I have a class discussion question due in three days. I will attach the requirements needed to complete this lesson. Please be advised that there is a 250 word minimum for this assignment. Must use re

This discussion addresses module outcome 1.  After reviewing various social science disciplines and their related theories, you can assess whether the social sciences add value to our collective understanding of humanity and its many dilemmas.  In this discussion, you are to evaluate this and the more specific argument that interdisciplinary social science (like all science) is better, more thorough, and capable of examining difficult subjects and addressing possible remedies than single discipline and theory assessments. 

Before beginning this activity, be sure to read the module notes and the assigned readings and viewings. Use and cite as much detail from the readings and other learning materials in these modules as possible to answer the following three questions:

• How is interdisciplinary research important to understanding societal problems and possible policy changes to address those problems? Is it better than single discipline research and policy prescriptions?  If so, why?  If not, why not?

• In your considered view, do you find social science research to be valuable to society as a whole and to governing officials who might make funding changes to society programs?

• What do you make of the claim that social science research merely finds what its funders want it to find, and therefore, has little objective truth behind it? Is this a view you share?  If so, why?  If not, why not?

Must be at least 250 words and must substantively integrate the assigned readings with proper APA 

Read:

• Required

  • Module Notes: Science and Interdisciplinary Social Science

  • Hunt, E. & Colander, D. (2016). Social science: An introduction to the study of society (15th ed.). New York, NY: Routledge.

    • Chapter 10: Education, pp. 182-188 , 194-200 

    • Chapter 11: Social and Economic Stratification, pp. 213-218 

    • Chapter 13: The Functions and Forms of Government, pp. 254-255 

    • Chapter 16: The Organization of Economic Activities, pp. 324-326 

    • Chapter 17: The Economy, Government, and Economic Challenges Facing the United States, pp. 349-350 

• Crow, B. & Lodha, S.K. (2011). Poverty in Atlas of global inequalities. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. Retrieved from http://vlib.excelsior.edu/login?url=http://search.credoreference.com/content/entry/ucpressi/poverty/0?institutionId=1649

• Demers, D. (2011). The Ivory Tower of Babel: Why the social sciences are failing to live up to their promises (Links to an external site.)Links to an external site. 60-63 (. New York, NY: Algora Publishing. Retrieved from EBSCOdatabase.

• Smelser, N. J., & Reed, J. S. (2012). Usable social science . Berkeley: University of California Press, 294-314 . Retrieved from EBSCO database. 

• Boix-Mansilla, C. (2014). Interdisciplinary understanding: What counts as quality work?  Interdisciplinary Studies Project, Harvard University, pp.1-5.

• van Evera, S. (2015, February 9). U.S. social science and international relations . Retrieved from https://warontherocks.com/2015/02/u-s-social-science-and-international-relations/

• de Parle, J. (2016, March 10). Kicked out in America! ( Retrieved from http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2016/03/10/evicted-kicked-out-in-america/

• Leonhardt, D. (2016, December 11). The American dream, quantified at last . New York Times. Retrieved from LexisNexis database.

• Desmond, M. (2016, February 8 & 15). Forced out: For many poor Americans, eviction never ends . Retrieved from http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/02/08/forced-out

View:

• Required

  • Promedion Productions. (1995) Research methods for the social sciences, The scientific method  [Video file, 03:37 mins]. Retrieved from http://fod.infobase.com.vlib.excelsior.edu/p_ViewVideo.aspx?xtid=115847&loid=426921

  • Pew Charitable Trusts. (2011). Economic mobility and the American dream . [Video file, 03:02 mins]. Retrieved from http://www.pewtrusts.org/en/multimedia/video/2011/economic-mobility-and-the-american-dream

  • U.S. Census Bureau. (n.d.). Poverty . Retrieved from https://www.census.gov/topics/income-poverty/poverty.html

  • World Bank. (n.d.). Poverty & equity data . Retrieved from https://www.census.gov/topics/income-poverty/poverty.html

Module 4: Module Notes: Science and Interdisciplinary Social Science

So far in the course, you have reviewed four of the major social science disciplines and begun to explore the interdisciplinary nature of the best research done in each field.  You begin with a review of the scientific method, and grapple with the need for higher quality interdisciplinary research to help solve modern dilemmas.  To this end, you will explore the difficult subject of poverty.  What causes poverty and what can be done to alleviate its devastating consequences?  How might sociologists, political scientists, economists, and psychologists evaluate the dilemma of poverty and what do they each and working collectively across disciplinary lines think can be done about it?  In this module, you will evaluate these and other subjects and assess these disciplines again in some detail.

The scientific method is common to all of the social science disciplines (Links to an external site.)Links to an external site. you have examined in the course to date.  It is an exacting process, requiring rigorous attention to evidence and logical argumentation, which clearly links cause and effect.  It is crucial to always understand and guard against falsely equating covariance of phenomena with causality among them.  Just because two things move in a related direction (correlation), this does not mean one is causing the other (Links to an external site.)Links to an external site..  Correlation among variables or phenomena one is studying is common, and mistakes are made in assigning causal weight to one or another variable/phenomenon in the legitimate effort to find the cause of a given societal problem one seeks to remedy.  Causal analysis requires the isolation of the hypothesized variable causing the problem under examination, but this is difficult in practice on social phenomena because multiple causal mechanisms are also usually at play with anything important and difficult to understand and solve.  This is another reason interdisciplinary research and problem solving is preferable. 

Interdisciplinary social science is best when disciplinary conventions, related theories, and concepts complement each other across disciplines.  For example, a psychological conceptual insight about herd-like behavior in humans, wanting to be with the mass in effect, is readily coupled with economics theorists who study market manias and price bubbles.  Why didn’t the price of something lift off and not come back to reality?  The buyers of an overpriced asset buy into the crowd’s logic of now is the time to join in with the group and own pets.com (Links to an external site.)Links to an external site., or whatever other asset is being overplayed by the group.  Both a sense of longing to be part of a group and a willingness to believe in something one knows to be more than a bit false animate this interdisciplinary research in behavioral economics.  As the authors identified in this module note, the pull of disciplinary convention and rivalrous competition with others often inhibits fruitful collaboration across disciplinary lines.  In 1890, eminent sociologist Emile Durkheim labeled all of political science as filled with mere “bastard speculations, half-way theoretical and half-way practical, half-way science and half-way arts” (Wagner, 2001, p. 25).  

Although anthropology, geography, and history are often considered part of the social science set of fields, in this course you have focused the primary social science fields of economics, political science, psychology, and sociology.  You might recognize geopolitics (Links to an external site.)Links to an external site., for example, as an interdisciplinary subfield that explores the importance of geographical realities to political processes, particularly international ones focused on power politics.  Interdisciplinary examples like this abound, but what matters to us most in this course is the serious work of the major disciplines on society’s most challenging dilemmas.  Serious social scientists examine more important and pressing problems, and the best among them work across disciplinary lines to address the most pressing problems confronting humanity. 

Reference:

• Wagner, P. (2001). A History and Theory of the Social Sciences: Not All That Is Solid Melts into Air. (Links to an external site.)Links to an external site. London, England: SAGE Publications.