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After reading this article you will learn about the meaning of theory in social science.
Scientific theory is a term which comes from the Greek word ‘theorem’ meaning to look at. A fair translation of scientific theory would be a knowledgeable outlook. There is a sense, of course, in which every one has a world outlook, and thus the meanest of man has his own theory; and to think at all is to theorize.
Theory in ordinary speech does not mean this (more usually it means what is called a working hypothesis). Science provides the only systematic and corrigible world outlook not requiring any special suppositions beyond those readily made by ordinary men of affairs. It thus makes possible agreement and collaboration among people who in other respects, would be in severe disagreement.
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Theory is a much abused term. It is, therefore, important to distinguish the modern scientific usage of the word ‘theory’ from other possible meanings it might have come to acquire. In common parlance, theory is identified with speculation.
What is ‘theoretical’ is thought to be unrealistic, visionary or impracticable. Merton points out that among sociologists the term ‘sociological theory’ has had at least six different meanings.
In the early days of a science, theories were often the result of arm-chair speculation and had meager support in empirical data. Theory and observation (empirical facts) became more and more connected as science developed.
The social sciences in their present state of development do not always show a close link between research and theory and some current social theories do contain speculative elements, that leap off beyond the evidence of available data.
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By and large, the intention of a theory in modern science is to summarize existing knowledge, to provide an explanation for observed events and relationships and to predict the occurrence of as yet unobserved events and relationships, on the basis of the explanatory principles embodied in the conceptual scheme.
Simply viewed, theory could be understood as a conceptual scheme designed to explain observed regularities or relationships between two or more variables.
Writes Karl Popper in his Logic of Scientific Discovery, “Theories are nets cast to catch what we call ‘the world,’ to rationalize, to explain and also to master it. We endeavour to make the mesh finer and finer.” Parsons observes, “The theoretical system (in the present sense) is the body of logically interdependent generalized concepts of empirical reference.”
Whereas a theory in the earlier times was considered a final and irrefutable explanation of some class of things or realm of phenomena, in modern science it is always held with some measure of tentativeness, no matter how great the accumulation of findings consistent with it.
It is considered as the most probable or most efficient way of accounting for those findings in the light of extant body of knowledge, but is always open to revision. On the whole, it may be said that modern science is modest in regard to its claims in as much as it is fully aware that its findings are all provisional.
It does not find itself in a position to make final pronouncements having seen that the river of knowledge has too often turned back on itself. Science has changed not only the face of earth and the life of its people, it has also changed its own face and identity.
Today, the scientific mode of thinking plays a more important role than knowledge and erudition, as of old. It has resulted in a method which leads to new knowledge and making a line of thought.
Johan Galtung conceives of theory as a set of hypotheses structured by the relation of implication or deducibility.
Formally put, “A theory T is a structure (H, I) where H is a set of hypotheses and I is a relation in H called implication or deducibility, so that H is weakly connected by I.”
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R. B. Braithwaite’s exposition of’ theory’ can barely be equaled. For him, “a theory consists of a set of hypotheses which form a deductive system, that is, which is arranged in such a way that from some of the hypotheses as premises all the other hypotheses logically follow. The propositions in a deductive system may be considered as being arranged in an order of levels, the hypotheses at the highest level being those which occur only as premises in the system, those at the lower level being those which occur as conclusions or deductions from higher level hypotheses and which serve as premises for deduction to lower level hypotheses.”
Parsons would view the theoretical system as one which ideally tends to become logically closed, to reach such a state of logical integration that every logical implication of any combination of propositions in the system is explicitly stated in some other proposition in the same system.
However, it is well worth remembering that not all theories have a determinate logical structure as Braithwaite’s exposition would lead us to ‘believe.’ Theories may have strong or weak structures.
A strong theory structure (tight-knit theory) may be represented as under:
From the above representation, it is clear that the lower level Hypotheses which are deductions from the higher level hypotheses are all on the same implication path and that the chain of implication is a neat and uninterested one.
In contradiction, a weakly structured (loose-knit theory may be depicted as under:
It is obvious that the loose-knit structure unlike the one for tight knit theories (Fig. 20.2) is characterized by the intersection of the implication chains on which the hypotheses are located. Thus, it would seem as Abel puts it, “All theories fall in two extremes of a simple explanatory principle and a deductive system with an abstract relational structure formed by the theoretical postulates.”
Hempel has likened a scientific theory to a network in which terms and concepts are represented by knots and the definitions and. hypotheses by threads connecting the knots.
Says Hempel, “The whole system floats, as it were, above the plane of observation and is anchored to it by the rules of interpretation. These might be viewed as strings which are not the part of the network but link certain points of the latter, with specific places on the plane of observation. By virtue of these interpretative connections, the network can function as a scientific theory. From certain observational data, we may ascend, via an interpretative string, to some point in the theoretical network, and from there proceed, via definitions and hypotheses, to other points, from which other interpretative strings permit descent to the plane of observation,” (See Fig. 20.3).
A theory explains empirical observations, since if anything, it is a mental construction that seeks to model the empirical system. Let us try to understand with the help of an interesting illustration, the nature of theoretical explanation.
In the third century A.D., it was observed that any natural catastrophe, be it an earthquake, flood, drought, famine or pestilence, was followed by persecution of the Christians by the Romans.
In the present century around the thirties (1930-40), it was observed that a fall in the per acre value of cotton in certain southern states of the USA, was followed by incidences of lynching of Negroes by the whites.
The underlying similarity in the two observations, viz., that catastrophe leads to persecution, is all the more striking because these incidents relate to periods far apart in time as also to different peoples and events. How can we go about explaining this sequence of events?
These two observations of a similar nature can be explained by means of a theory which involves the concepts: frustration, aggression, inhibition and displacement. This theory by Dollard and associates, known as the ‘Frustration aggression theory,’ is constituted of interlocking hypotheses involving the above-mentioned concepts.
The theory in essence states that when a person is frustrated and is inhibited from expressing his aggression directly toward the perceived source of frustration (because the source is powerful and capable of inflicting injuries, e.g., God or Government) he or she will displace his or her aggression toward weaker things (incapable of retaliating to the aggressive acts).
Thus, according to this theory both the aggression by Romans against Christians after the occurrence of natural catastrophes or by fall in income of whites, results in aggression but the futility or fear of being directly aggressive against the God or society or Government inhibits the direct expression of aggression against the real sources of frustration and results in its being ‘displaced’ on to groups which are underprivileged and thus incapable of retaliating.
Hence, with the help of the above theory, an explanation can be offered not only for these two different observations but also of many other events such as the aggressive action of an officer against his subordinates following frustration by his superior officer or the aggressive action of child against a younger sibling or a doll, following frustration caused by its parent’s actions.
This way, a theoretical perspective brings out in a number of different phenomena the operation of some underlying general principle.
It must, of course, be noted that the ‘frustration aggression theory’ in its present form is inadequate. It does not account for the variety of relevant phenomena and cannot satisfactorily overcome some objections (Freud shows, for instance, that the frustration may lead to some highly constructive activity too).
This does not, however, mean that the ‘frustration aggression theory’ is wrong. It is just that it is insufficient, not specific enough and not able to cover the relevant observable phenomena. The limiting conditions under which it applies (the ceteris paribus clause) have not yet been defined and this interferes seriously with its predictive value.
In social sciences, there are very few theories that can safely be used for explanation and prediction. To speak in terms of Hempel’s metaphor, one discovers isolated knots with loose threads hanging, awaiting systematic efforts to tighten them and to tie them together; and quite often, even knots are not yet available.
Something needs to be said here what has hitherto been left implicit. The term theory as applied to the realm of social sciences is in fact used mostly to refer to some logical explanation about social phenomena or a class thereof, logically constructed and systematically organised, that underscores the relationship between two well-defined variables.
It is much more than a social law supported by evidence. As a systematic relation between facts, it cannot simply be derived from empirical observations and generalizations by means of rigorous induction. It represents a symbolic construction, theory building is a matter of creative achievement.
As a conceptual scheme reaches out beyond itself, it transcends the observable realm of empirical reality into a higher level of abstraction by means of symbolic construction.
In other words, theoretic statements can in most cases arise by a genetic path between sense-data and theoretical perspectives; out of sense datum statements. But by the time theoretical statements are reached, there is much more than could even be represented in terms of sense-data.
A certain open texture is required in scientific theory which can be marred by an insistence on translatability criteria. Theory, if it is to be of any use, is bound to move ahead of the observations which support it in the first place.
Thus, theory is not something which can be summed up in terms of observations, measurements or the positive content of our empirical knowledge. Hence, the question that must principally be asked of any statement seeking entitlement as scientific theory is whether it can demonstrate the other phenomena, i.e., not merely the ones on which it rests in the first place.
In this sense it stands for the symbolic dimension of experience as opposed to the apprehension of brute fact.
From the very nature of social science theories emanates the limitation characterizing these theories, viz., that they often represent speculative exercises and it may not be possible to establish their correspondence with well-defined propositions or laws that can be empirically tested. This state of maturity is a distant goal for most social sciences.
The development of these sciences has been marked by a large number of conflicting theoretical perspectives. Social scientists have not yet been able to develop a single inductive procedure or a mathematical model that could test their theories and validate them as applicable to all groups and societies.
These theories lie between empirical law and speculative argument. Even a simple hypothesis may be regarded a minor theory and a speculative idea may come to be called theory if it generates at least one fruitful hypothesis, logically.
The theories of social sciences in the light of what has been said above can be verified only in a preliminary way, i.e., not in the strict statistical sense or not by fitting the syndrome of facts having a bearing on the class of phenomena being theorized. Social science theory can aspire for validation mostly by symbolic correspondence.
In the social-behavioural sciences, a quest for true theory could be a futile intellectual exercise. Every theory holds some pieces to the picture puzzle of the social world. A comprehensive picture of social phenomena may be expected to emerge through the integration of a variety of social theories.
If it is assumed that nothing exists except the world, then theory is part of the world; a part which stands in some way for the whole; and a comprehensive theory in dealing with the world will have to deal also with itself as a part of this world, just as the map of a country drawn somewhere in that country would have to contain a very much reduced replica of itself.
A particular social theory may be likened to a map which showed only roads, or one which showed only railways. Scientific theories are selective; any one science is dealing with only a fraction of what there is to be observed.
For that matter, all the sciences taken together will still give a very incomplete account of the world we know, just as the superimposition of all the specialized maps the road map, the railway map, the demographic map, etc., would still leave indefinitely many concrete facts about the country unexpressed.
It is well-worth reminding ourselves here that no theory is absolutely true since there is no absolute truth in the first place and no theory is a final formulation because ripples of new knowledge are splashing in all the time. These modify or even repudiate the existing theory.
It will serve us well to note that theories which stand repudiated today had their days of glory. For example, at the present time Comte’s theory of unilateral evolution has been used by experts on modernization to describe progress and evolution in total societies.
Here we need to sound a caution about the possible fallacy of misplaced concreteness which comprises placing of theoretical entities in the same world as the observable ones. Indeed, if they are there at all, they are there by definition, invisibly, which is certainly odd in a world whose claim to existence lies in it being observed.
But the invention of theoretical entities is necessary for the progress of science and there is nothing wrong with them as long as they are not thought of as belonging to the observable world.
All sorts of possible worlds with all sorts of imaginary constituents, behaving in all sorts of ways may be constructed by science and nobody would have any objection until the scientist tries to force conclusions derived from his hypothetical world upon actions to be carried out in the observable world.
In essence, then, the provision of a working replica of the real world is the goal of theory and yet the claim that it is a replica of the real world is always rather presumptions.
Research and theory as co-travellers must proceed toward continuous increments of knowledge. Each has an important contribution to make to the other. A scientist may take one or the other as his starting point, but he must consider at some point of his exercise the bearing of his work on the interrelation between theory and research.
That is, if he concentrates on empirical research alone, he must at some point later, examine its relevance to social theory if its potential contribution is to be realized. On the other hand, if his major interest is in the development of theory, he must take into account ways of testing and expanding his theory by empirical research if it is to turn out to be more than just an interesting speculation.