Expert: Gorkey Gourab - 1/26/2009

Question
Hi,
my teacher asked me to "Discuss the similarities between how Anthropologists, Psychologists and Sociologists would describe the concept of an individual in relation to others around them." I cannot think of what an anthropologist would say. Can you help?
thank you

Answer
Hello Jermain!

Actually these subjects overlap to some extent as all of them focus on studying human. The differences are in philosophy of studying human, methodology and the way of precession.

Some of the social scientists say that Sociology focuses on studying of groups of people (rather than focusing on individuals only) and Anthropology study of man. Well, it’s complex to make comment so straightforward. While, Anthropology once focused on past (Archeology) or ‘simple’ cultures (Cultural Anthropology) … it doesn’t mean that it always do so. Rapid paradigm shifts made it difficult to say that “Anthropologists primarily focus on studying ‘primitive’ culture.” Anthropologists are now more focused on applied aspects and studying industrial societies like Sociologists. Among the four fields of Anthropology (Cultural Anthropology, Archeology, Linguistic Anthropology and Archeology) we can find similarities between Sociology and Anthropology if we focus on Cultural Anthropology only. If we do not take some postmodern theories in account, both the disciplines tend to study individual as a part of society. While Sociology focuses on an individual based on his/her relation with society, Anthropological studies on an individual generally focus on contextual issues those influence his/her relation with others surrounding him/her.

The focus of psychology is on processes that occur within the individual, within the skin-bound organism." Psychologists are primarily concerned with mental processes: intelligence, emotions, perception, and memory. Some concentrate on attitudes and values; others focus on personality, mental aberration (psychopathology, or mental illness), and how individuals cope with the problems they face. However, Anthropologists like Benedict, Margaret Mead, and Franz Boas also pioneered the Anthropological Paradigm called Psychological Anthropology. Sociologists also focused on Social Psychology of individual as a part of the society and group behavior. Therefore, you can find similarities here as well.

Like anthropologists, sociologists study culture; they have a specific attention in the social consequences of material goods, group structure, and belief systems, as well as in how people communicate with one another and like psychologists, sociologists are also concerned with how people adjust to the difficulties of life.

While finding similarities, you can also focus on the implication of these subjects in healthcare sectors. Medical Anthropology and Medical Sociology both focus on human in order to devise effective means to serve them. Psychologists work side by side to achieve the same goal. And in Medical ANthropology, Anthropologists focus on individual perceptions and contextual actions considering him/her as a pert of a specific culture.

Hope it worked. Sorry for delay. Take care of yourself and have a nice day.

Best,
Gorkey