K. R. Tagiuri in Handbook of Social Psychology, vol. 2, ed. G. Lindzey (Cambridge, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1954), pp. 634–54; J. S. Bruner, D. Shapiro, and R. Tagiuri in Person Perception and Interpersonal Behavior, ed. R. Tagiuri and L. Petrullo (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1958), pp. 277–88.
16. For an example of a similar self-fulfilling prophecy, in this instance dealing with the “central” trait of intelligence, see R. Rosenthal and L. Jacobson, Pygmalion in the Classroom (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1968).
17. Scheff, Being Mentally Ill.
18. E. Zigler and L. Phillips, Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology 63 (1961): 69. See also R. K. Freudenberg and J. P. Robertson, A.M.A. Archives of Neurological Psychiatry 76 (1956): 14.
19. W. Mischel, Personality and Assessment (New York: Wiley, 1968).
Reading 7 Finding Out How The Social World Works
Michael Schwalbe
Most sociologists agree that the best way to learn about research is through hands-on experience gained by conducting a study. The research process, examined in the next three readings, often turns up new questions and challenges for the researcher. The first reading is by Michael Schwalbe, a professor of sociology at North Carolina State University, and is excerpted from his 1998 book, The Sociologically Examined Life: Pieces of the Conversation. In this selection, Schwalbe explains the advantages of utilizing systematic research to study the social world. Schwalbe also summarizes the kinds of questions sociologists often ask and argues that it is important to be “sociologically mindful” whenever addressing social research.
Without looking up any statistics, can you say whether there are more poor black people or poor white people in the United States? A common mistake, because blacks are often represented as being poor, is to say that there are more poor black people than poor white people. But blacks make up only about 12 percent of the U.S. population. And even though the rate of poverty is higher among blacks (about 30 percent) than among whites (about 15 percent), there are so many more white people in the United States that whites still make up the majority of those living in poverty…. A few facts and a bit of logic make this easy to figure out.
Source: Michael Schwalbe, “Finding Out How the Social World Works” from The Sociologically Examined Life: Pieces of the Conversation. Copyright © 1998 by Michael Schwalbe. Reprinted with the permission of the author.
So logical deduction is one way to know things, or to find out the implications of what we know. Much of what we know comes straight from others. It is passed on to us by parents, teachers, friends, and so on. We can also know things from personal experience or observation, from systematic research, and from mystical revelation. It is possible, too, that some knowledge is instinctive, as, for example, when an infant “knows” that it should suck on whatever is put in its mouth.
It is interesting to think about where our knowledge comes from. What usually concerns us more, however, is how to be sure that our knowledge is valid and reliable. Each source of knowledge has limitations in these respects. Part of being sociologically mindful is being aware of these limitations.
Logical deduction, for instance, is a fine way to elaborate our knowledge—except that if our premises are wrong, then our conclusions will also be wrong; we will simply reason our way to further ignorance. One strength of logical deduction, however, is that others can check up on our assumptions and our reasoning, and thus correct us if we go astray.
Relying on what others tell us is necessary and is often a good way to learn, but how do we know that what others tell us is right? Surely you have had the experience of being told—by a parent, teacher, or mentor—something that later turned out to be wrong. Then there is the problem of deciding between different versions of the truth that come to us from sources that seem equally credible. How do we decide who is right?
Personal experience and observation are good sources of knowledge, except that it is easy to misjudge and overgeneralize from these sources. For example, your own observations might tell you that the sun revolves around the earth, or that all Lithuanians are slobs because both of the Lithuanians you’ve met in your life were a bit slobby, or that there is no ruling class in the United States because you’ve never seen it gathered in one place, or that crime is rising because you were just robbed. The problem in each case is not that you don’t know what you’ve seen, but that what you’ve seen isn’t enough to support the conclusion you reached….
Advantages of Systematic Research
Careful research is perhaps the best way to create valid and reliable knowledge about the state of the social world and how it works. It is the best way for several reasons. First, by using standard, widely accepted means of finding things out, we can control personal biases. If we can do this, we are less likely to mistake what we would like to be true for what is really true.
Suppose, for example, I believe that democratic work organizations are better than authoritarian ones and would therefore like to believe that they are also more efficient. My bias would be to look only for evidence that supports my belief. But if I use a standard method of assessing efficiency, and use it carefully and fairly to compare democratic and authoritarian work organizations, I will have to accept whatever I find. My bias would thus be canceled out, or at least controlled.
Second, research can get us beyond personal experience and casual observation, because to re-search is to look beyond what is obvious to us from where we stand. It is to look for ideas and information that might challenge the common sense that gets us through daily life. It means considering the quality and correctness of knowledge created by others, even if we find their knowledge irritating. All this can be difficult, because our usual habit is to settle comfortably into believing that we already know what is right.
A third reason for doing research is that it lets us check up on each other. If we use methods that others agree are proper, they can look at our results and say, “Hmmm, yes, you did it right; these results must be correct.” Or they can say, “Ah, you went astray here at this point, so your conclusions are not trustworthy.” We can make the same judgments when others offer us knowledge they have created. In this way, by working together, we can do better at dispelling illusions and, in the long run, creating knowledge that is valid and reliable.
Perhaps you noticed that I had only good things to say about knowledge that comes from research. Does this mean that one should accept as true whatever is published in a scientific or scholarly journal? No. Knowledge from any source should be critically interrogated. Careful research is just a way to avoid problems that are common when knowledge is created in other ways. And if research is not done properly, it can yield as much foolishness as any other method.
The larger point here is that we should be mindful, to the extent we can, of where our own knowledge comes from. We can be mindful in this way by asking ourselves how we know what we claim to know. Is some piece of knowledge a result of logical deduction? (If so, have we reasoned correctly? How do we know that our premises are correct?) Is some piece of knowledge a hand-me-down from others? (If so, where did their knowledge come from? How can we be sure it is correct?) Is some piece of knowledge a result of personal experience or observation? (If so, are we claiming to know more than our personal experience can warrant? Is it possible that we have observed only what we want to believe is true, or that our observations have been limited in some crucial way?)
The point of asking ourselves these questions is not to arrive at a paralyzing state of doubt about what we know, but to more wisely decide how much
