Principles of Economics ( German : Grundsätze der Volkswirtschaftslehre ; 1871) is a book by economist Carl Menger which is credited with the founding of the Austrian School of economics . It was one of the first modern treatises to advance the theory of marginal utility .
113-477: In the social sciences , unintended consequences (sometimes unanticipated consequences or unforeseen consequences , more colloquially called knock-on effects ) are outcomes of a purposeful action that are not intended or foreseen. The term was popularized in the 20th century by American sociologist Robert K. Merton . Unintended consequences can be grouped into three types: The idea of unintended consequences dates back at least to John Locke who discussed
226-494: A degree in the subject. The classic brief definition of economics, set out by Lionel Robbins in 1932, is "the science which studies human behavior as a relationship between ends and scarce means which have alternative uses". Without scarcity and alternative uses, there is no economic problem . Briefer yet is "the study of how people seek to satisfy needs and wants" and "the study of the financial aspects of human behavior". Economics has two broad branches: microeconomics , where
339-611: A science of society based on historical materialism , becoming recognized as a founding figure of sociology posthumously as the term gained broader meaning. Around the start of the 20th century, the first wave of German sociologists, including Max Weber and Georg Simmel , developed sociological antipositivism. The field may be broadly recognized as an amalgam of three modes of social thought in particular: Durkheimian positivism and structural functionalism ; Marxist historical materialism and conflict theory ; and Weberian antipositivism and verstehen analysis. American sociology broadly arose on
452-457: A "system of rules", as an "interpretive concept" to achieve justice, as an "authority" to mediate people's interests, and even as "the command of a sovereign, backed by the threat of a sanction". However one likes to think of law, it is a completely central social institution. Legal policy incorporates the practical manifestation of thinking from almost every social science and the humanities. Laws are politics, because politicians create them. Law
565-431: A change in the condition of a single good can have ramifications beyond that good. Menger wrote: If it is established that the existence of human needs capable of satisfaction is a prerequisite of goods-character [...] This principle is valid whether the goods can be placed in direct causal connection with the satisfaction of human needs, or derive their goods-character from a more or less indirect causal connection with
678-464: A common topic of study and commentary for the Austrian school of economics given its emphasis on methodological individualism . This is to such an extent that unexpected consequences can be considered as a distinctive part of Austrian tenets. In " Principles of Economics ", Austrian school founder Carl Menger (1840 - 1921) noted that the relationships that occur in the economy are so intricate that
791-454: A degree of autonomy as practitioners from various disciplines share similar goals and methods. The history of the social sciences began in the Age of Enlightenment after 1651, which saw a revolution within natural philosophy , changing the basic framework by which individuals understood what was scientific. Social sciences came forth from the moral philosophy of the time and were influenced by
904-421: A diversity of research methods, collecting both quantitative and qualitative data, draw upon empirical techniques, and engage critical theory. Common modern methods include case studies, historical research , interviewing, participant observation , social network analysis , survey research, statistical analysis, and model building, among other approaches. Since the late 1970s, many sociologists have tried to make
1017-477: A drug for an unlicensed purpose. Famously, the drug Viagra was developed to lower blood pressure, with its use for treating erectile dysfunction being discovered as a side effect in clinical trials. The implementation of a profanity filter by AOL in 1996 had the unintended consequence of blocking residents of Scunthorpe , North Lincolnshire , England, from creating accounts because of a false positive . The accidental censorship of innocent language, known as
1130-662: A foundation to practical social research. Durkheim set up the first European department of sociology at the University of Bordeaux in 1895, publishing his Rules of the Sociological Method . In 1896, he established the journal L'Année sociologique . Durkheim's seminal monograph, Suicide (1897), a case study of suicide rates among Catholic and Protestant populations, distinguished sociological analysis from psychology or philosophy. Karl Marx rejected Comte's positivism but nevertheless aimed to establish
1243-452: A heavy science basis, or heavy social science basis to their degree. If they applied to read the BA . for example, but specialized in heavily science-based modules, then they will still generally be awarded the BA . Sociology is the systematic study of society, individuals' relationship to their societies, the consequences of difference, and other aspects of human social action . The meaning of
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#17327942806001356-921: A humanities-based subject is contested. In the United States the National Endowment for the Humanities includes history in its definition of humanities (as it does for applied linguistics). However, the National Research Council classifies history as a social science. The historical method comprises the techniques and guidelines by which historians use primary sources and other evidence to research and then to write history . The Social Science History Association , formed in 1976, brings together scholars from numerous disciplines interested in social history . The social science of law, jurisprudence, in common parlance, means
1469-610: A life of its own after World War II, influencing literary criticism and the Birmingham School establishment of cultural studies . Sociology evolved as an academic response to the challenges of modernity , such as industrialization , urbanization , secularization , and a perceived process of enveloping rationalization . The field generally concerns the social rules and processes that bind and separate people not only as individuals, but as members of associations , groups , communities and institutions , and includes
1582-479: A mutual contempt for one another, the former looking down on the latter as unscientific, the latter regarding the former as philistine . […] The difference comes down to the fact that social science really wants to be predictive, meaning that man is predictable, while the humanities say that he is not. The social science disciplines are branches of knowledge taught and researched at the college or university level. Social science disciplines are defined and recognized by
1695-517: A particular point in time), and a great deal of it—partly owing to the influence of Noam Chomsky —aims at formulating theories of the cognitive processing of language. However, language does not exist in a vacuum, or only in the brain, and approaches like contact linguistics, creole studies, discourse analysis , social interactional linguistics, and sociolinguistics explore language in its social context. Sociolinguistics often makes use of traditional quantitative analysis and statistics in investigating
1808-499: A people in detail, using biogenetic, archaeological, and linguistic data alongside direct observation of contemporary customs. In the 1990s and 2000s, calls for clarification of what constitutes a culture , of how an observer knows where his or her own culture ends and another begins, and other crucial topics in writing anthropology were heard. It is possible to view all human cultures as part of one large, evolving global culture. These dynamic relationships, between what can be observed on
1921-519: A result, the wild cobra population further increased. The apparent solution for the problem made the situation even worse, becoming known as the Cobra effect . Theobald Mathew 's temperance campaign in 19th-century Ireland resulted in thousands of people vowing never to drink alcohol again. This led to the consumption of diethyl ether , a much more dangerous intoxicant—owing to its high flammability—by those seeking to become intoxicated without breaking
2034-447: A rule that (unlike a rule of ethics ) is capable of enforcement through institutions. However, many laws are based on norms accepted by a community and thus have an ethical foundation. The study of law crosses the boundaries between the social sciences and humanities, depending on one's view of research into its objectives and effects. Law is not always enforceable, especially in the international relations context. It has been defined as
2147-421: A safety feature, but led to an increase in child fatalities in the mid-1990s because small children were being hit by airbags that deployed automatically during collisions. The supposed solution to this problem, moving the child seat to the back of the vehicle, led to an increase in the number of children forgotten in unattended vehicles, some of whom died under extreme temperature conditions. Risk compensation, or
2260-623: A separate trajectory, with little Marxist influence, an emphasis on rigorous experimental methodology, and a closer association with pragmatism and social psychology . In the 1920s, the Chicago school developed symbolic interactionism . Meanwhile, in the 1930s, the Frankfurt School pioneered the idea of critical theory , an interdisciplinary form of Marxist sociology drawing upon thinkers as diverse as Sigmund Freud and Friedrich Nietzsche . Critical theory would take on something of
2373-459: A strong (or entire) scientific concentration, whereas a BA underlines a majority of social science credits. This is not always necessarily the case however, and in many UK institutions students studying the BPsy , BSc , and BA follow the same curriculum as outlined by The British Psychological Society and have the same options of specialism open to them regardless of whether they choose a balance,
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#17327942806002486-561: A sub-component of complexity (in the scientific sense), the chaotic nature of the universe—and especially its quality of having small, apparently insignificant changes with far-reaching effects (e.g., the butterfly effect )—applies. In 1936, Robert K. Merton listed five possible causes of unanticipated consequences: In addition to Merton's causes, psychologist Stuart Vyse has noted that groupthink , described by Irving Janis , has been blamed for some decisions that result in unintended consequences. The creation of " no-man's lands " during
2599-555: A systematic analysis to the problem of unintended consequences of deliberate acts intended to cause social change . He emphasized that his term purposive action , "[was exclusively] concerned with 'conduct' as distinct from 'behavior.' That is, with action that involves motives and consequently a choice between various alternatives". Merton's usage included deviations from what Max Weber defined as rational social action: instrumentally rational and value rational. Merton also stated that "no blanket statement categorically affirming or denying
2712-498: A theoretical structure. The development of social science subfields became very quantitative in methodology. The interdisciplinary and cross-disciplinary nature of scientific inquiry into human behaviour, social and environmental factors affecting it, made many of the natural sciences interested in some aspects of social science methodology. Examples of boundary blurring include emerging disciplines like social research of medicine , sociobiology , neuropsychology , bioeconomics and
2825-485: A transportation method is uncommonly sighted, the likelier it could be deemed to be accident prone) Research by Vulcan, et al. found that the reduction in juvenile cyclists was because the youths considered wearing a bicycle helmet unfashionable. A health-benefit model developed at Macquarie University in Sydney suggests that, while helmet use reduces "the risk of head or brain injury by approximately two-thirds or more",
2938-423: Is a relatively autonomous term, encompassing the work of practitioners from various disciplines that share in its aims and methods. Social scientists employ a range of methods in order to analyse a vast breadth of social phenomena; from census survey data derived from millions of individuals, to the in-depth analysis of a single agent's social experiences; from monitoring what is happening on contemporary streets, to
3051-500: Is a social science that seeks to analyze and describe the production, distribution, and consumption of wealth. The word "economics" is from the Ancient Greek οἶκος ( oikos , "family, household, estate") and νόμος ( nomos , "custom, law"), and hence means "household management" or "management of the state". An economist is a person using economic concepts and data in the course of employment, or someone who has earned
3164-402: Is a very broad science that is rarely tackled as a whole, major block. Although some subfields encompass a natural science base and a social science application, others can be clearly distinguished as having little to do with the social sciences or having a lot to do with the social sciences. For example, biological psychology is considered a natural science with a social scientific application (as
3277-543: Is an academic and applied field involving the study of behaviour and mental processes. Psychology also refers to the application of such knowledge to various spheres of human activity, including problems of individuals' daily lives and the treatment of mental illness . The word psychology comes from the Ancient Greek ψυχή ( psyche , "soul" or "mind") and the suffix logy ("study"). Psychology differs from anthropology, economics, political science, and sociology in seeking to capture explanatory generalizations about
3390-547: Is an area that is offered at most undergraduate institutions. The word anthropos ( ἄνθρωπος ) in Ancient Greek means "human being" or "person". Eric Wolf described sociocultural anthropology as "the most scientific of the humanities, and the most humanistic of the sciences". The goal of anthropology is to provide a holistic account of humans and human nature. This means that, though anthropologists generally specialize in only one sub-field, they always keep in mind
3503-551: Is another key figure in the Austrian School of Economics who is notable for his comments on unintended consequences. In " The Use of Knowledge in Society " (1945) Hayek argues that a centrally planned economy cannot reach the level of efficiency of the free market economy because the necessary (and pertinent) information for decision-making is not concentrated but dispersed among a vast number of agents. Then, for Hayek,
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3616-450: Is clinical medicine), social and occupational psychology are, generally speaking, purely social sciences, whereas neuropsychology is a natural science that lacks application out of the scientific tradition entirely. In British universities, emphasis on what tenet of psychology a student has studied and/or concentrated is communicated through the degree conferred: BPsy indicates a balance between natural and social sciences, BSc indicates
3729-597: Is one of the branches of science , devoted to the study of societies and the relationships among members within those societies. The term was formerly used to refer to the field of sociology , the original "science of society", established in the 18th century. In addition to sociology, it now encompasses a wide array of academic disciplines , including anthropology , archaeology , economics , geography , linguistics , management , communication studies , psychology , culturology and political science . Positivist social scientists use methods resembling those used in
3842-515: Is philosophy, because moral and ethical persuasions shape their ideas. Law tells many of history's stories, because statutes, case law and codifications build up over time. And law is economics, because any rule about contract , tort , property law , labour law , company law and many more can have long-lasting effects on the distribution of wealth. The noun law derives from the Old English lagu , meaning something laid down or fixed and
3955-399: Is the average cost of production, it includes the fact that a tiny proportion of commodities may be found, although finding goods is hardly typical of modern manufacturing processes. Marginal utility as the source of value meant that the perceived need for an object was seen to be dictating the value, on an individual rather than a general level. The implication was that the individual mind is
4068-467: Is the continuous, systematic narrative and research into past human events as interpreted through historiographical paradigms or theories. When used as the name of a field of study , history refers to the study and interpretation of the record of humans , societies, institutions, and any topic that has changed over time. Traditionally, the study of history has been considered a part of the humanities . In modern academia , whether or not history remains
4181-431: Is the holistic "science of man", a science of the totality of human existence. The discipline deals with the integration of different aspects of the social sciences, humanities , and human biology . In the twentieth century, academic disciplines have often been institutionally divided into three broad domains. Firstly, the natural sciences seek to derive general laws through reproducible and verifiable experiments. Secondly,
4294-455: Is the source of their value. This marginalist theory solved the diamond-water paradox that had been puzzling classical economists : the fact that mankind finds diamonds to be far more valuable than water although water is far more important. Menger stressed uncertainty in the making of economic decisions, rather than relying on " homo economicus " or the rational man who was fully informed of all circumstances impinging on his decisions. This
4407-641: The Age of Revolutions , such as the Industrial Revolution and the French Revolution . The social sciences developed from the sciences ( experimental and applied ), or the systematic knowledge-bases or prescriptive practices, relating to the social improvement of a group of interacting entities . The beginnings of the social sciences in the 18th century are reflected in the grand encyclopedia of Diderot , with articles from Jean-Jacques Rousseau and other pioneers. The growth of
4520-534: The Cold War , in places such as the border between Eastern and Western Europe, and the Korean Demilitarized Zone , has led to large natural habitats. The sinking of ships in shallow waters during wartime has created many artificial coral reefs , which can be scientifically valuable and have become an attraction for recreational divers. This led to the deliberate sinking of retired ships for
4633-552: The Latin educare , or to facilitate the realization of an individual's potential and talents. It is an application of pedagogy , a body of theoretical and applied research relating to teaching and learning and draws on many disciplines such as psychology, philosophy , computer science , linguistics, neuroscience , sociology and anthropology. Geography as a discipline can be split broadly into two main sub fields: human geography and physical geography . The former focuses largely on
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4746-480: The Peltzman effect , occurs after implementation of safety measures intended to reduce injury or death (e.g. bike helmets, seatbelts, etc.). People may feel safer than they really are and take additional risks which they would not have taken without the safety measures in place. This may result in no change, or even an increase, in morbidity or mortality, rather than a decrease as intended. According to an anecdote ,
4859-658: The Scunthorpe problem , has been repeated and widely documented. In 1990, the Australian state of Victoria made safety helmets mandatory for all bicycle riders. While there was a reduction in the number of head injuries, there was also an unintended reduction in the number of juvenile cyclists—fewer cyclists obviously leads to fewer injuries, all else being equal . The risk of death and serious injury per cyclist seems to have increased, possibly because of risk compensation , or due to invisibilisation of cyclists. (the more
4972-496: The United States and Europe . Another route undertaken was initiated by Émile Durkheim , studying "social facts", and Vilfredo Pareto , opening metatheoretical ideas and individual theories. A third means developed, arising from the methodological dichotomy present, in which social phenomena were identified with and understood; this was championed by figures such as Max Weber . The fourth route taken, based in economics,
5085-754: The War on Drugs , intended to suppress the illegal drug trade , instead increased the power and profitability of drug cartels who became the primary source of the products. In CIA jargon , " blowback " describes the unintended, undesirable consequences of covert operations, such as the funding of the Afghan Mujahideen and the destabilization of Afghanistan contributing to the rise of the Taliban and Al-Qaeda . The introduction of exotic animals and plants for food, for decorative purposes, or to control unwanted species often leads to more harm than good done by
5198-411: The academic journals in which research is published, and the learned social science societies and academic departments or faculties to which their practitioners belong. Social science fields of study usually have several sub-disciplines or branches, and the distinguishing lines between these are often both arbitrary and ambiguous. The following are widely-considered to be social sciences: Anthropology
5311-496: The built environment and how space is created, viewed and managed by humans as well as the influence humans have on the space they occupy. This may involve cultural geography , transportation , health , military operations , and cities . The latter examines the natural environment and how the climate, vegetation and life, soil, oceans , water and landforms are produced and interact (is also commonly regarded as an Earth Science ). Physical geography examines phenomena related to
5424-419: The history and sociology of science . Increasingly, quantitative research and qualitative methods are being integrated in the study of human action and its implications and consequences. In the first half of the 20th century, statistics became a free-standing discipline of applied mathematics. Statistical methods were used confidently. In the contemporary period, Karl Popper and Talcott Parsons influenced
5537-533: The law , education , health , economy and trade , and art . Around the start of the 21st century, the expanding domain of economics in the social sciences has been described as economic imperialism . A distinction is usually drawn between the social sciences and the humanities . Classicist Allan Bloom writes in The Closing of the American Mind (1987): Social science and humanities have
5650-412: The measurement of earth . As a result of the two subfields using different approaches a third field has emerged, which is environmental geography . Environmental geography combines physical and human geography and looks at the interactions between the environment and humans. Other branches of geography include social geography , regional geography , and geomatics . Geographers attempt to understand
5763-408: The mental function and overt behaviour of individuals, while the other disciplines focus on creating descriptive generalizations about the functioning of social groups or situation-specific human behaviour. In practice, however, there is quite a lot of cross-fertilization that takes place among the various fields. Psychology differs from biology and neuroscience in that it is primarily concerned with
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#17327942806005876-555: The natural sciences as tools for understanding societies, and so define science in its stricter modern sense . Interpretivist or speculative social scientists, by contrast, may use social critique or symbolic interpretation rather than constructing empirically falsifiable theories, and thus treat science in its broader sense. In modern academic practice, researchers are often eclectic , using multiple methodologies (for instance, by combining both quantitative and qualitative research ). The term social research has also acquired
5989-844: The 19th and early 20th centuries. Ferdinand Saussure is considered the father of modern linguistics. Political science is an academic and research discipline that deals with the theory and practice of politics and the description and analysis of political systems and political behaviour. Fields and subfields of political science include political economy , political theory and philosophy , civics and comparative politics , theory of direct democracy , apolitical governance, participatory direct democracy, national systems, cross-national political analysis, political development, international relations, foreign policy , international law , politics, public administration, administrative behaviour, public law, judicial behaviour, and public policy . Political science also studies power in international relations and
6102-528: The Austrian school, this process of social adjustment that generates a social order in an unintendedly way is known as catallactics . For Hayek and the Austrian School, the number of individuals involved in the process of creating a social order defines the type of unintended consequence: Sociologist Robert K. Merton popularised this concept in the twentieth century. In "The Unanticipated Consequences of Purposive Social Action" (1936), Merton tried to apply
6215-532: The British government, concerned about the number of venomous cobra snakes in Delhi , offered a bounty for every dead cobra. This was a successful strategy as large numbers of snakes were killed for the reward. Eventually, enterprising people began breeding cobras for the income. When the government became aware of this, they scrapped the reward program, causing the cobra breeders to set the now-worthless snakes free. As
6328-910: The Earth in terms of physical and spatial relationships. The first geographers focused on the science of mapmaking and finding ways to precisely project the surface of the earth. In this sense, geography bridges some gaps between the natural sciences and social sciences. Historical geography is often taught in a college in a unified Department of Geography. Modern geography is an all-encompassing discipline, closely related to Geographic Information Science , that seeks to understand humanity and its natural environment. The fields of urban planning , regional science , and planetology are closely related to geography. Practitioners of geography use many technologies and methods to collect data such as Geographic Information Systems , remote sensing , aerial photography , statistics , and global positioning systems . History
6441-515: The French government between 1980 and 1981. This resulted in people vandalizing nets to collect the reward. Beginning in the 1940s and continuing into the 1960s, the Canadian federal government gave Quebec $ 2.75 per day per psychiatric patient for their cost of care, but only $ 1.25 a day per orphan. The perverse result is that the orphan children were diagnosed as mentally ill so Quebec could receive
6554-490: The Italian one, sociology slowly affirms itself and experiences the difficulty of affirming a strategic knowledge beyond philosophy and theology. Around the start of the 20th century, Enlightenment philosophy was challenged in various quarters. After the use of classical theories since the end of the scientific revolution, various fields substituted mathematics studies for experimental studies and examining equations to build
6667-402: The abstract sound system of a particular language); however, work in areas like evolutionary linguistics (the study of the origins and evolution of language) and psycholinguistics (the study of psychological factors in human language) cut across these divisions. The overwhelming majority of modern research in linguistics takes a predominantly synchronic perspective (focusing on language at
6780-460: The adjective legal comes from the Latin word lex . Linguistics investigates the cognitive and social aspects of human language. The field is divided into areas that focus on aspects of the linguistic signal, such as syntax (the study of the rules that govern the structure of sentences), semantics (the study of meaning), morphology (the study of the structure of words), phonetics (the study of speech sounds) and phonology (the study of
6893-853: The biological, linguistic, historic and cultural aspects of any problem. Since anthropology arose as a science in Western societies that were complex and industrial, a major trend within anthropology has been a methodological drive to study peoples in societies with more simple social organization, sometimes called "primitive" in anthropological literature, but without any connotation of "inferior". Today, anthropologists use terms such as "less complex" societies or refer to specific modes of subsistence or production , such as "pastoralist" or "forager" or "horticulturalist" to refer to humans living in non-industrial, non-Western cultures, such people or folk ( ethnos ) remaining of great interest within anthropology. The quest for holism leads most anthropologists to study
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#17327942806007006-517: The decrease in exercise caused by reduced cycling as a result of helmet laws is counterproductive in terms of net health. Prohibition in the 1920s United States , originally enacted to suppress the alcohol trade, drove many small-time alcohol suppliers out of business and consolidated the hold of large-scale organized crime over the illegal alcohol industry. Since alcohol was still popular, criminal organisations producing alcohol were well-funded and hence also increased their other activities. Similarly,
7119-580: The descriptive understanding of the social realm. He proposed that social ills could be remedied through sociological positivism, an epistemological approach outlined in The Course in Positive Philosophy [1830–1842] and A General View of Positivism (1844). Though Comte is generally regarded as the "Father of Sociology", the discipline was formally established by another French thinker, Émile Durkheim (1858–1917), who developed positivism as
7232-498: The discipline is as a cluster of sub-fields that examine different dimensions of society. For example, social stratification studies inequality and class structure; demography studies changes in population size or type; criminology examines criminal behaviour and deviance; and political sociology studies the interaction between society and state. Since its inception, sociological epistemologies, methods, and frames of enquiry, have significantly expanded and diverged. Sociologists use
7345-426: The discipline useful for purposes beyond the academy. The results of sociological research aid educators, lawmakers, administrators, developers, and others interested in resolving social problems and formulating public policy, through subdisciplinary areas such as evaluation research , methodological assessment, and public sociology . In the early 1970s, women sociologists began to question sociological paradigms and
7458-401: The dispersion (or lack of concentration) of information. The implication of this is that the social order (which derives from social progress, which in turn derives from the economy), would be result of a spontaneous cooperation and also an unintended consequence, being born from a process of which no individual or group had all the information available or could know all possible outcomes. In
7571-436: The domain of history produce a state of affairs entirely analogous to [...] the realm of unconscious nature. The ends of the actions are intended, but the results which actually follow from these actions are not intended; or when they do seem to correspond to the end intended, they ultimately have consequences quite other than those intended. Historical events thus appear on the whole to be likewise governed by chance. But where on
7684-488: The early part of the 20th century, economics has focused largely on measurable quantities, employing both theoretical models and empirical analysis. Quantitative models, however, can be traced as far back as the physiocratic school . Economic reasoning has been increasingly applied in recent decades to other social situations such as politics , law, psychology , history , religion , marriage and family life, and other social interactions. The expanding domain of economics in
7797-540: The examination of the organization and development of human social life. The sociological field of interest ranges from the analysis of short contacts between anonymous individuals on the street to the study of global social processes . In the terms of sociologists Peter L. Berger and Thomas Luckmann , social scientists seek an understanding of the Social Construction of Reality . Most sociologists work in one or more subfields . One useful way to describe
7910-466: The file, two of them Streisand's attorneys. The lawsuit drew attention to the image, resulting in 420,000 people visiting the site. The Streisand Effect was named after this incident, describing when an attempt to censor or remove a certain piece of information instead draws attention to the material being suppressed, resulting in the material instead becoming widely known, reported on, and distributed. Passenger-side airbags in motorcars were intended as
8023-419: The frequency of features, while some disciplines, like contact linguistics, focus on qualitative analysis. While certain areas of linguistics can thus be understood as clearly falling within the social sciences, other areas, like acoustic phonetics and neurolinguistics , draw on the natural sciences. Linguistics draws only secondarily on the humanities, which played a rather greater role in linguistic inquiry in
8136-442: The furtherance of the social sciences. Researchers continue to search for a unified consensus on what methodology might have the power and refinement to connect a proposed "grand theory" with the various midrange theories that, with considerable success, continue to provide usable frameworks for massive, growing data banks; for more, see consilience . The social sciences will for the foreseeable future be composed of different zones in
8249-510: The general laws derived in physics or chemistry, or they may explain individual cases through more general principles, as in many fields of psychology. Anthropology (like some fields of history) does not easily fit into one of these categories, and different branches of anthropology draw on one or more of these domains. Within the United States, anthropology is divided into four sub-fields: archaeology, physical or biological anthropology , anthropological linguistics , and cultural anthropology . It
8362-531: The ground, as opposed to what can be observed by compiling many local observations remain fundamental in any kind of anthropology, whether cultural, biological, linguistic or archaeological. Communication studies deals with processes of human communication , commonly defined as the sharing of symbols to create meaning . The discipline encompasses a range of topics, from face-to-face conversation to mass media outlets such as television broadcasting. Communication studies also examine how messages are interpreted through
8475-473: The humanities generally study local traditions, through their history, literature, music, and arts, with an emphasis on understanding particular individuals, events, or eras. Finally, the social sciences have generally attempted to develop scientific methods to understand social phenomena in a generalizable way, though usually with methods distinct from those of the natural sciences. The anthropological social sciences often develop nuanced descriptions rather than
8588-523: The humanities. As a social science, the discipline often overlaps with sociology, psychology, anthropology, biology, political science, economics, and public policy, among others. From a humanities perspective, communication is concerned with rhetoric and persuasion (traditional graduate programs in communication studies trace their history to the rhetoricians of Ancient Greece ). The field applies to outside disciplines as well, including engineering, architecture, mathematics, and information science. Economics
8701-402: The idea of (apparent) unintended consequences: In nature [...] there are only blind, unconscious agencies acting upon one another, [...] In the history of society, on the contrary, the actors are all endowed with consciousness, are men acting with deliberation or passion, working towards definite goals; nothing happens without a conscious purpose, without an intended aim. [...] For here, also, on
8814-429: The idea of uncertainty and chance in social dynamics (and thus unintended consequences beyond results of perfectly defined laws) was only apparent, (if not rejected) since social actions were directed and produced by deliberate human intention. While discerning between the forces that generate changes in nature and those that generate changes in history in his discussion of Ludwig Feuerbach , Friedrich Engels touched on
8927-760: The interaction of mental processes and behaviour, and of the overall processes of a system, and not simply the biological or neural processes themselves, though the subfield of neuropsychology combines the study of the actual neural processes with the study of the mental effects they have subjectively produced. Many people associate psychology with clinical psychology , which focuses on assessment and treatment of problems in living and psychopathology. In reality, psychology has myriad specialties including social psychology , developmental psychology , cognitive psychology , educational psychology , industrial-organizational psychology , mathematical psychology , neuropsychology, and quantitative analysis of behaviour. Psychology
9040-404: The introduced species. The protection of the steel industry in the United States reduced production of steel in the United States, increased costs to users, and increased unemployment in associated industries. In 2003, Barbra Streisand unsuccessfully sued Kenneth Adelman and Pictopia.com for posting a photograph of her home online. Before the lawsuit had been filed, only 6 people had downloaded
9153-405: The investigation of ancient historical documents. The methods originally rooted in classical sociology and statistical mathematics have formed the basis for research in other disciplines, such as political science, media studies, and marketing and market research . Principles of Economics (Menger book) Menger advanced his theory that the marginal utility of goods, rather than labor inputs,
9266-507: The invisibility of women in sociological studies, analysis, and courses. In 1969, feminist sociologists challenged the discipline's androcentrism at the American Sociological Association's annual conference. This led to the founding of the organization Sociologists for Women in Society, and, eventually, a new sociology journal, Gender & Society . Today, the sociology of gender is considered to be one of
9379-528: The larger amount of money. This psychiatric misdiagnosis affected up to 20,000 people, and the children are known as the Duplessis Orphans in reference to the Premier of Quebec who oversaw the scheme, Maurice Duplessis . There have been attempts to curb the consumption of sugary beverages by imposing a tax on them. However, a study found that the reduced consumption was only temporary. Also, there
9492-449: The law was passed, it was suggested the law be repealed if gun rights lobbyists agree not to resist the introduction of "smart" firearms. Drug prohibition can lead drug traffickers to prefer stronger, more dangerous substances, that can be more easily smuggled and distributed than other, less concentrated substances. Televised drug prevention advertisements may lead to increased drug use. Social sciences Social science
9605-459: The letter of their pledge. It was thought that adding south-facing conservatories to British houses would reduce energy consumption by providing extra insulation and warmth from the sun. However, people tended to use the conservatories as living areas, installing heating and ultimately increasing overall energy consumption. A reward for lost nets found along the Normandy coast was offered by
9718-430: The most efficient allocation of resources, contributes to overall economic efficiency ; the merchant's reaction to price signals helps to ensure that the allocation of resources accurately reflects the structure of consumer preferences; and the drive to better our condition contributes to economic growth ." Influenced by 19th century positivism and Charles Darwin 's evolution , for both Friedrich Engels and Karl Marx,
9831-453: The most prominent sub-fields in the discipline. New sociological sub-fields continue to appear — such as community studies , computational sociology , environmental sociology , network analysis, actor-network theory , gender studies, and a growing list, many of which are cross-disciplinary in nature. Additional applied or interdisciplinary fields related to the social sciences or are applied social sciences include: The origin of
9944-483: The original intended goal and the product derived from conflicts would be a marxist equivalent to «unintended consequences.» This social conflicts would happen as a result of a competitive society, and also lead society to sabotage itself and prevent historical progress. Thus, historical progress (in Marxist terms) should eliminate these conflicts and make unintended consequences predictable. Unintended consequences are
10057-474: The political, cultural, economic, and social dimensions of their contexts. Communication is institutionalized under many different names at different universities, including communication , communication studies , speech communication , rhetorical studies , communication science , media studies , communication arts , mass communication , media ecology , and communication and media science . Communication studies integrate aspects of both social sciences and
10170-413: The practical feasibility of all social planning is warranted." More recently, the law of unintended consequences has come to be used as an adage or idiomatic warning that an intervention in a complex system tends to create unanticipated and often undesirable outcomes. Akin to Murphy's law , it is commonly used as a wry or humorous warning against the hubristic belief that humans can fully control
10283-472: The price system in the free market allows the members of a society to anonymously coordinate for the most efficient use of resources, for example, in a situation of scarcity of a raw material, the price increase would coordinate the actions of an uncountable amount of individuals "in the right direction". The development of this system of interactions would allow the progress of society, and individuals would carry it out without knowing all its implications, given
10396-480: The purpose of replacing coral reefs lost to global warming and other factors. In medicine , most drugs have unintended consequences (' side effects ') associated with their use. However, some are beneficial. For instance, aspirin , a pain reliever , is also an anticoagulant that can help prevent heart attacks and reduce the severity and damage from thrombotic strokes . The existence of beneficial side effects also leads to off-label use —prescription or use of
10509-417: The research of, and sometimes distinct in approach toward, the field. The term "social science" may refer either to the specific sciences of society established by thinkers such as Comte, Durkheim, Marx, and Weber, or more generally to all disciplines outside of "noble science" and arts . By the late 19th century, the academic social sciences were constituted of five fields: jurisprudence and amendment of
10622-664: The satisfaction of human needs. [...] Thus quinine would cease to be a good if the diseases it serves to cure should disappear, since the only need with the satisfaction of which it is causally connected would no longer exist. But the disappearance of the usefulness of quinine would have the further consequence that a large part of the corresponding goods of higher order would also be deprived of their goods-character. The inhabitants of quinine-producing countries, who currently earn their livings by cutting and peeling cinchona trees, would suddenly find that not only their stocks of cinchona bark, but also, in consequence, their cinchona trees,
10735-419: The social sciences has been described as economic imperialism. Education encompasses teaching and learning specific skills, and also something less tangible but more profound: the imparting of knowledge, positive judgement and well-developed wisdom. Education has as one of its fundamental aspects the imparting of culture from generation to generation (see socialization ). To educate means 'to draw out', from
10848-413: The social sciences is also reflected in other specialized encyclopedias. The term "social science" was coined in French by Mirabeau in 1767, before becoming a distinct conceptual field in the nineteenth century. Social science was influenced by positivism, focusing on knowledge based on actual positive sense experience and avoiding the negative; metaphysical speculation was avoided. Auguste Comte used
10961-426: The social sciences, uses methods and techniques that relate to the kinds of inquiries sought: primary sources such as historical documents, interviews, and official records, as well as secondary sources such as scholarly articles , are used in building and testing theories. Empirical methods include survey research, statistical analysis or econometrics , case studies , experiments, and model building. Psychology
11074-423: The source of economic value. Although Menger accepted the marginal utility theory , he made deviations from the work of other neoclassical pioneers . Most importantly he fundamentally rejected the use of mathematical methods insisting that the function of economics was to investigate the essences rather than the specific quantities of economic phenomena. Ludwig von Mises called the book the best introduction to
11187-456: The supply or demand for their product. Thus the price of the finished product bears no resemblance to the costs of production, since the two represent market conditions at very different points in time. The labour theory of value was the explanation that had been reached by Adam Smith among others, and the Marxist school of economics still relies on this theory. The labour theory of value
11300-498: The surface accident holds sway, there actually it is always governed by inner, hidden laws, and it is only a matter of discovering these laws. For his part, for Karl Marx what can be understood as unintended consequences are actually consequences that should be expected but are obtained unconsciously. These consequences (that no one consciously sought) would be (in the same way as it is for Engels) product of conflicts that confront actions from countless individuals. The deviation between
11413-525: The survey can be traced back at least as early as the Domesday Book in 1086, while some scholars pinpoint the origin of demography to 1663 with the publication of John Graunt 's Natural and Political Observations upon the Bills of Mortality . Social research began most intentionally, however, with the positivist philosophy of science in the 19th century. In contemporary usage, "social research"
11526-399: The term science sociale to describe the field, taken from the ideas of Charles Fourier ; Comte also referred to the field as social physics . Following this period, five paths of development sprang forth in the social sciences, influenced by Comte in other fields. One route that was taken was the rise of social research. Large statistical surveys were undertaken in various parts of
11639-505: The theory of great powers and superpowers . Political science is methodologically diverse, although recent years have witnessed an upsurge in the use of the scientific method , that is, the proliferation of formal-deductive model building and quantitative hypothesis testing. Approaches to the discipline include rational choice , classical political philosophy, interpretivism , structuralism , and behaviouralism , realism , pluralism, and institutionalism . Political science, as one of
11752-413: The tools and appliances applicable only to the production of quinine, and above all the specialized labor services, by means of which they previously earned their livings, would at once lose their goods-character, since all these things would, under the changed circumstances, no longer have any causal relationship with the satisfaction of human needs. Economist and philosopher Friedrich Hayek (1899 – 1992)
11865-515: The unintended consequences of interest rate regulation in his letter to Sir John Somers, Member of Parliament. The idea was also discussed by Adam Smith , the Scottish Enlightenment , and consequentialism (judging by results). The invisible hand theorem is an example of the unintended consequences of agents acting in their self-interest. As Andrew S. Skinner puts it: "The individual undertaker ( entrepreneur ), seeking
11978-423: The unit of analysis is the individual agent, such as a household or firm, and macroeconomics , where the unit of analysis is an economy as a whole. Another division of the subject distinguishes positive economics, which seeks to predict and explain economic phenomena, from normative economics , which orders choices and actions by some criterion; such orderings necessarily involve subjective value judgments. Since
12091-444: The whole, in spite of the consciously desired aims of all individuals, accident apparently reigns on the surface. That which is willed happens but rarely; in the majority of instances the numerous desired ends cross and conflict with one another, or these ends themselves are from the outset incapable of realization, or the means of attaining them are insufficient. Thus the conflicts of innumerable individual wills and individual actions in
12204-478: The word comes from the suffix -logy , which means "study of", derived from Ancient Greek, and the stem soci- , which is from the Latin word socius , meaning "companion", or society in general. Auguste Comte (1798–1857) coined the term sociology to describe a way to apply natural science principles and techniques to the social world in 1838. Comte endeavoured to unify history, psychology and economics through
12317-407: The world around them, not to presuppose a belief in predestination or a lack or a disbelief in that of free will. Possible causes of unintended consequences include the world's inherent complexity (parts of a system responding to changes in the environment), perverse incentives , human stupidity , self-deception , failure to account for human nature, or other cognitive or emotional biases. As
12430-403: Was a deviation from classical and neoclassical economic thought. Menger asserted that such perfect knowledge never exists, and that therefore all economic activity implies risk. The entrepreneurs ' role was to collect and evaluate information and to act on those risks. Menger saw that time was the root of uncertainty within economics. As production takes time then producers have no certainty on
12543-634: Was an increase in the consumption of beer among households. The New Jersey Childproof Handgun Law , which was intended to protect children from accidental discharge of firearms by forcing all future firearms sold in New Jersey to contain "smart" safety features , has delayed, if not stopped entirely, the introduction of such firearms to New Jersey markets. The wording of the law caused significant public backlash, fuelled by gun rights lobbyists , and several shop owners offering such guns received death threats and stopped stocking them. In 2014, 12 years after
12656-557: Was developed and furthered economic knowledge as a hard science . The last path was the correlation of knowledge and social values ; the antipositivism and verstehen sociology of Max Weber firmly demanded this distinction. In this route, theory (description) and prescription were non-overlapping formal discussions of a subject. The foundation of social sciences in the West implies conditioned relationships between progressive and traditional spheres of knowledge. In some contexts, such as
12769-405: Was that the value of an object was reliant on the labour that had gone into producing it, including any training or investment that supplemented the labour. According to neoclassical economists the labour theory of value could not explain fluctuating values for different kinds of labour, nor did it explain how found goods could be more valuable than extracted goods. As the price of a commodity
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