3.2: Quantitative Data
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The graph for quantitative data looks similar to a bar graph, except there are some major differences. First, in a bar graph the categories can be put in any order on the horizontal axis. There is no set order for these data values. You can’t say how the data is distributed based on the shape, since the shape can change just by putting the categories in different orders. With quantitative data, the data are in specific orders, since you are dealing with numbers. With quantitative data, you can talk about a distribution, since the shape only changes a little bit depending on how many categories you set up. This is called a frequency distribution .
This leads to the second difference from bar graphs. In a bar graph, the categories that you made in the frequency table were determined by you. In quantitative data, the categories are numerical categories, and the numbers are determined by how many categories (or what are called classes) you choose. If two people have the same number of categories, then they will have the same frequency distribution. Whereas in qualitative data, there can be many different categories depending on the point of view of the author.
The third difference is that the categories touch with quantitative data, and there will be no gaps in the graph. The reason that bar graphs have gaps is to show that the categories do not continue on, like they do in quantitative data. Since the graph for quantitative data is different from qualitative data, it is given a new name. The name of the graph is a histogram . To create a histogram, you must first create the frequency distribution. The idea of a frequency distribution is to take the interval that the data spans and divide it up into equal subintervals called classes.
Summary of the Steps Involved in Making a Frequency Distribution
- Find the range = largest value – smallest value
- Pick the number of classes to use. Usually the number of classes is between five and twenty. Five classes are used if there are a small number of data points and twenty classes if there are a large number of data points (over 1000 data points). (Note: categories will now be called classes from now on.)
- Class width = \(\dfrac{\text { range }}{\# \text { classes }}\) Always round up to the next integer (even if the answer is already a whole number go to the next integer). If you don’t do this, your last class will not contain your largest data value, and you would have to add another class just for it. If you round up, then your largest data value will fall in the last class, and there are no issues.
- Create the classes. Each class has limits that determine which values fall in each class. To find the class limits, set the smallest value as the lower class limit for the first class. Then add the class width to the lower class limit to get the next lower class limit. Repeat until you get all the classes. The upper class limit for a class is one less than the lower limit for the next class.
- In order for the classes to actually touch, then one class needs to start where the previous one ends. This is known as the class boundary. To find the class boundaries, subtract 0.5 from the lower class limit and add 0.5 to the upper class limit.
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Sometimes it is useful to find the class midpoint. The process is
Midpoint \(=\dfrac{\text { lower limit +upper limit }}{2}\) - To figure out the number of data points that fall in each class, go through each data value and see which class boundaries it is between. Utilizing tally marks may be helpful in counting the data values. The frequency for a class is the number of data values that fall in the class.
Note
The above description is for data values that are whole numbers. If you data value has decimal places, then your class width should be rounded up to the nearest value with the same number of decimal places as the original data. In addition, your class boundaries should have one more decimal place than the original data. As an example, if your data have one decimal place, then the class width would have one decimal place, and the class boundaries are formed by adding and subtracting 0.05 from each class limit.
Example \(\PageIndex{1}\) creating a frequency table
Example \(\PageIndex{1}\) contains the amount of rent paid every month for 24 students from a statistics course. Make a relative frequency distribution using 7 classes.
| 1500 | 1350 | 350 | 1200 | 850 | 900 |
| 1500 | 1150 | 1500 | 900 | 1400 | 1100 |
| 1250 | 600 | 610 | 960 | 890 | 1325 |
| 900 | 800 | 2550 | 495 | 1200 | 690 |
Solution
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Find the range:
largest value - smallest value \(= 2550-350=2200\) -
Pick the number of classes:
The directions to say to use 7 classes. -
Find the class width:
width \(=\dfrac{\text { range }}{7}=\dfrac{2200}{7} \approx 314.286\)
Round up to 315
\(\color{text}{Always round up to the next integer even if the width is already an integer.}\) -
Find the class limits:
Start at the smallest value. This is the lower class limit for the first class. Add the width to get the lower limit of the next class. Keep adding the width to get all the lower limits.
\(350+315=665,665+315=980,980+315=1295 \rightleftharpoons\),
The upper limit is one less than the next lower limit: so for the first class the upper class limit would be \(665-1=664\).
When you have all 7 classes, make sure the last number, in this case the 2550, is at least as large as the largest value in the data. If not, you made a mistake somewhere. -
Find the class boundaries:
Subtract 0.5 from the lower class limit to get the class boundaries. Add 0.5 to the upper class limit for the last class's boundary.
\(350-0.5=349.5, \quad 665-0.5=664.5,\quad 980-0.5=979.5, \quad 1295-0.5=1294.5 \rightleftharpoons\)
Every value in the data should fall into exactly one of the classes. No data values should fall right on the boundary of two classes. -
Find the class midpoints:
midpoint \(=\dfrac{\text { lower limit }+\text { upper limit }}{2}\)
\(\dfrac{350+664}{2}=507, \dfrac{665+979}{2}=822, \rightleftharpoons\) -
Tally and find the frequency of the data:
Go through the data and put a tally mark in the appropriate class for each piece of data by looking to see which class boundaries the data value is between. Fill in the frequency by changing each of the tallies into a number.
| Class Limits | Class Boundaries | Class Midpoint | Tally | Frequency |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 350-664 | 349.5-664.5 | 507 | |||| | 4 |
| 665-979 | 664.5-979.5 | 822 | \(\cancel{||||}\) ||| | 8 |
| 980-1294 | 979.5-1294.5 | 1137 | \(\cancel{||||}\) | 5 |
| 1295-1609 | 1294.5-1609.5 | 1452 | \(\cancel{||||}\) | | 6 |
| 1610-1924 | 1609.5-1924.5 | 1767 | 0 | |
| 1925-2239 | 1924.5-2239.5 | 2082 | 0 | |
| 2240-2554 | 2239.5-2554.5 | 2397 | | | 1 |
Make sure the total of the frequencies is the same as the number of data points.
R command for a frequency distribution:
To create a frequency distribution:
summary(variable) – so you can find out the minimum and maximum.
breaks = seq(min, number above max, by = class width)
breaks – so you can see the breaks that R made.
variable.cut=cut(variable, breaks, right=FALSE) – this will cut up the data into the classes.
variable.freq=table(variable.cut) – this will create the frequency table.
variable.freq – this will display the frequency table.
For the data in Example \(\PageIndex{1}\), the R command would be:
rent<-c(1500, 1350, 350, 1200, 850, 900, 1500, 1150, 1500, 900, 1400, 1100, 1250, 600, 610, 960, 890, 1325, 900, 800, 2550, 495, 1200, 690) summary(rent)
Output:
\(\begin{array}{cccccc}{\text{Min} }&{1\text{st Qu.}}& {\text{Median}} & {\text{Mean}} & {3\text{rd Qu.}} & {\text{Max}} \\ {350} & {837.5} & {1030 .0} & {1082.0} & {1331.0} & {2550 .0} \end{array}\)
breaks=seq(350, 3000, by = 315)
breaks
Output:
[1] 350<PHONE_NUMBER> 1610 1925 2240 2555 2870
These are your lower limits of the frequency distribution. You can now write your own table.
rent.cut=cut(rent, breaks, right=FALSE)
rent.freq=table(rent.cut)
Output:
rent.cut
\(\begin{array}{cccccccc}{[350,665)} & {[665,980)} & {[980,1.3 e+03)} & {[1.3e+03, 1.61e+03)} & {[1.61e+03, 1.92e+03)} & {[1.92e+03, 2.24e+03)} & {[2.24e+03, 2.56e+03)} & {[2.56e+03, 2.87e+03)} \\ {4} & {8} & {5} & {6}& {0} & {0} & {1} & {0}\end{array}\)
It is difficult to determine the basic shape of the distribution by looking at the frequency distribution. It would be easier to look at a graph. The graph of a frequency distribution for quantitative data is called a frequency histogram or just histogram for short.
Definition \(\PageIndex{1}\): Histogram
A Histogram is a graph of the frequencies on the vertical axis and the class boundaries on the horizontal axis. Rectangles where the height is the frequency and the width is the class width are drawn for each class.
Example \(\PageIndex{2}\: Drawing a Histogram
Draw a histogram for the distribution from Example \(\PageIndex{1}\).
Solution
The class boundaries are plotted on the horizontal axis and the frequencies are plotted on the vertical axis. You can plot the midpoints of the classes instead of the class boundaries. Graph 2.2.1 was created using the midpoints because it was easier to do with the software that created the graph. On R, the command is
hist(variable, col="type in what color you want", breaks, main="type the title you want", xlab="type the label you want for the horizontal axis",
ylim=c(0, number above maximum frequency) – produces histogram with specified color and using the breaks you made for the frequency distribution.
For this example, the command in R would be (assuming you created a frequency distribution in R as described previously):
hist(rent, col="blue", breaks, right=FALSE, main="Monthly Rent Paid by Students", ylim=c(0,8) xlab="Monthly Rent ($)")
If no frequency distribution was created before the histogram, then the command would be:
hist(variable, col="type in what color you want", number of classes, main="type the title you want", xlab="type the label you want for the horizontal axis") – produces histogram with specified color and number of classes (though the number of classes is an estimate and R will create the number of classes near this value).
For this example, the R command without a frequency distribution created first would be:
hist(rent, col="blue", 7, main="Monthly Rent Paid by Students", xlab="Monthly Rent ($)")
Notice the graph has the axes labeled, the tick marks are labeled on each axis, and there is a title.
Reviewing the graph you can see that most of the students pay around $750 per month for rent, with about $1500 being the other common value. You can see from the graph, that most students pay between $600 and $1600 per month for rent. Of course, these values are just estimates from the graph. There is a large gap between the $1500 class and the highest data value. This seems to say that one student is paying a great deal more than everyone else. This value could be considered an outlier. An outlier is a data value that is far from the rest of the values. It may be an unusual value or a mistake. It is a data value that should be investigated. In this case, the student lives in a very expensive part of town, thus the value is not a mistake, and is just very unusual. There are other aspects that can be discussed, but first some other concepts need to be introduced.
Frequencies are helpful, but understanding the relative size each class is to the total is also useful. To find this you can divide the frequency by the total to create a relative frequency. If you have the relative frequencies for all of the classes, then you have a relative frequency distribution.
Definition \(\PageIndex{2}\)
Relative Frequency Distribution
A variation on a frequency distribution is a relative frequency distribution. Instead of giving the frequencies for each class, the relative frequencies are calculated.
Relative frequency \(=\dfrac{\text { frequency }}{\# \text { of data points }}\)
This gives you percentages of data that fall in each class.
Example \(\PageIndex{3}\) creating a relative frequency table
Find the relative frequency for the grade data.
Solution
From Example \(\PageIndex{1}\), the frequency distribution is reproduced in Example \(\PageIndex{2}\).
| Class Limits | Class Boundaries | Class Midpoint | Frequency |
|---|---|---|---|
| 350-664 | 349.5-664.5 | 507 | 4 |
| 665-979 | 664.5-979.5 | 822 | 8 |
| 980-1294 | 979.5-1294.5 | 1127 | 5 |
| 1295-1609 | 1294.5-1609.5 | 1452 | 6 |
| 1610-1924 | 1609.5-1924.5 | 1767 | 0 |
| 1925-2239 | 1924.5-2239.5 | 2082 | 0 |
| 2240-2554 | 2239.5-2554.5 | 2397 | 1 |
Divide each frequency by the number of data points.
\(\dfrac{4}{24}=0.17, \dfrac{8}{24}=0.33, \dfrac{5}{24}=0.21, \rightleftharpoons\)
| Class Limits | Class Boundaries | Class Midpoint | Frequency | Relative Frequency |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 350-664 | 349.5-664.5 | 507 | 4 | 0.17 |
| 665-979 | 664.5-979.5 | 822 | 8 | 0.33 |
| 980-1294 | 979.5-1294.5 | 1127 | 5 | 0.21 |
| 1295-1609 | 1294.5-1609.5 | 1452 | 6 | 0.25 |
| 1610-1924 | 1609.5-1924.5 | 1767 | 0 | 0 |
| 1925-2239 | 1924.5-2239.5 | 2082 | 0 | 0 |
| 2240-2554 | 2239.5-2554.5 | 2397 | 1 | 0.04 |
| Total | 24 | 1 |
The relative frequencies should add up to 1 or 100%. (This might be off a little due to rounding errors.)
The graph of the relative frequency is known as a relative frequency histogram. It looks identical to the frequency histogram, but the vertical axis is relative frequency instead of just frequencies.
Example \(\PageIndex{4}\) drawing a relative frequency histogram
Draw a relative frequency histogram for the grade distribution from Example \(\PageIndex{1}\).
Solution
The class boundaries are plotted on the horizontal axis and the relative frequencies are plotted on the vertical axis. (This is not easy to do in R, so use another technology to graph a relative frequency histogram.)
Notice the shape is the same as the frequency distribution.
Another useful piece of information is how many data points fall below a particular class boundary. As an example, a teacher may want to know how many students received below an 80%, a doctor may want to know how many adults have cholesterol below 160, or a manager may want to know how many stores gross less than $2000 per day. This is known as a cumulative frequency . If you want to know what percent of the data falls below a certain class boundary, then this would be a cumulative relative frequency . For cumulative frequencies you are finding how many data values fall below the upper class limit.
To create a cumulative frequency distribution , count the number of data points that are below the upper class boundary, starting with the first class and working up to the top class. The last upper class boundary should have all of the data points below it. Also include the number of data points below the lowest class boundary, which is zero.
Example \(\PageIndex{5}\) creating a cumulative frequency distribution
Create a cumulative frequency distribution for the data in Example \(\PageIndex{1}\).
Solution
The frequency distribution for the data is in Example \(\PageIndex{2}\).
| Class Limits | Class Boundaries | Class Midpoint | Frequency |
|---|---|---|---|
| 350-664 | 349.5-664.5 | 507 | 4 |
| 665-979 | 664.5-979.5 | 822 | 8 |
| 980-1294 | 979.5-1294.5 | 1127 | 5 |
| 1295-1609 | 1294.5-1609.5 | 1452 | 6 |
| 1610-1924 | 1609.5-1924.5 | 1767 | 0 |
| 1925-2239 | 1924.5-2239.5 | 2082 | 0 |
| 2240-2554 | 2239.5-2554.5 | 2397 | 1 |
Now ask yourself how many data points fall below each class boundary. Below 349.5, there are 0 data points. Below 664.5 there are 4 data points, below 979.5, there are 4 + 8 = 12 data points, below 1294.5 there are 4 + 8 + 5 = 17 data points, and continue this process until you reach the upper class boundary. This is summarized in Example \(\PageIndex{4}\).
To produce cumulative frequencies in R, you need to have performed the commands for the frequency distribution. Once you have complete that, then use variable.cumfreq=cumsum(variable.freq) – creates the cumulative frequencies for the variable
cumfreq0=c(0,variable.cumfreq) – creates a cumulative frequency table for the variable.
cumfreq0 – displays the cumulative frequency table.
For this example the command would be:
rent.cumfreq=cumsum(rent.freq)
cumfreq0=c(0,rent.cumfreq)
cumfreq0
Output:
\(\begin{array}{ccccccccc}{}&{[350,665)} & {[665,980)} & {[980,1.3e+03)}& {[1.3e+03, 1.61e+03)}&{[1.61e+03, 1.92e+03)}&{[1.92e+03,2.24e+03)}&{[2.24e+03, 2.56e+03)}&{[2.56e+03, 2.87e+03)} \\ {0}&{4} & {12}&{17}&{23}&{23}&{23}&{24}&{24}\end{array}\)
Now type this into a table. See Example \(\PageIndex{4}\).
| Class Limits | Class Boundaries | Class Midpoint | Frequency | Cumulative Frequency |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 350-664 | 349.5-664.5 | 507 | 4 | 4 |
| 665-979 | 664.5-979.5 | 822 | 8 | 12 |
| 980-1294 | 979.5-1294.5 | 1127 | 5 | 17 |
| 1295-1609 | 1294.5-1609.5 | 1452 | 6 | 23 |
| 1610-1924 | 1609.5-1924.5 | 1767 | 0 | 23 |
| 1925-2239 | 1924.5-2239.5 | 2082 | 0 | 23 |
| 2240-2554 | 2239.5-2554.5 | 2397 | 1 | 24 |
Again, it is hard to look at the data the way it is. A graph would be useful. The graph for cumulative frequency is called an ogive (o-jive). To create an ogive, first create a scale on both the horizontal and vertical axes that will fit the data. Then plot the points of the class upper class boundary versus the cumulative frequency. Make sure you include the point with the lowest class boundary and the 0 cumulative frequency. Then just connect the dots.
Example \(\PageIndex{6}\) drawing an ogive
Draw an ogive for the data in Example \(\PageIndex{1}\).
Solution
In R, the commands would be:
plot(breaks,cumfreq0, main="title you want to use", xlab="label you want to use", ylab="label you want to use", ylim=c(0, number above maximum cumulative frequency) – plots the ogive
lines(breaks,cumfreq0) – connects the dots on the ogive
For this example, the commands would be:
Plot(breaks,cumfreq0, main=”Cumulative Frequency for Monthly Rent”, xlab=”Monthly Rent ($)”, ylab=”Cumulative Frequency”, ylim=c(0,25))
lines(breaks,cumfreq0)
The usefulness of a ogive is to allow the reader to find out how many students pay less than a certain value, and also what amount of monthly rent is paid by a certain number of students. As an example, suppose you want to know how many students pay less than $1500 a month in rent, then you can go up from the $1500 until you hit the graph and then you go over to the cumulative frequency axes to see what value corresponds to this value. It appears that around 20 students pay less than $1500. (See Graph 2.2.4 .)
Also, if you want to know the amount that 15 students pay less than, then you start at 15 on the vertical axis and then go over to the graph and down to the horizontal axis where the line intersects the graph. You can see that 15 students pay less than about $1200 a month. (See Graph 2.2.5 .)
If you graph the cumulative relative frequency then you can find out what percentage is below a certain number instead of just the number of people below a certain value.
Shapes of the distribution:
When you look at a distribution, look at the basic shape. There are some basic shapes that are seen in histograms. Realize though that some distributions have no shape. The common shapes are symmetric, skewed, and uniform. Another interest is how many peaks a graph may have. This is known as modal.
Symmetric means that you can fold the graph in half down the middle and the two sides will line up. You can think of the two sides as being mirror images of each other. Skewed means one “tail” of the graph is longer than the other. The graph is skewed in the direction of the longer tail (backwards from what you would expect). A uniform graph has all the bars the same height.
Modal refers to the number of peaks. Unimodal has one peak and bimodal has two peaks. Usually if a graph has more than two peaks, the modal information is not longer of interest.
Other important features to consider are gaps between bars, a repetitive pattern, how spread out is the data, and where the center of the graph is.
Examples of Graphs :
This graph is roughly symmetric and unimodal:
This graph is symmetric and bimodal:
This graph is skewed to the right:
This graph is skewed to the left and has a gap:
This graph is uniform since all the bars are the same height:
Example \(\PageIndex{7}\) creating a frequency distribution, histogram, and ogive
The following data represents the percent change in tuition levels at public, fouryear colleges (inflation adjusted) from 2008 to 2013 (Weissmann, 2013). Create a frequency distribution, histogram, and ogive for the data.
| 19.5% | 40.8% | 57.0% | 15.1% | 17.4% | 5.2% | 13.0% |
| 15.6% | 51.5% | 15.6% | 14.5% | 22.4% | 19.5% | 31.3% |
| 21.7% | 27.0% | 13.1% | 26.8% | 24.3% | 38.0% | 21.1% |
| 9.3% | 46.7% | 14.5% | 78.4% | 67.3% | 21.1% | 22.4% |
| 5.3% | 17.3% | 17.5% | 36.6% | 72.0% | 63.2% | 15.1% |
| 2.2% | 17.5% | 36.7% | 2.8% | 16.2% | 20.5% | 17.8% |
| 30.1% | 63.6% | 17.8% | 23.2% | 25.3% | 21.4% | 28.5% |
| 9.4% |
Solution
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Find the range:
largest value - smallest value = \(78.4\)% \(-2.2\)% \(=76.2\)% -
Pick the number of classes:
Since there are 50 data points, then around 6 to 8 classes should be used. Let's use 8. -
Find the class width:
width \(=\dfrac{\text { range }}{8}=\dfrac{76.2 \%}{8} \approx 9.525 \%\)
Since the data has one decimal place, then the class width should round to one decimal place. Make sure you round up.
width \(=9.6\)% -
Find the class limits:
\(2.2 \%+9.6 \%=11.8 \%, 11.8 \%+9.6 \%=21.4 \%, 21.4 \%+9.6 \%=31.0 \%, \leftrightharpoons\) -
Find the class boundaries:
Since the data has one decimal place, the class boundaries should have two decimal places, so subtract 0.05 from the lower class limit to get the class boundaries. Add 0.05 to the upper class limit for the last class’s boundary.
\(2.2-0.05=2.15 \%, 11.8-0.05=11.75 \%, 21.4-0.05=21.35 \% \leftrightharpoons\)
Every value in the data should fall into exactly one of the classes. No data values should fall right on the boundary of two classes. -
Find the class midpoints:
midpoint \(=\dfrac{\text { lower limt }+\text { upper limit }}{2}\)
\(\dfrac{2.2+11.7}{2}=6.95 \%, \dfrac{11.8+21.3}{2}=16.55 \%, \leftrightharpoons\) - Tally and find the frequency of the data:
| Class Limits | Class Boundaries | Class Midpoint | Tally | Frequency | Relative Frequency | Cumulative Frequency |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2.2-11.7 | 2.15-11.75 | 6.95 | \(\cancel{||||} |\) | 6 | 0.12 | 6 |
| 11.8-21.3 | 11.75-21.35 | 16.55 | \(\cancel{||||} \cancel{||||} \cancel{||||} \cancel{||||}\) | 20 | 0.40 | 26 |
| 21.4-30.9 | 21.35-30.95 | 26.15 | \(\cancel{||||} \cancel{||||} |\) | 11 | 0.22 | 37 |
| 31.0-45.0 | 30.95-40.55 | 35.75 | \( |||| \) | 4 | 0.08 | 41 |
| 40.6-50.1 | 40.55-50.15 | 45.35 | \( || \) | 2 | 0.04 | 43 |
| 50.2-59.7 | 50.15-59.75 | 54.95 | \( || \) | 2 | 0.04 | 45 |
| 59.8-69.3 | 59.75-69.35 | 64.55 | \( ||| \) | 3 | 0.06 | 48 |
| 69.4-78.9 | 69.35-78.95 | 74.15 | \( || \) | 2 | 0.04 | 50 |
Make sure the total of the frequencies is the same as the number of data points.
This graph is skewed right, with no gaps. This says that most percent increases in tuition were around 16.55%, with very few states having a percent increase greater than 45.35%.
Looking at the ogive, you can see that 30 states had a percent change in tuition levels of about 25% or less.
There are occasions where the class limits in the frequency distribution are predetermined. Example \(\PageIndex{8}\) demonstrates this situation.
Example \(\PageIndex{8}\) creating a frequency distribution and histogram
The following are the percentage grades of 25 students from a statistics course. Make a frequency distribution and histogram.
| 62 | 87 | 81 | 69 | 87 | 62 | 45 | 95 | 76 | 76 |
| 62 | 71 | 65 | 67 | 72 | 80 | 40 | 77 | 87 | 58 |
| 84 | 73 | 93 | 64 | 89 |
Solution
Since this data is percent grades, it makes more sense to make the classes in multiples of 10, since grades are usually 90 to 100%, 80 to 90%, and so forth. It is easier to not use the class boundaries, but instead use the class limits and think of the upper class limit being up to but not including the next classes lower limit. As an example the class 80 – 90 means a grade of 80% up to but not including a 90%. A student with an 89.9% would be in the 80-90 class.
| Class Limit | Class Midpoint | Tally | Freqeuncy |
|---|---|---|---|
| 40-50 | 45 | \( || \) | 2 |
| 50-60 | 55 | \( | \) | 1 |
| 60-70 | 65 | \( \cancel{||||} || \) | 7 |
| 70-80 | 75 | \( \cancel{||||} | \) | 6 |
| 80-90 | 85 | \( \cancel{||||} || \) | 7 |
| 90-100 | 95 | \( || \) | 2 |
It appears that most of the students had between 60 to 90%. This graph looks somewhat symmetric and also bimodal. The same number of students earned between 60 to 70% and 80 to 90%.
There are other types of graphs for quantitative data. They will be explored in the next section.
Homework
Exercise \(\PageIndex{1}\)
-
The median incomes of males in each state of the United States, including the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico, are given in Example \(\PageIndex{9}\) ("Median income of," 2013). Create a frequency distribution, relative frequency distribution, and cumulative frequency distribution using 7 classes.
$42,951 $52,379 $42,544 $37,488 $49,281 $50,987 $60,705 $50,411 $66,760 $40,951 $43,902 $45,494 $41,528 $50,746 $45,183 $43,624 $43,993 $41,612 $46,313 $43,944 $56,708 $60,264 $50,053 $50,580 $40,202 $43,146 $41,635 $42,182 $41,803 $53,033 $60,568 $41,037 $50,388 $41,950 $44,660 $46,176 $41,420 $45,976 $47,956 $22,529 $48,842 $41,464 $40,285 $41,309 $43,160 $47,573 $44,057 $52,805 $53,046 $42,125 $46,214 $51,630 Table \(\PageIndex{9}\): Data of Median Income for Males -
The median incomes of females in each state of the United States, including the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico, are given in Example \(\PageIndex{10}\) ("Median income of," 2013). Create a frequency distribution, relative frequency distribution, and cumulative frequency distribution using 7 classes.
$31,862 $40,550 $36,048 $30,752 $41,817 $40,236 $47,476 $40,500 $60,332 $33,823 $35,438 $37,242 $31,238 $39,150 $34,023 $33,745 $33,269 $32,684 $31,844 $34,599 $48,748 $46,185 $36,931 $40,416 $29,548 $33,865 $31,067 $33,424 $35,484 $41,021 $47,155 $32,316 $42,113 $33,459 $32,462 $35,746 $31,274 $36,027 $37,089 $22,117 $41,412 $31,330 $31,329 $33,184 $35,301 $32,843 $38,177 $40,969 $40,993 $29,688 $35,890 $34,381 Table \(\PageIndex{10}\): Data of Median Income for Females -
The density of people per square kilometer for African countries is in Example \(\PageIndex{11}\) ("Density of people," 2013). Create a frequency distribution, relative frequency distribution, and cumulative frequency distribution using 8 classes.
15 16 81 3 62 367 42 123 8 9 337 12 29 70 39 83 26 51 79 6 157 105 42 45 72 72 37 4 36 134 12 3 630 563 72 29 3 13 176 341 415 187 65 194 75 16 41 18 69 49 103 65 143 2 18 31 Table \(\PageIndex{11}\): Data of Density of People per Square Kilometer -
The Affordable Care Act created a market place for individuals to purchase health care plans. In 2014, the premiums for a 27 year old for the bronze level health insurance are given in Example \(\PageIndex{12}\) ("Health insurance marketplace," 2013). Create a frequency distribution, relative frequency distribution, and cumulative frequency distribution using 5 classes.
$114 $119 $121 $125 $132 $139 $139 $141 $143 $145 $151 $153 $156 $159 $162 $163 $165 $166 $170 $170 $176 $177 $181 $185 $185 $186 $186 $189 $190 $192 $196 $203 $204 $219 $254 $286 Table \(\PageIndex{12}\): Data of Health Insurance Premiums -
Create a histogram and relative frequency histogram for the data in Example \(\PageIndex{9}\). Describe the shape and any findings you can from the graph.
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Create a histogram and relative frequency histogram for the data in Example \(\PageIndex{10}\). Describe the shape and any findings you can from the graph.
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Create a histogram and relative frequency histogram for the data in Example \(\PageIndex{11}\). Describe the shape and any findings you can from the graph.
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Create a histogram and relative frequency histogram for the data in Example \(\PageIndex{12}\). Describe the shape and any findings you can from the graph.
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Create an ogive for the data in Example \(\PageIndex{9}\). Describe any findings you can from the graph.
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Create an ogive for the data in Example \(\PageIndex{10}\). Describe any findings you can from the graph.
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Create an ogive for the data in Example \(\PageIndex{11}\). Describe any findings you can from the graph.
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Create an ogive for the data in Example \(\PageIndex{12}\). Describe any findings you can from the graph.
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Students in a statistics class took their first test. The following are the scores they earned. Create a frequency distribution and histogram for the data using class limits that make sense for grade data. Describe the shape of the distribution.
80 79 89 74 73 67 79 93 70 70 76 88 83 73 81 79 80 85 79 80 79 58 93 94 74 Table \(\PageIndex{13}\): Data of Test 1 Grades -
Students in a statistics class took their first test. The following are the scores they earned. Create a frequency distribution and histogram for the data using class limits that make sense for grade data. Describe the shape of the distribution. Compare to the graph in question 13.
Table \(\PageIndex{14}\): Data of Test 1 Grades 67 67 76 47 85 70 87 76 80 72 84 98 84 64 65 82 81 81 88 74 87 83
- Answer
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8.1.4: The Functionalist Perspective on Education
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Socialization
According to functionalists, the socialization process is coercive, forcing us to accept to the values and norms of society.
Learning Objectives
Examine socialization in three ways – the functionalist perspective, and according to Merton and Parsons
Key Points
- Structural functionalists view the socialization process as one where the values and norms of society are agreed upon by all members of society because there is a “social contract” in effect which protects us from one another and keeps society stable and balanced.
- Socialization refers to the lifelong process of inheriting and disseminating norms, customs and ideologies, providing an individual with the skills and habits necessary for participating within his or her own society.
- The values and norms of society are agreed upon by all members of society because there is a “social contract” in effect which protects us from one another and keeps society stable and balanced.
- Robert K. Merton coined the term “role model” and hypothesized that individuals compare themselves with reference groups of people who occupy the social role to which the individual aspires.
- The key processes for Talcott Parsons for system reproduction are socialization and social control.
- Socialization is supported by the positive and negative sanctioning of role behaviors that do or do not meet these expectations.
Key Terms
- Reference Groups : Groups to which a person may compare himself to.
- social contract : An implicit agreement or contract among members of a society that dictates things that are considered acceptable conduct.
Socialization is a term that refers to the lifelong process of inheriting and disseminating norms, customs and ideologies, providing an individual with the skills and habits necessary for participating within his or her own society. Socialization describes a process that may lead to desirable or moral outcomes. Individual views on certain issues, such as race or economics, may be socialized within a society.
Functionalist Perspective on Socialization
The Functionalist paradigm describes society as stable and describes all of the various mechanisms that maintain social stability. Functionalism argues that the social structure is responsible for all stability and instability, and that that the social structure is continuously attempting to maintain social equilibrium among all the components of society.
According to functionalists, the socialization process is coercive, forcing us to accept the values and norms of society. The values and norms of society are agreed upon by all members of society because there is a “social contract” in effect which protects us from one another and keeps society stable and balanced. People follow and accept the values and norms of society in order to maintain their own safety as well as maintaining social order.
Robert K. Merton
The term role model generally means any “person who serves as an example, whose behavior is emulated by others. ” The term first appeared in Robert K. Merton’s socialization research of medical students. Merton hypothesized that socialization happens when individuals compare themselves with reference groups of people who occupy the social role to which the individual aspires. Beginning with Merton, sociologists call any group that individuals use as a standard for evaluating themselves and their own behavior a reference group. For example, an individual in the U.S. with an annual income of $80,000, may consider himself affluent if he compares himself to those who earn roughly $35,000 a year. If, however, the same person considers the relevant reference group to be those in the top 0.1 percent of households in the U.S., those making $1.6 million or more, then the individual’s income of $80,000 would make him or her seem rather poor.
Talcott Parsons
Talcott Parsons was heavily influenced by Emile Durkheim and Max Weber, synthesizing much of their work into his action theory, which he based on the system-theoretical concept and the methodological principle of voluntary action. The key processes for Parsons for system reproduction are socialization and social control. Socialization is important because it is the mechanism for transferring the accepted norms and values of society to the individuals within the system. Parsons never spoke about “perfect socialization”—in any society socialization was only partial and “incomplete” from an integral point of view. Socialization is supported by the positive and negative sanctioning of role behaviors that do or do not meet these expectations. A punishment could be informal, like a snicker or gossip, or more formalized, through institutions such as prisons and mental institutions.
Cultural Transmission
Cultural transmission is the way a group of people within a society or culture tend to learn and pass on new information.
Learning Objectives
Analyze the importance of cultural transmission, particularly in terms of learning styles
Key Points
- Learning styles are greatly influenced by how a culture socializes with its children and young people.
- The process by which a child acquires his or her own culture is referred to as enculturation.
- On the basis of cultural learning, people create, remember, and deal with ideas. They understand and apply specific systems of symbolic meaning.
- A meme is “an idea, behavior or style that spreads from person to person within a culture. ” The term was coined by the British evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins in The Selfish Gene (1976).
- Intercultural competence is the ability to communicate successfully with people of other cultures.
Key Terms
- Intercultural Competence : The ability to communicate successfully with people of other cultures.
- Cultural Transmission : The way a group of people or animals within a society or culture tend to learn and pass on new information.
- Symbolic Meaning : Meaning that is conveyed through language; when one knows that X means Y.
Cultural transmission is the way a group of people or animals within a society or culture tend to learn and pass on new information. Learning styles are greatly influenced by how a culture socializes with its children and young people. The key aspect of culture is that it is not passed on biologically from the parents to the offspring, but rather learned through experience and participation. The process by which a child acquires his or her own culture is referred to as “enculturation. ” Cultural learning allows individuals to acquire skills that they would be unable to independently over the course of their lifetimes.
Cultural Transmission for Humans
Cultural learning is believed to be particularly important for humans. Humans are weaned at an early age compared to the emergence of adult dentition. The immaturity of dentition and the digestive system, the time required for growth of the brain, the rapid skeletory growth needed for the young to reach adult height and strength means that children have special digestive needs and are dependent on adults for a long period of time. This time of dependence also allows time for cultural learning to occur before passage into adulthood.
On the basis of cultural learning, people create, remember, and deal with ideas. They understand and apply specific systems of symbolic meaning. Cultures have been compared to sets of control mechanisms, plans, recipes, rules, or instructions. Cultural differences have been found in academic motivation, achievement, learning style, conformity, and compliance. Cultural learning is dependent on innovation or the ability to create new responses to the environment and the ability to communicate or imitate the behavior of others. A meme is “an idea, behavior or style that spreads from person to person within a culture. ” A meme acts as a unit for carrying cultural ideas, symbols or practices, which can be transmitted from one mind to another through writing, speech, gestures, rituals, or other imitable phenomena. The term was coined by the British evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins in The Selfish Gene (1976).
Intercultural Competence
Intercultural competence is the ability to communicate successfully with people of other cultures. In interactions with people from foreign cultures, a person who is interculturally competent understands culture-specific concepts in perception, thinking, feeling, and acting. The interculturally competent person considers earlier experiences free from prejudices, and has an interest in, and motivation towards, continued learning.
The development of intercultural competence is mostly based on the individual’s experiences while communicating with different cultures. While interacting with people from other cultures, the individual generally faces certain obstacles, which are caused by differences in cultural understanding between the two people in question. Such experiences motivate the individual to work on skills that can help him communicate his point of view to an audience belonging to a completely different cultural ethnicity and background. For example, showing the thumb held upwards in certain parts of the world means “everything’s okay,” while it is understood in some Islamic countries as a rude sexual sign. Additionally, the thumb is held up to signify “one” in France and certain other European countries, where the index finger is used to signify “one” in other cultures. In India and Indonesia, it is often regarded as wishing “all the best.”
Academic Skills and Knowledge
In academia, an individual’s educational level and other academic experience can be used to gain a place in society.
Learning Objectives
Examine the implications of academia in society, especially in terms of structure, qualifications and academic capital
Key Points
- Academia is the community of students and scholars engaged in higher education and research.
- Academia is usually conceived of as divided into disciplines or fields of study.
- The degree awarded for completed study is the primary academic qualification. Typically these are, in order of accomplishment, associate’s degree, bachelor’s degree, master’s degree, and doctorate.
- In the United States, “professors” commonly occupy any of several positions in academia, typically the ranks of assistant professor, associate professor, or full professor.
- Academic capital is a term used by sociologists to represent how an individual’s amount of education and other academic experience can be used to gain a place in society.
Key Terms
- Academic Capital : A term referring to how an individual’s amount of education and other academic experience can be used to gain a more esteemed place in society.
- academia : The scientific and cultural community engaged in higher education and research, taken as a whole.
Academia is the community of students and scholars engaged in higher education and research. In Western Europe, universities were founded in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, and the European institution of Academia took shape. Monks and priests moved out of monasteries to cathedral cities and other towns where they opened the first schools dedicated to advanced study. In the United States, the term “academic” is approximately synonymous with that of the job title professor, although in recent decades a growing number of institutions include librarians in the category of “academic staff. ”
Structure
Academia is usually conceived of as divided into disciplines or fields of study. The disciplines have been much revised, and many new disciplines have become more specialized, researching smaller and smaller areas. Because of this, interdisciplinary research is often prized in today’s academy, though it can also be made difficult both by practical matters of administration and funding and by differing research methods of different disciplines. In fact, many new fields of study have initially been conceived as interdisciplinary, and later become specialized disciplines in their own right. On recent example is cognitive science.
Qualifications
The degree awarded for completed study is the primary academic qualification. Typically, these are, in order of completion, associate’s degree, bachelor’s degree, master’s degree, and doctorate. In the United States, “professors” commonly occupy any of several positions in academia, typically the ranks of assistant professor, associate professor, or full professor. Research and education are among the main tasks of professors with the time spent in research or teaching depending strongly on the type of institution. Publication of articles in conferences, journals, and books is essential to occupational advancement. As of August 2007, teaching in tertiary educational institutions is one of the fastest growing occupations, topping the U.S. Department of Labor’s list of “above average wages and high projected growth occupations,” with a projected increase of 524,000 positions between 2004 and 2014.
Academic Capital
“Academic capital” is a term used by sociologists to represent how an individual’s amount of education and other academic experience can be used to gain a place in society. The term originated in 1979 when Pierre Bourdieu (1930–2002), a prominent French sociologist, used the term in his book, Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgment of Taste . The book attempts to show how individuals are not defined by social class, but instead by their “social space,” which is dependent on each type of capital the individual has.
Much like other forms of capital, social capital, economic capital, and cultural capital, academic capital doesn’t depend on one sole factor but instead is made up of many different factors, including the individual’s academic transmission from his/her family, status of the academic institutions attended, and publications produced by the individual. Since Bourdieu first coined the term, it has been used widely to discuss many of the implications involved with schooling and the rise of individuals in academia. Numerous studies have been done involving the idea of academic capital, and scholars have disagreed on what counts as academic capital.
Bourdieu’s definition of the term is applicable to any individual. However, it seems that most references to academic capital point solely to professional teachers and researchers within higher education. For example, in 2009, Michael Burawoy defined academic capital as being estimated from an individual’s curriculum vitae, but admitted that it was subjective because some fields of study seem to value certain academic qualities more than others—research.
Innovation
Innovation is the creation of better or more effective products, processes, services, technologies, or ideas.
Learning Objectives
Compare the difference between innovation and invention, as well as the pros and cons of each
Key Points
- Innovation differs from invention in that innovation refers to the use of better and, as a result, novel idea or method, whereas invention refers more directly to the creation of the idea or method itself.
- Innovation differs from improvement in that innovation refers to the notion of doing something different rather than doing the same thing better.
- In society, innovation aids in comfort, convenience, and efficiency in everyday life.
- In the organizational context, innovation may be linked to positive changes in efficiency, productivity, quality, competitiveness, market share, and others.
- When an innovative idea requires a better business model, or radically redesigns the delivery of value to focus on the customer, a real-world experimentation approach increases the chances of market success.
- Once innovation occurs, innovations may be spread from the innovator to other individuals and groups. This process can be described using the “s-curve” or diffusion curve. This is known as the process of diffusion.
Key Terms
- organization : A group of people or other legal entities with an explicit purpose and written rules.
- business model : The particular way in which a business organization ensures that it generates income, one that includes the choice of offerings, strategies, infrastructure, organizational structures, trading practices, and operational processes and policies.
- improvement : Increase; growth; progress; advance.
Innovation is the creation of better or more effective products, processes, services, technologies, or ideas that are readily available to markets, governments, and society. Innovation differs from invention in that innovation refers to the use of better and, as a result, a novel idea or method, whereas invention refers more directly to the creation of the idea or method itself. Innovation differs from improvement in that innovation refers to the notion of doing something different rather than doing the same thing better.
Due to its widespread effect, innovation is an important topic in the study of economics, business, entrepreneurship, design, technology, sociology, and engineering. In society, innovation aids in comfort, convenience, and efficiency in everyday life. For instance, the benchmarks in railroad equipment and infrastructure added to greater safety, maintenance, speed, and weight capacity for passenger services. These innovations included wood to steel cars, iron to steel rails, stove-heated to steam-heated cars, gas lighting to electric lighting, diesel-powered to electric-diesel locomotives. By mid-twentieth century, trains were making longer, more comfortable, and faster trips at lower costs for passengers
Organization
In the organizational context, innovation may be linked to positive changes in efficiency, productivity, quality, competitiveness, market share, and others. All organizations can innovate, including hospitals, universities, and local governments. For instance, former Mayor Martin O’Malley pushed the City of Baltimore to use CitiStat, a performance-measurement data and management system that allows city officials to maintain statistics on crime trends to condition of potholes. This system aids in better evaluation of policies and procedures with accountability and efficiency in terms of time and money. In its first year, CitiStat saved the city $13.2 million.
There are several sources of innovation. According to the Peter F. Drucker the general sources of innovations are different changes in industry structure, in market structure, in local and global demographics, in human perception, mood and meaning, in the amount of already available scientific knowledge, etc. When an innovative idea requires a better business model, or radically redesigns the delivery of value to focus on the customer, a real-world experimentation approach increases the chances of market success. Potentially, innovative business models and customer experiences can’t be tested through traditional market research methods. Programs of organizational innovation are typically tightly linked to organizational goals and objectives, the business plan, and to market competitive positioning. One driver for innovation programs in corporations is to achieve growth objectives. Once innovation occurs, innovations may be spread from the innovator to other individuals and groups. This process can be described as using the “s-curve” or diffusion curve. This is known as the process of diffusion.
Child Care
Child care involves caring for and supervising a child or children, usually from infancy to age thirteen.
Learning Objectives
Analyze the different types of child care in the United States, from parental care to center-based care
Key Points
- It is traditional in Western society for children to be taken care of by their parents or their legal guardians.
- If a parent or extended family is unable to care for the children, orphanages and foster homes are a way of providing for children’s care, housing, and schooling.
- The two main types of child care options are center-based care and home-based care.
- Home-based care typically is provided by nannies, au-pairs, or friends and family.
- In 1995, over thirty-six percent of families of preschoolers with working mothers primarily relied on child care in the home of a relative, family day care provider or other non relative. Almost twenty-six percent of families used organized child care facilities as their primary arrangement.
Key Terms
- Home-based care : Child care that occurs in the child’s home as opposed to in a preschool or external institution.
- Center-based care : Child care that occurs outside of the child’s home, such as in a preschool.
- extended family : A family consisting of parents and children, along with either grandparents, grandchildren, aunts or uncles, cousins etc.
Child care involves supervising a child or children, usually from infancy to age thirteen, and typically refers to work done by somebody outside the child’s immediate family. Child care is a broad topic covering a wide spectrum of contexts, activities, social and cultural conventions, and institutions. The majority of child care institutions that are available require that child care providers have extensive training in first aid and are CPR certified. In addition, background checks, drug testing, and reference verification are normally required.
It is traditional in Western society for children to be cared for by their parents or their legal guardians. In families where children live with one or both of their parents, the child care role may also be taken on by the child’s extended family. If a parent or extended family is unable to care for the children, orphanages and foster homes are a way of providing for children’s care, housing, and schooling.
Types of Child Care
The two main types of child care options are center-based care and home-based care. In addition to these licensed options, parents may also choose to find their own caregiver or arrange child care exchanges/swaps with another family. In-home care typically is provided by nannies, au-pairs, or friends and family. The child is watched inside their own home or the caregiver’s home, reducing exposure to outside children and illnesses. Depending on the number of children in the home, the children utilizing in-home care enjoy the greatest amount of interaction with their caregiver, forming a close bond. There are no required licensing or background checks for in-home care, making parental vigilance essential in choosing an appropriate caregiver. Nanny and au-pair services provide certified caregivers and the cost of in-home care is the highest of child care options per child, though a household with many children may find this the most convenient and affordable option.
Child Care in the United States
State legislation may regulate the number and ages of children allowed before the home is considered an official daycare program and subject to more stringent safety regulations. Often the nationally recognized Child Development Associate credential is the minimum standard for the individual leading this home care program. Each state has different regulations for teacher requirements. In some states, teaching in a day care center requires an Associates Degree in child development. States with quality standards built into their licensing programs may have higher requirements for support staff, such as teacher assistants. And for Head Start Teachers, by 2012 all lead teachers must have a bachelors degree in Early Childhood Education. States vary in other standards set for daycare providers, such as teacher to child ratios.
According to the 1995 U.S. Census Bureau Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP), over thirty-six percent of families of preschoolers with working mothers primarily relied on child care in the home of a relative, family day care provider, or other non relative. Almost twenty-six percent of families used organized child care facilities as their primary arrangement.
Postponing Job Hunting
Job hunting is the act of looking for employment, due to unemployment or discontent with a current position.
Learning Objectives
Examine the reasons why a person would job hunt and the common methods used
Key Points
- The immediate goal of job seeking is usually to obtain a job interview with an employer which may lead to getting hired.
- Common methods of job hunting are finding a job through a friend or an extended business network, personal network, online social network service, or employment website.
- Many job seekers research the employers to which they are applying. Some employers see evidence of this as a positive sign of enthusiasm for the position or the company.
Key Terms
- outplacement : The process of helping to find new employment for redundant workers, especially executives.
- social networking : The use of Internet communities to network and communicate using shared interests, related skills, or geographical location between consumers and businesses.
Job hunting is the act of looking for employment, due to unemployment or discontent with a current position. The immediate goal of job seeking is usually to obtain a job interview with an employer which may lead to getting hired. The job hunter typically first looks for job vacancies or employment opportunities. As of 2010, less than 10% of U.S. jobs are filled through online ads.
Common methods of job hunting are finding a job through a friend or an extended business network, personal network, or online social network service; using an employment website; looking through the classifieds in newspapers; using a private or public employment agency or recruiter; looking on a company’s web site for open jobs, typically in its applicant tracking system; going to a job fairs; using professional guidance such as outplacement services that give training in writing a résumé, applying for jobs, and how to be successful at an interview.
Many job seekers research the employers to which they are applying, and some employers see evidence of this as a positive sign of enthusiasm for the position or the company, or as a mark of thoroughness. Information collected might include open positions, full name, locations, web site, business description, year established, revenues, number of employees, stock price if public, name of the chief executive officer, major products or services, major competitors, and strengths and weaknesses.
Contacting as many people as possible is a highly effective way to find a job. It is estimated that 50% or higher of all jobs are found through networking. Job recruiters and decision makers are increasingly using online social networking sites to gather information about job applicants, according to a mid-2011 Jobvite survey of 800 employers in the U.S. Job seekers need to begin to pay more attention to what employers and recruiters find when they do their pre-interview information gathering about applicants, according to this 2010 study by Microsoft, “Online Reputation in a Connected World.”
Gatekeeping
Gatekeeping is the process through which information in publications, broadcasting, and the Internet is filtered for dissemination.
Learning Objectives
Discuss the concept and implications of the gatekeeping process and censorship
Key Points
- Originally focused on the mass media with its few-to-masses dynamic, theories of gatekeeping also now include the workings of face-to-face communication and the many-to-many dynamic now easily available via the Internet.
- Gatekeeping was formally identified in Kurt Lewin’s publication, Forces Behind Food Habits and Methods of Change (1943).
- Censorship is the suppression of speech or other public communication that may be considered objectionable, harmful, sensitive, or inconvenient as determined by a government, media outlet, or other controlling body.
Key Terms
- information : Things that are or can be known about a given topic; communicable knowledge of something.
- Gatekeeping : Gatekeeping is practiced by gatekeepers, people who control access to something, for example, via a city gate. In the late twentieth century, the term came into metaphorical use, referring to individuals who decide whether a given message will be distributed by a mass medium.
- censorship : The use of state or group power to control freedom of expression, such as passing laws to prevent media from being published or propagated.
Gatekeeping is the process through which information is filtered for dissemination, be it publication, broadcasting, the Internet, or some other type of communication. As an academic theory, it is found in several fields, including communication studies, journalism, political science, and sociology. Originally focused on the mass media with its few-to-masses dynamic, theories of gatekeeping also now include the workings of face-to-face communication and the many-to-many dynamic now easily available via the Internet.
The Gatekeeping Process
According to Pamela Shoemaker and Tim Vos, gatekeeping is the “process of culling and crafting countless bits of information into the limited number of messages that reach people everyday. ” Gatekeeping as a news process was identified in the literature as early as 1922, though not yet given a formal theoretical name. Gatekeeping was formally identified in Kurt Lewin’s publication, Forces Behind Food Habits and Methods of Change (1943).
Lewin identified several parts of the gatekeeping process in his 1943 article. These parts include:
1. Information moves step by step through channels. The number of channels varies and the amount of time in each channel can vary.
2. Information must pass a “gate” to move from one channel to the next.
3. Forces govern channels. There may be opposing psychological forces causing conflict that creates resistance to movement through the channel.
4. There may be several channels that lead to the same end result.
5. Different actors may control the channels and act as gatekeepers at different times.
Censorship
Censorship is the suppression of speech or other public communication that may be considered objectionable, harmful, sensitive, or inconvenient as determined by a government, media outlet, or other controlling body. It can be done by governments and private organizations or by individuals who engage in self-censorship. It occurs in a variety of different contexts including speech, books, music, films and other arts, the press, radio, television, and the Internet. Censorship occurs for a variety of reasons including national security; to control obscenity, child pornography, and hate speech; to protect children; to promote or restrict political or religious views; to prevent slander and libel; and to protect intellectual property.
Replacing Family Functions
Family types that are replacing the traditional nuclear family include single parent families, cohabitation, and gay and lesbian families.
Learning Objectives
Examine the different types of families and the changing face of family roles
Key Points
- Single parent families usually refers to a parent who has most of the day to day responsibilities in the raising of the child or children who is not living with a spouse or partner, or those who are not married.
- Cohabitation is an arrangement where two people who are not married live together in an intimate relationship, particularly an emotionally and/or sexually intimate one, on a long-term or permanent basis.
 In 1989 Demark was the first nation allow same sex couples to get married to provide equal rights to all citizens.
- Singlehood is a family that contains a person who is not married or in a common law relationship.
Key Terms
- cohabitation : An emotionally and physically intimate relationship that includes a common living place and which exists without legal or religious sanction.
- Single Parent Families : Families in which the children are primarily raised by one parent rather than by both parents.
- singlehood : The state of being single (unattached or unmarried).
The sociology of the family examines the family as an institution and a unit of socialization. Sociological studies of the family look at demographic characteristic of the family members: family size, age, ethnicity and gender of its members, social class of the family, the economic level and mobility of the family, professions of its members, and the education levels of the family members.
Current Studies
Currently, one of the biggest issues that sociologists study are the changing roles of family members. Often, each member is restricted by the gender roles of the traditional family. These roles, such as the father as the breadwinner and the mother as the homemaker, are declining. Now, the mother is often the supplementary provider while retaining the responsibilities of child rearing. In this scenario, females’ role in the labor force is “compatible with the demands of the traditional family. ” Sociology studies the adaptation of males’ role to caregiver as well as provider. The gender roles are increasingly interwoven.
Alternate Family Forms
The number of married couples raising children has decreased over the years. In Canada, married and common law couples with children under the age of 25 represented 44% of all families in 2001. This statistic has lowered since 1991, when married and common law couples raising children under the age of 25 represented 49% of all Canadian families. There are various other family forms that are becoming increasingly common.
A single parent family usually refers to a parent who has most of the day-to-day responsibilities in the raising of the child or children, who is not living with a spouse or partner, or who is not married. The dominant caregiver is the parent with whom the children reside the majority of the time; if the parents are separated or divorced, children live with their custodial parent and have visitation with their noncustodial parent. In western society in general, following separation a child will end up with the primary caregiver, usually the mother, and a secondary caregiver, usually the father.
Cohabitation is an arrangement where two people who are not married live together in an intimate relationship, particularly an emotionally and/or sexually intimate one, on a long-term or permanent basis. Today, cohabitation is a common pattern among people in the Western world. More than two-thirds of married couples in the U.S. say that they lived together before getting married.
 In 1989, Demark became the first nation to allow same sex couples to get married. After this, many nations, such as Canada and Spain, began to allow same sex marriage. Some states in the United States have changed their laws to allow same sex marriages, but 30 states have yet to amend their laws.
A link to the YouTube element can be found in Contributors & Attributions section.
ACLU Freedom Files: Lesbian & Gay Parents | Florida : “Freedom to Parent: Lesbian & Gay Families” shows how bans on adoptions and fostering by same-sex couples end up hurting thousands of children who are desperate for good homes. The program looks at the impact of a Florida law that prevents needy children from being adopted by loving gay families.
A singlehood family contains a person who is not married or in a common law relationship. He or she may share a relationship with a partner, but lead a single life style.
Contributors and Attributions
CC licensed content, Specific attribution


3.1: Early Mediterranean Peoples
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Learning Objectives
By the end of this section, you will be able to:
- Identify the regional peoples of the Mediterranean before 500 BCE
- Discuss the technological achievements of the early Mediterranean peoples
- Describe the interconnectedness of the early Mediterranean peoples
During the Bronze Age (c. 3300–1200 BCE), trade connected the peoples and cultures of Greece and the Aegean islands such as Crete . By the third millennium BCE, the inhabitants of these lands were already producing wine and olive oil, products in high demand in ancient Egypt and the Near East. The Aegean Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations of the Late Bronze Age (c. 1600–1100 BCE) thus shared in the economic prosperity and cultural interaction that linked the eastern Mediterranean with the ancient cultures of western Asia.
The eventual collapse of the Late Bronze Age world coincided with the development of new technology that allowed people to devise iron tools and weapons. During the new Iron Age , the Phoenicians not only preserved Bronze Age cultural traditions but they also developed a revolutionary new communication tool, the alphabet , that vastly expanded literacy. They established trading posts across the Mediterranean as far as Spain, often in search of new sources of iron ore and other metals such as tin. The arrival of the Phoenicians and Greek traders in the western Mediterranean brought them into contact with the Etruscans in the Italian peninsula. Thus, the period from the Bronze Age through the Iron Age witnessed the development of numerous cultures across the Mediterranean.
The Late Bronze Age World
Egypt was the dominant economic and military power of the Late Bronze Age, for the most part a time of economic prosperity and political stability. Other powerful kingdoms included Minoan Crete, Mycenaean Greece, the Hittites of Asia Minor (modern Turkey), the Mitanni and Assyrians in northern Mesopotamia, and the Kassites and Elamites in southern Mesopotamia and western Iran (Figure 6.4). While each maintained its own unique culture, their interactions created a shared Late Bronze Age culture.
For instance, they all used a redistributive economic system in which agricultural goods were collected from local farmers as taxes, stored in the palace or temple, and redistributed to urban artisans, merchants, and officials who could not grow food. They all possessed military forces of elite warriors trained to fight from horse-drawn chariots. They interacted using a common set of diplomatic practices: Official correspondence was often written in Akkadian cuneiform , military alliances were sealed by arranged marriages between the royal families of allied states, and vassal states paid tribute to dominant states to avoid military assault.
These civilizations also exchanged prized goods, such as wine and oil from Greece, cedar logs from the Levant (modern Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, and Syria), and copper from the island of Cyprus . Great cultural achievements resulted from their interaction. For example, in the small maritime kingdom of Ugarit (now Syria), scribes modified Egyptian hieroglyphics to suit their local Semitic Canaanite language, creating an ancestor of our alphabet. They used this script to record traditional epic poetry featuring myths of their main deity, the storm god Baal .
Minoan Crete and Mycenaean Greece
By 2000 BCE, a unique culture had developed on the Aegean island of Crete, reaching the height of its power at the beginning of the Late Bronze Age around 1600 BCE. The later Classical Greeks told the myth of King Minos of Crete, who built a giant maze known as the Labyrinth and imprisoned there a half-man, half-bull called the Minotaur (the “Bull of Minos”). To avenge his own son’s death, Minos forced young men and women from Athens in Greece to enter the Labyrinth and be eaten by the monster. Historians see in the myth a distant memory of the earlier civilization on Crete and use the term Minoan, derived from Minos, to describe it.
The Minoans built spacious palaces on Crete, the largest at Knossos . Since these were usually unfortified, historians believe Crete was generally peaceful and united under a single government with Knossos as the capital. The Minoans also established settlements and trading posts on other Aegean islands such as Thera and along the Anatolian coast. Their palaces were huge complexes that served as economic and administrative centers. To keep records for these centers the Minoans developed their own script, written on clay tablets and known to scholars as Linear A . It has not yet been deciphered.
A common weapon and symbol in these palaces was the labrys , or double ax, from which the word “labyrinth” arose. In the courtyards, young men and women participated in bullfights that may be the basis for the myth of the Minotaur. Frescoes on the palace walls depict these fights as well as sea creatures and scenes from nature (Figure 6.5). The Minoan religion revered bulls and a goddess associated with snakes, nature, and fertility. The abundance of figurines of this snake-wielding female deity and other artistic depictions of women may mean that at least some women enjoyed high social status in Minoan society. Religious rituals were practiced in small shrines as well as on mountain tops and in caves and sacred forests.
Link to Learning
For a thorough examination of the art and archaeology of the Aegean Bronze Age, visit Dartmouth University’s Aegean Prehistoric Archaeology website.
Sometime around 1500 BCE, the palaces on Crete were destroyed. Knossos was rebuilt, and scribes there began employing a new script scholars call Linear B , apparently derived from Linear A and found to be an early form of Greek. Linear B clay tablets discovered on the Greek mainland led historians to conclude that Greeks from the mainland conquered Crete and rebuilt Knossos.
The Bronze Age culture that produced Linear B is called Mycenaean since the largest Bronze Age city in Greece was at Mycenae . Bronze Age Greeks appear to have migrated from the Balkans into mainland Greece around 2000 BCE and adopted Minoan civilization around the beginning of the Late Bronze Age , in 1600 BCE. Unlike the Minoans, the Mycenaean Greeks were divided into a number of separate kingdoms. Immense palace complexes like those at Knossos have been found at Mycenae, Tiryns, Thebes, Pylos, and Sparta, sometimes surrounded by monumental fortifications. These locations correspond to the powerful kingdoms described in the later Greek epic poem the Iliad , attributed to the poet Homer . This poem tells the story of the Trojan War , in which the Greek kingdoms, led by King Agamemnon of Mycenae, waged war against the city of Troy . Archaeologists have also uncovered the Bronze Age city of Troy in western Turkey, which suggests the Iliad was loosely based on oral traditions that preserved the memory of these ancient Bronze Age kingdoms. The Linear B tablets indicate that the ruler of these palaces was known as the Wanax or “lord,” the same word used to describe the heroic kings of the Iliad .
The Collapse of the Bronze Age World
The last century of the Late Bronze Age, after 1200 BCE, was a period of wars and invasions that witnessed the collapse of many powerful states. The palaces of Mycenaean Greece were destroyed, perhaps following revolts by the lower class and natural disasters like climate change and earthquakes. In the centuries that followed, the population declined drastically, writing and literacy disappeared, and Greece entered a “Dark Age.”
Later ancient Greek historians reported that Greek-speaking tribes known as the Dorians migrated from northwest Greece to the south after the Trojan War. The instability in Greece and the Aegean resulted in much migration by people in search of new homes. For instance, ancient Egyptian inscriptions tell us that the “ Sea Peoples ” destroyed the Hittite Empire and numerous kingdoms in the Levant to the north of Egypt. One particular group known as the Philistines (Peleset), who attacked Egypt , eventually settled just north of Egypt along the coast of the southern Levant. But there were many others, including the Akawasha, Lukka, Shardana, Tursha, and more who washed across the eastern Mediterranean during the Late Bronze Age Collapse (Figure 6.6).
Other groups were also on the move. Libyans , who inhabited the North African coastal region west of Egypt, invaded the northern Nile River valley and settled there. The attacks of the Sea Peoples and Libyans contributed to the later collapse of Egypt’s central governments after 1100 BCE, ending the New Kingdom period. Phrygians , who inhabited the Balkans in southeast Europe, migrated into Asia Minor (Turkey). The Aramaeans , nomadic tribes who spoke a Semitic language and inhabited the Arabian Desert, migrated into Syria and Mesopotamia.
These wars and invasions coincided with an important technological innovation, the birth of sophisticated iron-making technology. For thousands of years, bronze had been the metal of choice in the ancient world. But the disruptions caused by the Late Bronze Age Collapse made it difficult for metal workers to access tin, a crucial ingredient in bronze. Without a sufficient supply of tin, artisans experimented for centuries with iron ore. In the process, they developed the techniques of steeling (adding carbon to the iron to make it stronger), quenching (rapidly cooling hot iron with water), and tempering (heat treating) to produce a metal far superior in strength to bronze. By around 900 BCE, the Iron Age had begun in the eastern Mediterranean.
Phoenicians, Greeks, and Etruscans
The Phoenicians were descended from the Bronze Age Canaanites and lived in cities like Sidon and Tyre (in today’s Lebanon), each ruled by a king. They were great sailors, explorers, and traders who established trading posts in Cyprus, North Africa, Sicily, Sardinia, and Spain. They sailed along the west coast of Africa and to the British Isles in search of new markets and goods such as tin (See Figure 6.7).
Around 1100 BCE, the Phoenicians also invented the world’s first known alphabet , using symbols that represented consonant sounds. Strung together, these consonants created words in which vowel sounds were interpreted by the order of the consonants. Because the Phoenician alphabet simplified the earlier script of the Canaanites, more people could now become literate, not just a small, specialized group of scribes. The Phoenicians’ commercial success was undoubtedly partly a result of their better, more efficient record-keeping system that a larger population could learn and employ. Other cultures like the Aramaean peoples and the Israelites quickly adapted the new script to their own languages. By the eighth century BCE, the Greeks had also adopted and later adapted the Phoenician alphabet to write their language.
Beginning with the Assyrian Empire’s expansion in the eighth century BCE, the Phoenician kingdoms became subjects of the successive Iron Age empires of western Asia: the Assyrians , the Chaldeans (Neo-Babylonian), and the Persians . The Phoenicians continued to flourish, however. The Assyrians valued Phoenician artists, and finely crafted Phoenician wares such as jewelry and furniture became popular among the ruling elites. The Persians relied largely on Phoenician sailors and ships to serve as the naval forces, especially in their campaigns to conquer Greece in the early fifth century BCE. When Phoenician city-states such as Sidon and Tyre became subject to foreign rule, many Phoenicians immigrated to the city of Carthage (in modern-day Tunisia), founded by Phoenician merchants around 700 BCE as a stopping place on the long but profitable voyage to Spain. Given this influx of immigrants, Carthage grew large and wealthy, and by the fifth century BCE the southern Italian peninsula was the dominant power in the western Mediterranean.
The Phoenicians were not the only people establishing colonial outposts around the wider Mediterranean world. Beginning in the eighth century, Greeks began founding colonies in North Africa, in coastal Spain and France, on the shores of the Black Sea, and on the Italian peninsula. Many of these colonies were built in resource-rich areas and commonly produced grain, tin, or timber for export back to Greece. Others served more mercantile interests, trading with major and minor powers across the Mediterranean. It was through these colonial ventures that Greeks and Phoenicians came into contact with the Etruscans of the northern Italian peninsula.
The Etruscans were organized into independent city-state s such as Veii and Vulci , much like the Greeks were, and each city was ruled by its own king and council of elders. In their art and architecture, the Etruscans followed Greek models (Figure 6.8). They modified the alphabet the Greeks had acquired from the Phoenicians to write their language, which scholars have not yet fully deciphered. By 600 BCE, they had expanded beyond their base in modern Tuscany and colonized Rome , which became an Etruscan city. They also founded new colonies in northern and southern Italy. The Etruscan states remained the dominant power in the Italian peninsula until 474 BCE. In that year, at the Battle of Cumae off the coast of southern Italy, the naval forces of the Greek city-state of Syracuse won a decisive victory over the Etruscan fleet and emerged as the chief power in the region, along with Carthage .
Since ancient Rome began as an Etruscan city-state, the Etruscans strongly influenced the development of Roman culture. For example, Roman priests divined the will of the gods by examining a sacrificed animal’s entrails, a custom adopted from the Etruscans. The Etruscans honored their dead with elaborate tombs, and the Romans did the same, maintaining that the spirits of their ancestors watched over them. Gladiatorial contests in Rome had origins among the Etruscans, who at funerals forced prisoners of war to fight to the death as human sacrifices to their dead. The fasces , a bundle of rods and an ax that symbolized the authority of Roman magistrates, originally denoted the authority of Etruscan kings. Finally, the Roman alphabet, still used in western and central Europe today, was based on Etruscan modifications to the Greek alphabet.