Sociology Report
World Values Survey, http://www.worldvaluessurvey.org, from chapter two titled "Culture". This site houses information accumulated by members of the World Values Survey Association, a non-profit organization studying changes in different cultural values and the impact they have on both social and political life. Included in this site is the process by which the questionnaires are developed as well as the data accumulated from the developed surveys. Once a research team gathers a sample group representing the country they are researching, the surveys are conducted and the findings are analyzed and compiled into a final report with the results from other countries. World Values Survey provides a data analysis tool for five different wave periods each covering a four year period. With the WVS data tool you select the countries you wish to evaluate and pick from hundreds of different variables, you are then shown a table enabling you to compare survey results of each country you selected. This tool makes it possible to analyze a number of different topics and the collected data assists individuals in understanding the changing beliefs and values of people all over the world. The need and desire to understand different cultures is growing as we can see by the number of different countries studied since the survey first began in 1981. At the start only ten countries were evaluated, but that number rose to over fifty countries.
The cultural diversity is constantly expanding in our world and with the survey findings provided by WVS website we are given a glimpse of that expansion. The questionnaires were developed to survey a variety of cultures ranging from those in low-income countries to those in high-income countries making it possible to compare the differences in each culture. Results of each wave have provided a growing global perspective on values and the ways they vary in different cultures which is an important element in sociology because of the affect a society’s position has on the larger world. All over the world there are a number of cultural universals, such as the family and this website helps to identify some of them. The norms of each culture may not be explained by the table results, making it difficult to comprehend if the findings are deviant or customary for the particular culture, but regardless it provides more awareness to those wishing to understand other cultures. Though subject to ethnocentrism, the results relay popular culture among the different societies over time assisting the understanding of cultural change and how those changes affect other values and beliefs.
This website studies the different components of a culture from its held interest in politics to the way they conduct their daily life. Unfortunately the WVS does not take the trouble to interview every member of the society, thus producing a macro-level analysis of the different cultures all around the world. With the macro-level analysis we are able to apply the structural-functional approach to this website and the data produced by the surveys. The structural-functional approach to sociology sees society as an organism with different complex parts working together in order to promote a stable and harmonious environment. The cultural values of a society are what directly affect their lives and this website studies the different values of a culture, from their held interest in politics to the way they conduct their daily life. Using this approach to sociology helps emphasizes cultural patterns thus showing how they are important in meeting human needs.
Positive Deviance Initiative, http://www.positivedeviance.org, from chapter seven titled "Deviance". The Positive Deviance Initiative was developed to illustrate how implementing the positive deviance method can solve difficult problems and better the lives of defenseless people. PDI has executed a number of projects all around the world making the process and results of