Social Interaction
– When the actions of one person affect another
person
– The most common method is through speech
– Enduring social interaction is a social
relationship
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The Micro Level
• Culture
– The shared beliefs of a group’s members that
serve to guide conduct
– Common expectation about how people should
act are called norms
– Criteria for judging what is appropriate, correct,
moral and important are the values of a group
– The expectations that group members have of
individuals occupying the various positions
within the group are social roles
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The Micro Level
• Norms
– Rules that specify appropriate and inappropriate
behaviors
• Folkways are minor rules
• Mores are important norms
• Status
– The positions each societal member occupies
– A master status is a status that has exceptional
significance for social identity.
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The Micro Level
• Role
– The behavioral expectations and requirements attached
to a position in a social organization
• Reasons for varied behavior within a role
– Personality variables can account for variations in the
behavior of people holding identical statuses
– The occupants of a status may not receive a clear,
consistent message about which behavior is expected
– The statuses we occupy may have conflicting demands
on our behavior due to multiple group memberships
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The Micro Level
• Social Control
– Social groups universally demand conformity
to some norms.
– Mechanisms of social control can occur subtly
in the socialization process, in the form of
rewards, or can be public.
– Sanctions are social rewards or punishments
for approved or disapproved behavior.
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Primary and Social Groups
• Social Group
– An organization created through enduring and
patterned interaction
• Primary Group
– Groups whose members are most intimately
involved with each other
• Secondary Group
– Formally organized, task oriented, and relatively
nonpermanent groups
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Bureaucracy:
The Ultimate Social Group
• A bureaucracy is a hierarchical formal
organization characterized by rationality
and efficiency
• The increasing bureaucratization of social
life is called McDonaldization, as coined
by George Ritzer.
• There is the danger that Max Weber
feared from the “iron cage” of rationality.
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Power of the Social Group
• The Group Affects the Probability of
Suicide
– Emile Durkheim’s Suicide
• One’s attachment to social groups affects the
probability of suicide.
• Types of Suicide
– Egoistic suicide
– Altruistic suicide
– Anomic suicide
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Power of the Social Group
• The Group Affects Perceptions
– Apparently, our wish to conform is so great that we
often give in to group pressure.
• The Group Affects Convictions
– Sectarians with group support maintain their conviction
despite contrary evidence.
• The Group Affects Health and Life
– Membership in a group may have an effect on one’s
health and even on life itself.
• The Group Affects Behavior
– The group can alter the behavior of members, even
behaviors that involve basic human drives.
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Figure 2.1 – Process of Social Organization
Source: This scheme is adapted from that developed by Marvin E. Olsen, The Process of Social
Organization, 2nd ed. (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1976)
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The Societal or Macro Level
• Society
– An aggregate of people, united by a common
culture, who are relatively autonomous and
self-sufficient and who live in a definite
geographical location
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Society as a Social System
• Society is a social system composed of
interdependent parts that are linked together into
a boundary-maintaining whole.
• Culture explains much individual and group
behavior as well as the persistence of much of
social life.
• Social Stratification is the hierarchical
arrangement of people in terms of power,
prestige, and resources.
• Social Institutions are social arrangements that
channel behavior in prescribed ways in the
important areas of social life.
Copyright © Allyn and Bacon 2007
Copyright © Allyn and Bacon 2007