Functionalist Perspective
A social problem is when enough people agree that a condition exists that threatens the quality of their lives and their values, and agree that something should be done about it. Even though people agree that something should be done about this social problem, not all people think it should be handled the same way. One person may have a different perspective on how to handle the situation and another person may have a different way. There are three basic perspectives on social problems and they are; The Functionalist Perspective, The Conflict Perspective, and The Interactiontionist Perspective. In this essay, I will explain the perspective of each. The functionalist perspective is that everyone has a position in life and that a person’s
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The Interactionist are interested in knowing what put the person into the situation that they are in and made them take on the values of the people in that social problem. For instance let’s say a kid needed money, a kid at his school was in pain and need painkiller, and he sold it to him. That is considered drug dealing because the kid sold drugs, even though it was just pain killer it was still a drug and was still sold. Someone found out and they put the label of “Drug dealer” on the kid. The kid thinks that he is a drug dealer so he does what drug dealers do, and leads the type of lifestyle that they are depicted to lead. If a person falls back a bit financially and someone calls them poor, what do they do? They do what poor people are depicted to do, and apply for welfare. So the people who are a part of the social problem simply align themselves to fit the description. For Interactionist, the group’s definition of their social problems is central to understanding their actions. In conclusion, for a social problem to be a social problem it people must agree that a condition exists and that something should be done about it. The views differ on why the conditions exist and what should be done to fix it. The functionalist perspective is that social problems exist because people cannot adapt to function in society. The Conflict Perspective is that
The Interactionist are interested in knowing what put the person into the situation that they are in and made them take on the values of the people in that social problem. For instance let’s say a kid needed money, a kid at his school was in pain and need painkiller, and he sold it to him. That is considered drug dealing because the kid sold drugs, even though it was just pain killer it was still a drug and was still sold. Someone found out and they put the label of “Drug dealer” on the kid. The kid thinks that he is a drug dealer so he does what drug dealers do, and leads the type of lifestyle that they are depicted to lead. If a person falls back a bit financially and someone calls them poor, what do they do? They do what poor people are depicted to do, and apply for welfare. So the people who are a part of the social problem simply align themselves to fit the description. For Interactionist, the group’s definition of their social problems is central to understanding their actions. In conclusion, for a social problem to be a social problem it people must agree that a condition exists and that something should be done about it. The views differ on why the conditions exist and what should be done to fix it. The functionalist perspective is that social problems exist because people cannot adapt to function in society. The Conflict Perspective is that