Lecture 7: Social Interactions and Social Group

Professor Ferdous Zareen

Types of social interactions
Nonverbal communication
• Nonverbal communication is the process of communicating by sending and
receiving wordless messages. This type of communication includes
gestures, touch, body language, posture, facial expressions, and eye
contact. Nonverbal communication can also include messages
communicated through material items. For example, clothing or hairstyle is
a form of nonverbal exchange that communicates something about the
individual.
Speech
• Ironically, nonverbal communication can also be found in speech. This type
of nonverbal communication is called paralanguage and includes vocal
elements, such as voice quality, pace, pitch, volume, rhythm, and
intonation. Differences in paralanguage can impact the message that is
communicated through words. For example, if someone smiles while
saying “Get out of town,” that person likely is communicating that she
doubts something you’re saying or finds it unbelievable.
 Cont….
Posture
• Posture, or a person’s bodily stance, communicates much about a person’s
perspectives. Various postures include slouching, towering, shoulders
forward, and arm crossing. These nonverbal behaviors can indicate a
person’s feelings and attitudes. Posture can be used to determine an
individual’s degree of intention or involvement, the difference in status
between interlocutors, and the level of fondness a person has for the other
communicator, depending on body “openness.”
Gestures
• Gestures are movements with one’s hands, arms, or face that
communicate a particular message. The most common gestures are
emblem gestures or quotable gestures that are learned within a particular
cultural to communicate a particular message. For example, in the Western
world, waving one’s hand back and forth communicates “hello” or
“goodbye.”
Cont….
Clothing
• Clothing is a means of communicating nonverbally that relies upon
materials other than one’s body. Further, it is a form of nonverbal
communication that everyone engages in unless living on a nudist colony.
The types of clothing an individual wears convey nonverbal clues about his
or her personality, background, and financial status.
Exchange
• Social exchange theory is a socio-psychological and sociological perspective
that explains social change and stability as a process of negotiated
exchanges between parties. The theory is fundamentally oriented around
rational choice theory, or the idea that all human behavior is guided by an
individual’s interpretation of what is in his best interest. Social exchange
theory advances the idea that relationships are essential for life in society
and that it is in one’s interest to form relationships with others.
Cont….
Cooperation
• Cooperation is the process of two or more people working or acting
together. Cooperation enables social reality by laying the groundwork for
social institutions, organizations, and the entire social system. Without
cooperation, no institution beyond the individual would develop; any
group behavior is an example of cooperation. Cooperation derives from an
overlap in desires and is more likely if there is a relationship between the
parties. This means that if two people know that they are going to
encounter one another in the future or if they have memories of past
cooperation, they are more likely to cooperate in the present.
Conflict
• Social conflict is the struggle for agency or power within a society. It occurs
when two or more people oppose one another in social interactions,
reciprocally exerting social power in an effort to attain scarce or
incompatible goals, and prevent the opponent from attaining them.
Cont….
Competition
• Competition is a contest between people or groups of people for control
over resources. In this definition, resources can have both literal and
symbolic meaning. People can compete over tangible resources like land,
food, and mates, but also over intangible resources, such as social capital.
Competition is the opposite of cooperation and arises whenever two
parties strive for a goal that cannot be shared.
Eye contact
• Eye contact is the meeting of the eyes between two individuals. In humans,
eye contact is a form of nonverbal communication and has a large
influence on social behavior. Eye contact provides a way in which one can
study social interactions, as it provides indications of social and emotional
information.
Cont…
Applied body language
• Body language is a form of human non-verbal communication, which
consists of body posture, gestures, facial expressions, and eye
movements. Humans send and interpret such signals almost entirely
subconsciously. It is impossible for social scientists to study body
language in any manner that is not applied.
The elements of Social Interactions
Status
• In everyday speech, “status” means prestige, but when sociologists say
“status” they mean recognized positions occupied by interacting people.
Flight attendants and passengers occupy distinct statuses. Note that each
person occupies many statuses. Thus, an individual may be a flight
attendant, a wife, and a mother at the same time. Sociologists call the
entire ensemble of statuses occupied by an individual a status set.
Roles
• Social interaction also requires roles, or sets of expected behaviors. While
people occupy statuses, they perform roles. A role set is a cluster of roles
attached to a single status. For example, someone occupying the status of
flight attendant may play the roles of inflight safety expert and server
Cont…
Norms
• Finally, social interaction requires norms, or generally accepted ways of
doing things. Some norms are prescriptive. They suggest what a person is
expected to do to while performing a particular role. Other norms are
proscriptive. They suggest what a person is expected not to do while
performing a particular role. Norms often change over time. At one point in
time, some norms are universal, whereas others differ from situation to
situation and from role to role.
Culture
• Culture is the set of beliefs, values, symbols, means of communication,
religion, logics, rituals, fashions, etiquette, foods, and art that unite a
particular society. Culture elements are learned behaviors; children learn
them while growing up in a particular culture as older members teach
them how to live. As such, culture is passed down from one generation to
the next. This process of learning culture is called “acculturation.”
Cont….
Social class
• A social hierarchy refers to the arrangement of people in society, with some
people having more power and others having less. Social hierarchies, also
referred to as social stratification, largely refers to socioeconomics, or the
amount of material and social capital that an individual possesses.
However, the socioeconomic classification is a stand-in for the amount of
power possessed by an individual.
Social institutions
• An institution is any structure or mechanism of social order and
cooperation governing the behavior of a set of individuals within a given
community. Institutions are identified with a social purpose and
permanence, transcending individual lives and intention by enforcing rules
that govern cooperative behavior. While institutions are obviously
comprised of individuals and create rules through these individuals’ agentic
actions, institutions act as forces of socialization, meaning that they teach
individuals to conform to their norms.
Cont…
Social networks
• A social network is a social structure that exists between actors—
individuals or organizations. A social network indicates the way that people
and organizations are connected through various social familiarities,
ranging from casual acquaintance to close familial bonds. Social networks
are composed of nodes and ties. The person or organization participating
in the network is called a node. Ties are the various types of connections
between these nodes.
Social Group
• Social groups and organizations comprise a basic part of virtually every
arena of modern life. A social group is a collection of people who interact
with each other and share similar characteristics and a sense of unity. A
social category is a collection of people who do not interact but who share
similar characteristics. For example, women, men, the elderly, and high
school students all constitute social categories.
Nature of groups
Primary Groups
• A primary group is typically a small social group whose members
share close, personal, enduring relationships. Sociologists distinguish
between two types of groups based upon their characteristics. A
primary group is typically a small social group whose members share
close, personal, enduring relationships.
Secondary Groups
• Secondary groups are large groups whose relationships are
impersonal and goal oriented; their relationships are temporary.
Unlike first groups, secondary groups are large groups whose
relationships are impersonal and goal oriented. People in a secondary
group interact on a less personal level than in a primary group, and
their relationships are generally temporary rather than long lasting.
Cont…
In-Groups and Out-Groups
• In-groups are social groups to which an individual feels he or she belongs,
while an individual doesn’t identify with the out-group. In-group favoritism
refers to a preference and affinity for one’s in-group over the out-group or
anyone viewed as outside the in-group. This can be expressed in evaluation
of others, linking, allocation of resources, and many other ways.
Reference Groups
• Sociologists call any group that individuals use as a standard for evaluating
themselves and their own behavior a reference groups are used in order to
evaluate and determine the nature of a given individual or other group’s
characteristics and sociological attributes. It is the group to which the
individual relates or aspires to relate himself or herself psychologically.
Reference groups become the individual’s frame of reference and source
for ordering his or her experiences, perceptions, cognition, and ideas of
self.
Cont….
Social Networks
• A social network is a social structure between actors, connecting
them through various social familiarities. A social network is a social
structure between actors, either individuals or organizations. It
indicates the ways in which they are connected through various social
familiarities, ranging from casual acquaintance to close familial bonds.
The study of social networks is called both “social network analysis”
and “social network theory.
Functions of groups
Defining boundaries
• Social groups are defined by boundaries. Cultural sociologists define
symbolic boundaries as “conceptual distinctions made by social actors
that separate people into groups and generate feelings of similarity
and group membership.”
Choosing Leaders
• Leadership is the ability to organize a Leadership is the ability to
organize a group of people to achieve a common purpose. Although
the leader may or may not have any formal authority, students of
leadership have produced theories involving traits, situational
interaction, function, behavior, power, vision and values, charisma,
and intelligence, among others.
Cont…
Making Decisions
• Decision-making is the mental processes resulting in the selection of a
course of action among several alternative scenarios. Decision-making is
the mental process resulting in the selection of a course of action among
several alternative scenarios.
Setting Goals
• Goal setting involves establishing specific, measurable, achievable, realistic,
and time-targeted (S.M.A.R.T.) goals. Setting goals involves establishing
specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time-targeted benchmarks
for results.
• Controlling the Behaviors of Group Members
• The behavior of group members can be controlled indirectly through group
polarization, groupthink, and herd behavior.
Reference
• Little, W. (2018). Introduction to Sociology-2nd Canadian Edition.
(Chapter 22)