AQA A2 SOCIOLOGY: Official Revision Thread for 2015 exams!

You can't evaluate it properly if you don't understand it....

you get marked on your interpretation/application and analysis as well as your evaluation, all of which contribute to your AO2/3 so you can get these marks by just answering the question in your own interpretation and spelling out key vocabulary in laymans terms

but I would guarantee even the knowledge you have on it (be it limited or broad) you'll undoubtedly include some evaluative points just in the nature that you've been taught it!

i examine for aqa.

there is no ao3....

ao2/3 is just how my sociology teacher makes us to include all aspects of the ao2 marks by splitting them all into component parts we also do ao4 but I know that other schools don't include this, my mistake
Thought you was a student who was finding it difficult oops! I'll stop giving advice now haha

For the SCLY4 specification point "The social distribution of crime and deviance by age, ethnicity, gender, locality and social class, including recent patterns and trends in crime" - What section of the paper can ask about this, and what kind of essays do they ask?

- Just I'm trying to structure my notes, but not sure about how they would ask about these...

Thanks

For the SCLY4 specification point "The social distribution of crime and deviance by age, ethnicity, gender, locality and social class, including recent patterns and trends in crime" - What section of the paper can ask about this, and what kind of essays do they ask?

- Just I'm trying to structure my notes, but not sure about how they would ask about these...

Thanks

I know there's only ao1 and ao2 in the real exams, but my teacher marks homework essays and mocks as ao1 knowledge ao2 interpretation/application ao3 analysis and ao4 evaluation, just like marking each component as 1,2,3,4 so that we can see we're using an array of all ao2 marks :-) I find it quite a useful tool to see that I'm using a range

This is actually a really clever way of picking up the marks. Can you explain the AO points further? As in which examples will go where?

x

x

Thank you both, very helpful!

In terms of gender and crime, where would sex role theory, control theory and liberation thesis come up in an essay?

How could/would they word an essay that asked you to include these explanations of gender differences in crime?

Cheers

that exact question has already come up (June 10 SCLY4)
it's likely to just be a direct "examine the reasons" question but you could easily include it in any patterns of crime or feminist essay

I guess it's similar to a PEE paragraph (but maybe with an extra E ? haha) i'll try and make it a little clearer in an example:
so say the question asked about a functionalist/subculturalist theory of crime and deviance i would say:

Fuctionalist writer Merton argued crime and deviance stems from his strain theory (this would be knowledge AO1 you could also then write about his 5 typologies which would be more AO1 marks)
This theory suggests that those who are working class with few qualifications and therefore more prone to poverty, are unable to obtain their material goals, which are set out as fully achievable by a capitalist society through meritocracy (this is unpacking the theory and spelling out what "strain theory" is in laymans terms so would get an AO2/3 from my teacher)
Working class individuals therefore have strain between what they can achieve and what they desire so may turn to illegitimate means to obtain these goods (Again maybe AO2/3 but i would further explain the most prone typologies such as innovators)

This theory is useful in understanding why working class people commit crimes and despite being a functionalist, Merton draws attention to class conflict in crime and deviance, something many other functionalists neglect. However this theory fails to explain why some people conform to changes which create strain whilst others turn to crime. It also doesn't give an explanation as to why some crimes are committed that show no financial gains such as vandalism.
Marxists would argue this theory ignores white collar crimes which arise from too much opportunity and not too little Box would therefore argue who this model is beneficial for. (this should all be AO4 evaluation by using general critiques alongside opposing perspectives)

I would use that kind of structure for all future paragraphs on Cohen -> Miller --> Cloward Ohlin and criticise them all through D. Matza
hope that has helped somewhat, if you need any other help with other topics and examples dm me and i'll try to explain :--)

Thank you so much this has been really helpful😀 just one more question. When writing the 33mark research method question do I use this method also?

And how many synoptic links do we need to include to get top marks? My teacher said something like 5 but I don't think that's possible..

i would say yes to that, I personally use that structure for all my essays including the 33 marker..
just remember the 33 is method and theory so use it on both theory and method. when using it on theory try and evaluate/criticize with another theory so for example with functionalism criticize marxism/feminism etc
and when using it on methodology try and criticize with the opposing method so for a positivist method try and criticize with interpretivist method and vice versa

personally i think it depends on what the question is asking, if it's a theory or methodology question then yeah i would try and include about 3 paragraphs on the theory and 2/3 on methods so a total of 5/6 different points including the critiques. But i find questions relating to things like social policy much harder to include a wide range
Just think about what you learnt this year, you have knowledge on theory and on methods and on a specialised topic like religion or media etc so if you can include 1 on each and 1 paragraph critiquing each one i guess that's 6 topics, but it's all down to a matter of opinion i suppose, i find the essay question really hard to include a wide range so tend to focus on the stuff i know really well. as long as it's structured well with detailed knowledge i personally wouldn't say it matters all that much on the breadth of your knowledge