Medical sociology note

Compiled by: Ashok Pandey
Visiting faculty
Little Buddha College of Health Sciences
6/23/2019 1

MEDICAL SOCIOLOGY
Professional endeavour devoted to social
epidemiology, study of cultural factors and social
relations in connection with illness, and the social
principles in medical organisation and treatment
– Charles Mclntire 1894
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MEDICAL SOCIOLOGY
 social epidemiology to practice social
medicine
 to study social problems
 to study cultural factors and social relation
 to study social factors of family,society,
and government about health or disease
 to study social principles in medical
organisation and treatment
 to study social security
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Unit1: Sociology 6 Hours
 Common terminologies: Sociology, Ethnicity, Mores, Folk Ways,
Social System, Social Control, Social Disorganization, Social
Problems, Acculturation, Enculturation, Socialization, Cooperation,
Accommodation, Assimilation, Conflict, Modernization,
Westernization, Sanskrtisation, Ethnomedicine, Ethnopsychiatry,
Value, Beliefs, Perception, Knowledge, Attitude, Behavior, Custom,
Habit, Self-Medication, Organization.
 Historical development of society
 Typological subject matter of sociology
 Relationship of sociology with anthropology, psychology, public
health and health education
 Sociological contributions in public health
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SOCIOLOGY
 STUDY OF SOCIAL CAUSES
AND CONSEQUENCES OF
HUMAN BEHAVIOUR
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Sociology
Sociology is the scientific study of society, including patterns of
social relationships, social interaction, and culture.
The term sociology was first used by Frenchman Auguste
Compte in the 1830s when he proposed a synthetic science
uniting all knowledge about human activity.
Sociology is the study of human social relationships and
institutions.
Sociology’s subject matter is diverse, ranging from crime to
religion, from the family to the state, from the divisions of race
and social class to the shared beliefs of a common culture, and
from social stability to radical change in whole societies.
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Ethnicity
 Term has its roots in the Greek word `ethnos’ meaning
people. (We the people)
 Ancient Greeks associate cohesive groups of people
formed on the basis of kinship as Tribe or Race.
 Ethnic groups were sub-divisions. Cohesive groups.
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Ethnicity
Ethnicity is a term that describes shared culture —the
practices, values, and beliefs of a group. This might
include shared language, religion, and traditions,
among other commonalities.
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Mores and Moral
 Mores are the moral customs and moral rules that a
group or society do as a matter of fact have.
 “No shoes, no shirt, no entry.”
“Do not spit in public.”
 Moral, =principles of right and wrong and standards
of conduct which are universally advocated, that is,
are put forth as prescriptions which all persons who
wish to be judged “moral”
should follow.
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Folk Ways
According to Reuter and Hart (1933), “The folkways are simple habits of action
common to the members of the group; they are the ways of the folks that are
somewhat standardised and have some degree of traditional sanction for their
persistence”.
Maclver and Page (1949) defined it as: “The folkways are the recognized or
accepted ways of behaving in the society.”
In simple terms, folkways are the customary, normal and habitual ways of the
group to meet certain needs or solving day-to-day problems. The time of meals,
the number of meals per day, the manner of taking meals—lunch or dinner, the
kind of food used, the manner of its preparations, the manner of speech and dress,
forms of etiquette and the numerous other facts of daily life are some of the
examples of customary practices to which individuals conform in their personal
habits.
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Getting in someone’s personal space
1.Taboo
2. Law
3. More
4. Folkway
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Eating three healthy meals a day
1.Law
2.More
3.Taboo
4.Folkway
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Values
1)Standards by which a culture judges an item
good or bad
2)Broad ideas about what most people in a
society consider to be desirable
3) Form the basis for norms
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Values
Values represent basic convictions that-
A specific mode of conduct or end-state of
existence is personally or socially preferable
to an opposite or converse mode of conduct or
end-state of existence. Value is a judgmental
element of what is right, good, or desirable.
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Social System
An organization of individuals into groups or structures that
have different functions, characteristics, origin or status. For
example, a social system might break a larger population
down into family groups, races, religious affiliations, gender,
wealth categories and social classes. These demographic
distinctions can be used by the marketing department of a
business to better target their promotional and sales efforts.
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Social control
Social control refers to the control of society over the
individual.
• Some social control implies a system of device through
which society controls the activities of individual members.
• Mannheim – “Social control as the sum of those methods by
which a society tries to influence human behaviour to
maintain a given order”.
• Ogburn and Nimkoff – “The patterns of pressure which a
society exerts to maintain order and established rules”.
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Social Disorganization
 Social disorganization means breaking or
dismantling or dispersing of the social system,
social institutions and social relationships.
 It increases when there is no general agreement
and individuals define the important interests of
the society in purely individualistic terms.
 When there is a change in the equilibrium of
forces or a breakdown of the social structure.
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Emile Durkheim considers social
disorganization as a state of disequilibrium
and a lack of social solidarity or consensus
among the members of a society.
Ogburn and Nimkoff said that when the
harmonious relationship between the various
parts of culture is disturbed, social
disorganization ensues.
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Causes of social disorganization
 Psychological factors include the social processes like imitation,
conflict, compitition, accommodation.
 Cultural factors: maladjustment in the existing institutions, cultural
lag, cultural conflict.
 Biological factors : include population explosion, interracial
marriages, inter caste marriages.
 physical factors include storms, earthquake, sea currents, tsunami etc.
 Social Problems include unemployment., corruption.
 Degeneration of values includes wars, criminality suicides etc
 Others causes includes confusion of roles, lack of proper planning etc
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Social Problems
The term “social problem” is usually taken to
refer to social conditions that disrupt or
damage society—crime, racism, and the like.
Social problems represent conditions that
should not be allowed to continue because
they are perceived to be problems for society,
requiring society to react to them and find
remedies.6/23/2019 22

Acculturation
 Definition
 Acculturation is a process in which
members of one cultural group adopts the
beliefs and behaviors of another group..
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Acculturation
The adoption of the behavior patterns of the surrounding
culture the process of assimilating new ideas into an existing
cognitive structure.
Deﬁned culture change that occurs when two populations
come into contact and has been treated in two ways:
(1)as a unidimensional measure of the adoption of values,
beliefs, norms and behaviours of another population, or
(2)as a bidimensional measure of adherence to each of two
cultures
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Assimilation
the blending or fusing of minority groups into
the dominant society
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Assimilation
 Assimilation of one cultural group into another
may be evidenced by changes in:
1. Language preference,
2. Adoption of common attitudes and values,
3. Membership in common social groups and
institutions,
4. Loss of separate political or ethnic
identification
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Conflict
states that tensions and it arise when
resources, status, and power are unevenly
distributed between groups in society and that
these conflicts become the engine for social
change.
society is made up of individuals competing
for limited resources (e.g., money, leisure,
sexual partners, etc.).
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 Originated from the efforts of Karl Marx.
 Sustained by Wright Mills in some years
later.
 Societies have a tendency of being in
conflict.
 Distribution of power and wealth remains
unequal.
 Dominant groups employ power and
authority in controlling most or all the
other social structure aspects.
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Modernization
it is the growth of economy, social , political,
cultural life of group of the people in a
positive way.
It is a process socio cultural transformation.
It is the process of change and involving
values, norms, institution and structure.
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 Political dimensions of modernization involves creation
of a modern nation or state.
 Cultural modernization involves adherence to
nationalistic ideology, belief in equality, freedom and
humanism, a rational and scientific outlook.
 Economic modernization involves industrialization
accompanied with monetization of economy, increasing
division of labor, use of management techniques and
improved technology and the expansion of service sector.
 Social modernization involves universalistic values,
achievement motivation, increasing literacy and
urbanization and the decline of traditional authority.
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Westernization
Westernization is a process in which societies adopt
western cultures in areas such as industry,
technology, law, politics, economies and lifestyles,
clothing, language etc.
According to M.N. Srinivas, “Westernization” refers
to “the changes brought about in the Indian society
and culture as a result of over 150 years of British
rule and the term subsumes changes occurring at
different levels technology, institutions, ideology
and values.
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Sanskritisation
the process of cultural mobility in the
traditional social structure.
It denotes the process by which caste or
tribes placed lower in the caste hierarchy seek
upward mobility by emulating the rituals and
practices of the upper or dominant castes. It is
a process similar
to passing in sociological terms.
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M. N. Srinivas defined sanskritisation as a process
by which "a low or middle Hindu caste, or tribal or
other group, changes its customs, ritual ideology,
and way of life in the direction of a high and
frequently twice-born caste. Generally such changes
are followed by a claim to a higher position in the
caste hierarchy than that traditionally conceded to
the claimant class by the local community
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Ethnomedicine
Ethnomedicine is a study or comparison of
the traditional medicine based on bioactive
compounds in plants and animalsand
practiced by various ethnic groups, especially
those with little access to western medicines,
e.g., indigenous peoples.
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Ethnomedicine is that branch of cultural medicine that
produces and administers drugs by the use of plants
and plant products while a herb in cultural
medicine is a plant or plant material which can be
used for therapeutic purposes. It could well be that
the initial selection of plant materials for medicinal
purposes was influenced by religious thoughts and,
its collection and administration was accompanied
by a magic ritual.
It has also been proposed that knowledge of medicinal
plants was gained by accident, although this theory
has been refuted by a number of traditional medical
practitioners who claimed that information on such
plants was communicated to their ancestors in
various ways (Akpata, 1979: Lambo, 1979).
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Ethnopsychiatry
Ethnopsychiatry is that branch of medical anthropology
focally concerned with mental health and illness.
The systematic study of the psychiatric theories and practices
of a primitive tribe. Its primary focus is, thus, the exploration
of
(a)culture that pertains to mental derangements, as (locally)
understood”
(b)Second, the field is the study of “culture and the
abnormal.”
The subject of ethnopsychiatry deals with the study of mental
ill-nesses in cross-cultural perspective including its
definition, classifica-tion, causality and treatment of mentally
ill persons in differing contexts.
6/23/2019 36

Review Questions
1. How is the sociological imagination key to the study of
sociology?
a) It helps us imagine how people in other cultures function in
daily life.
b) It helps us develop hypotheses that we can test with
statistical data.
c) It helps us get beyond our personal beliefs and
circumstances in order to examine things from a broader
perspective.
d) It helps us understand the broad array of theoretical
approaches that can be used to study sociological
phenomena.
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Review Questions
2. How did Emile Durkheim think that the division of labor contributes to
organic solidarity in modern societies?
a) Durkheim claimed that the division of labor creates more isolation in the
work place as people’s jobs become more specialized, but that this in turn
makes people invest more in remaining connected to one another outside
of work, which overall helps strengthen society.
b) Durkheim claimed that the division of labor teaches people the importance
of cooperation and coordination which helps strengthen social cohesion.
c) Durkheim claimed that the division of labor is a key social structure that
helps bring order to a chaotic world by constraining social behavior.
d) Durkheim claimed that people become more dependent on one another
as the division of labor expands and that this interdependence provides
social cohesion.
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Review Questions
3. According to Max Weber, _______ ideas and values shape
society as much as ______ factors do.
a) democratic; economic
b) cultural; economic
c) economic; religious
d) capitalist; cultural
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Review Questions
4. Examining the interactions between people with a focus on
how the people talk, dress, and use body language is an
example of which theoretical approach to sociology?
a) symbolic interactionism
b) postmodernism
c) feminist theory
d) functionalism
6/23/2019 40

Review Questions
5. Which two theoretical approaches share the belief that
sociological theory must be linked to political and social
action?
a) postmodernism and Marxism
b) feminist theory and symbolic interactionism
c) Marxism and feminist theory
d) rational choice theory and postmodernism
6/23/2019 41

Review Questions
6. According to some postmodern theorists, such as Jean
Baudrillard, how has the spread of electronic media affected
society?
a) It has disconnected us from real people and places and led to
greater social isolation as we respond to signs and images that
often have little to do with our everyday lives.
b) It has made us more aware of cultural differences as we are
exposed to a wider range of ideas and values.
c) It has led to ever greater levels of consumerism as people are
constantly reminded of things they don’t have that they would
like to own.
d) It has provided new ways for people to connect and create
community.
6/23/2019 42

Review Questions
7. How can sociology have practical implications?
a) Sociology can suggest new ways of evaluating major social
transformations in history.
b) Sociological studies are often used to assess the success,
or failure, of policy initiatives in areas ranging from
education to housing to sex discrimination.
c) Sociology can shed light on the importance of social actors
whose roles were previously ignored.
d) Sociology empowers larger social institutions, not
individuals, to alter conditions of inequality and injustice.
6/23/2019 43

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