Social and Culture Framework
After consultations with both Nur and Harah, I decided to combine various elements from other concepts / frameworks (Macro, meso, micro-level analysis method, Centage Learning’s social structure framework, Gregory’s perception theory) to create my own framework to understand how different persons or groups in society can interact and influence each other and how culture and society can change as time progresses. This will replace my layer 2 for Layering the Research #2.
The micro level structures consist of individuals, peers and family members. The interactions at the micro level are personal and are composed of one-on-one everyday conversations and actions of the people in the community. The meso level structures consist of groups in the wider community such as organisations, schools, workplaces and its interactions. The macro level structures are the large institutions such as the government, legislation and the media. Analysis at the macro level considers the broad systems in place that are heavily shaping the lives of the citizens. There are interactions between the micro and the meso level, the meso and the macro levels and these interactions can influence changes across the different levels. Every person in the society has statuses and roles that define each of them, dictating how one should behave in society. Often, people taking up more roles would have a higher likelihood of experiencing role conflict. For instance, younger working adults might feel older workers who are not retiring are competing against them for opportunities. Culture is the shared knowledge — traditions, customs, values, norms, artefacts, technologies — possessed by the societal members. The environment is the physical setting that the society is located in. It presents the society with both opportunities and limitations. Every single entity in the society and the environment is situated in time and changes in the passage of time. As we obtain information from the environment, we form our own perceptions based on stored knowledge or past events and experiences. These perceptions form the social constructs. Social construct or social construction is the jointly created understanding of reality based on the shared assumption of the real world. To influence events in the future, we need to implement changes at the present. This framework also allows us to visualise different scenarios of the futures to help us with decision-making at the present.