‘Sociology is the same as common sense, discuss’.

With the increase in technology and supposed increase in the understanding of our society, sociology is becoming progressively more effective and important in the break down and realisation of sociological problems and solutions.

Sociology is ‘the social science’. ‘It is the study and analysis of human behaviour as a result of society’. The aim of sociology is to study behaviour and establish it in a different way through testing and research.

Common sense on the other hand is the information that a person has learnt from society as they have been socialised. For example, it is common sense to drive on the left hand side of the road. It may seem useful to us, but it is not always necessarily correct.

Some people may argue that not everybody in the world is a sociologist, the majority of people that live on this planet do not attempt to prove or disprove theories, they live their lives as they have been socialised to do so. Regardless of what society a person lives in, it still functions. Therefore, these people and societies are theoretically functioning on common sense. People could not function properly in society if their knowledge and understand was wrong. This means that there must be a strong connection between common sense and sociology.

Hannah Nelson backs up this point strongly. Hannah Nelson was not a sociologist but said that, ‘the social, economic and historical conditions in which we live… shape the kind of people we become.’ This quote is a sociological idea, which has been researched and debated by numerous sociologists over time. The point is, that there are numerous non-sociologists, who have reached the same conclusions and basic theories as sociologists only by using their common sense, the knowledge that they have accumulated from observing themselves and other people around them.

This contradicts other points of view as it shows that common sense and sociology lead to the same idealisms and the same supporting ideas.

It is important to look at the basis of sociological knowledge and of common knowledge, to establish any similarities between the two.

This information has been adapted from Bauman, ‘Thinking Sociologically’. He compared common knowledge and sociological knowledge in a table stating their attributes. This shows the contrasting fundamentals of each;

Common sense statements are guesswork, they many not have been validated and there may be no evidence to prove or disprove ...

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This contradicts other points of view as it shows that common sense and sociology lead to the same idealisms and the same supporting ideas.

It is important to look at the basis of sociological knowledge and of common knowledge, to establish any similarities between the two.

Common sense statements are guesswork, they many not have been validated and there may be no evidence to prove or disprove the statement, it is just presumed to be correct. Whereas sociological statements have been thoroughly researched and tested to ensure that a statement or hypothesis is correct.

Common sense is only one person’s knowledge, it is something that as an individual you apply or use in your life and your own society. ‘Common sense is grounded in our personal experience.’ For instance one particular person may have experienced situations that have altered their common sense, or their perception of their common knowledge. On the contrary, Sociological knowledge is spread over ‘a multitude of life worlds.’ This means that it is viewed upon in a more general way, it has not been influenced or affected by one single person, but instead has been interpreted and generated as a result of numerous people from different environments.

Probably the most significant contrasting fundamental is that common sense is untested knowledge, or assumed knowledge that is simply presumed correct. In sociology a statement is analysed, and a sociologists’ goal is to ‘defamiliarise the familiar,’ to question what is known.

A quote from Mark Twain sums up simply the differences between the two; ‘supposing is good, but finding out is better.’

Zigmunt Bauman suggests that in order to think sociologically, we must move beyond our common sense. This means that sociological theories may begin as common sense statements, but in order for them to become a sociological theory or idea, the sociologist must go that step further. This is when something that is common knowledge is tested and analysed until it is proven or disproven, then it becomes sociological. Until something has been experimented and validated, until it has been questioned it remains common sense.

This shows that if although common sense forms the basis of sociology, it is not the same thing as sociology.

‘Children today are more likely to live in single parent households than they were 100 years ago.’

This is a statement that is assumed to be true by the majority of non-sociologists in the general public. However, this statement is in fact incorrect. It has been proven that the number of single parent households has remained roughly the same as it was 100 years ago.

Sociological research has disproved many common sense notions such as this one, which again reinforces the idea that sociology and common sense is not the same thing.

Here are some statements:

‘Most Roman Catholics oppose both control.’

‘Compared to men, women touch each other more whilst conversing.’

‘When there are a higher percentage of alcohol drinkers in a population, there are a higher percentage of alcoholics.’

‘Out of the following, which substance is the cause of the highest number of patients requiring hospital treatment: alcohol, aspirin, heroin or marijuana?’

Unless you are a sociologist, your common sense will tell probably tell you that the first three statements are true. However, they are all false.

80% of Roman Catholics favour birth control.

Men touch each other more whilst conversing rather than women.

There aren’t necessarily more alcoholics in a population where there are higher rates of alcohol consumption. For example in Jewish and Italian culture, it is customary to drink a lot of alcohol socially or religiously, this does not result in a higher number of alcoholics.

In the final question, you would probably be drawn to three possible answers, alcohol, heroin or marijuana. In fact it is aspirin that causes the most casualty patients.

These are all examples of common knowledge that has been disproved by sociology.

Common sense can be generalised as ‘the thing everyone knows’. Since ‘everybody’ knows that something is true, it is not questioned, it is just accepted by society, or the majority of a society to be valid. Since there is no question of the validity of a common knowledge statement, this closes down any argument against it. If it is the consensus that a certain piece of information or a particular view is correct, it will not be questioned.

This is the essential difference between the two; social knowledge, i.e. sociology, has been taken that step further, it has been validated through testing and scrutiny. This is what separates the two. Although they may be similar, and common sense statements may form the basis for sociology, they are not defined as the same thing.

In conclusion to the statement, sociology and common sense are not the same things. They have different attributes and different characteristics.