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Austin Brown

MLO III Sociology

As a Social and Behavioral Sciences (SBS) major at California State University

Monterey Bay (CSUMB), most students choose a concentration path to follow. I have chosen

sociology, and I feel it is giving me the knowledge and ability to pursue work in many career

fields. Throughout my time at the university I have taken many classes that address the

concentration of sociology or concepts pertaining to it. Two of the most influential classes I have

taken are SBS 245: Native American Societies and SOC 333: Sociology of Deviance. In these

classes I produced papers and a demographic profile that help illustrate the principles of

sociology and my experience with the subject.

To start lets define sociology. This is the study of societies and their institutions, systems,

problems, and potential. Sociologists are interested in watching societies evolve and using these

observations to determine social theories, or rules/patterns of social structures and customs.

Sociologists often perform research using a multitude of methods, both quantitative and

qualitative, to better understand a society and their needs. Finally, sociologists are used by many

government agencies and private companies. The government uses the data generated from

sociologists to get an idea of the needs of its people. They are able to provide better social

programs, invest in what the people actually need, and determine the overall happiness of the

people just to name a few examples. A private company would use sociologists or sociological

methods to understand their market and evolve their products to reflect the wants of their

consumers. Also, they could be used to affect marketing strategies of the company. In general,

sociology has a lot of application in the world, and sociologists do a lot of work in both of the

private and public sectors.


While talking about the work done by sociologists, it is important to note some of the

complications they may find in their work. The biggest of all are ethical issues that could reduce

the quality of their arguments or, worst case scenario, discredit them entirely. Because most of

the work done by sociologists revolve around conducting research on a population, a lot of these

ethical issues arise from uninformed participants in the studies. If a researcher does not

thoroughly prove that their method will not bring any affect to those being observed and gets the

approval of a human subjects board, or if the researcher does not properly inform their subjects

there are inherent ethical issues in the study. The participants should not be harmed during the

study, this includes physically, emotionally, and even socially. If sensitive information is asked of

individuals, their records should be kept anonymous to protect them from potential repercussions

relating to their answers. It is incredibly important that sociologists protect their participants and

do not cause anyone harm.

I had practice with this myself in a quantitative research methods course. We were

required to create a survey and produce results from said survey. It was important that we put

disclaimers in the beginning of the survey and also keep it anonymous. We asked information

regarding the individuals education level and income, which both could be considered sensitive

information, and wanted to maintain the integrity of our results, so we implemented the above

cautions. If we had not put the disclaimer or kept the survey anonymous it would have been

possible for our survey to be rejected by the professor or the human subjects review board. Also,

had the survey passed through those two filters, all of the work done after the survey could have

been jeopardized by the poor ethical quality of the initial survey. This would have been a

tremendous loss to our team and our grade, so it is not only important for the respondents that

they are protected, it is also important to the researchers.


Beyond this research course, I have also been through the classes mentioned at the

beginning. In SBS 245 I spent a lot of time learning about Native American communities in the

past and the present. While we did not conduct any studies or research of our own in the class,

we were well read on existing studies and historical texts that provided the basis for our

understanding of the problems affecting this group of people. Native Americans today are put

through a lot of oppression, from poverty issues and negative stereotypes. Also, they are often

abused for the financial benefits that can come with their reservation land. For example, casinos

will take advantage of the tribes by setting up on their reservations. The casino is out of view of

the U.S. federal government and they get cheap labor out of the natives. However, they do not

give back to the community that is supporting them. Instead, they abuse them for labor and land

and continue the stereotypes and poverty problems the community is already facing. This was all

learned through course readings and exercises done in class and in the community.

The most influential course I have been a part of, in terms of sociological knowledge,

was SOC 333. This class required that I produce a paper using theory to explain a form of

deviance and a demographic profile of a city in America. Through the theory of crime paper, I

analyzed domestic partner homicide and how stress could be a factor in these crimes. I was able

to find information supporting this idea and I spent a lot of the paper discussing how the male

population is incredibly unsupported when it comes to this crime. Many people believe that

women are the majority abused and men are the majority abuser. And this is not necessarily true.

My paper used existing scholarly sources to argue that men are almost equally as abused by

women as women are by men. I also argued that more programs should exist to help abused men,

instead of just vilifying the gender entirely.


The last thing I completed for the course was a demographic profile. In this assignment, I

looked at demographic data from the United States Census Bureau and crime data from the

Uniform Crime Report, ran by the FBI, to look for causes of crime in Ferguson, Missouri. This

required that I use existing government data to put together a potential policy plan to improve the

crime rates of the town. I also analyzed the Ferguson Effect, a term coined after the shooting of

Michael Brown, and looked to see if the effect was real. I ended up having pretty interesting

findings from this assignment.

Sociology is an important discipline to many parts of the world. It affects government,

goods and services sold, and our understanding of different groups of people. Many important

and influential studies are conducted by sociologists, and, as long as they are void of ethical

issues, these studies are used to progress society. It has been a fun ride being part of the

sociology concentration at CSUMB.

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