Social Facts
Created: 2022-12-27
Status: #soil
Last Edited: 2022-12-27
Topic: sociology
# What are social facts?
???
Social facts are the collective beliefs, norms and values of a given society. They are the external social forces that shape individual behavior and attitudes.
Emile Durkheim argued that social facts were more powerful than individual will, and thus should be studied in their own right, independent of psychology or individual psychology.
He argued that understanding social facts was essential to understanding the way society works, and could be used to develop new theories about social phenomena.
Examples of Social Facts
Examples of social facts include:
- Religious beliefs
- Political ideologies
- Cultural norms
- Social institutions such as government, education, and the family
- Laws
- Economic systems
- Social values such as honesty, loyalty, and respect.