Sociological Imagination

•C.Wright Mills came up with that phrase to explain how a sociologist must think to try to figure out why groups do what they do.

Sociologists try to look for social

characteristics of a group.

Sociologists search for social patterns

• Sociologists try to look at the repeated and predictable actions of a group. They try to see if there is a a pattern in the actions.

• In 1870, one researcher, Henry Morselli, looked at the number of suicides per 100,000 people in the European countries and noticed two things.

Morsellli looked at suicides in Europe in 1870. He noticed that….

• The numbers had increased in each country over time.

• There was a big difference in the number of suicides in the various countries in Europe.

• …and the differences were extremely large among some countries.

Suicide Rate

per100,000 People

in 1870.

Why would the figures differ so?

• He tried to figure out if there was a pattern that showed why the suicide rates in Denmark where nearly 20 times those in Ireland.

• Can you think of something that was happening in some countries more than in others in 1870 that would cause such a high difference in suicides?

• Look at the countries again. • Which countries had the lowest

suicide rates per 100,000?• How were they different from the

countries colored in the darker colors?

• Think about what you know about history in the U.S. and Europe in 1870.

• Hint : factories had something to do with it.

Suicide Rate

per100,000 People

in 1870.

Industrialization!

• That is a sample of what is meant by sociological imagination.

• A sociologist must use her imagination to try to figure out what pattern might be in a society or culture that would influence individual or group behavior.