Paper 1 – Sociology – The Discipline
Topic – Scope of the subject and comparison with other social sciences.
PSYCHOLOGY AND SOCIOLOGY – A COMPARISON
- Psychology is defined as the science of behaviour.
- Sociology is the science of society.
- Unlike sociology, psychology is not so well equipped to deal with the collectivity of the actors.
Thinkers view on psychology and sociology
- J S Mill sought to establish primacy of psychology over all other social sciences and believed that all laws are derived from the laws of mind.
- Sigmund Freud also implied that sociology is nearly an extension of social psychology.
- Durkheim made a radical distinction between the phenomena studied by Sociology and psychology respectively.
- Ginsberg claimed that many social skills and organisations can be more firmly established by relating them to general psychological laws.
- Weber believed that sociological explanations can be further enriched if an attempt is made to understand social behaviour in terms of underlying meanings.
Differences
- Psychology is the study of personality.
- Sociology is the study of individual as well as of society.
- Subject matter of psychology includes sympathy, imitations and passions.
- Subject matter of sociology includes family, individual, power, etc.
- The scope of psychology is limited and focused on man’s mental activities.
- Sociology is a general study of society and has a wider scope.
- Psychology has more scope of experimentation.
- The view that sociology is a science is often contested.
Synergy
- Girth and Mills assert that some concepts like ‘role’ are meeting point of the two sciences work social structure and individual character meet.
- According to them the study of social psychology is interplay between individual character and social structure as human behaviour is not purely driven by instincts.
- Psychology and sociology maintainer primary interest in the individual.
- Social psychology is a bridge between psychology and sociology.
