Key term
OCR A-Level Sociology H580
Introducing Socialisation, Culture and Identity
Topic overviewCulture, norms, values and cultural relativismSubculture, high culture and popular cultureGlobal and consumer culture, cultural diversity and hybridityPrimary and secondary socialisation, the family and peer groupMedia, religion, education and the workplace as agencies of socialisationLifelong socialisation and the nature/nurture debateSocial control, sanctions and formal agencies of controlInformal agencies and theories of social controlThe concept of identity, ethnicity and nationalityGender, class and sexual identityAge, disability, hybrid and intersecting identities
Families and RelationshipsComponent 01
Topic overviewFamily types and trends in marriage, divorce and cohabitationDemographic change, family diversity and newer family typesNuclear family ideology, functionalism and the New RightMarxist, feminist and postmodern views and the diversity debateConjugal roles and the domestic division of labourPower, the dark side of the family and theories of partner rolesThe child-centred family, views of childhood and its extensionParent-child power, grandparents in an ageing population and feminist views
Youth SubculturesComponent 01
Topic overviewFunctionalist and neo-Marxist views of youth cultureHebdige, feminist and postmodern views of youth subculturesClass, ethnic and hybrid subcultures and consensus versus conflictDelinquent, criminal, spectacular and anti-school subculturesGangs, newer deviant subcultures and patterns in youth offendingFunctionalist, New Right and Marxist explanations of youth devianceLabelling, identity, gender, ethnicity and moral panics in youth deviance
MediaComponent 01
Topic overviewRepresentations of ethnicity and nationality, symbolic annihilation and the male gazeRepresentations of gender, social class and young peopleRepresentations of older people and theories of media representationDirect and indirect media effects modelsActive audience models, deviance amplification and moral panics
Research Methods and Researching Social Inequalities
Topic overviewPositivism, quantitative data and interpretivismVerstehen, qualitative data and validityReliability, representativeness, generalisability and theoryResearch topics, aims, hypotheses and primary and secondary dataOperationalisation, pilot studies and respondent validationLongitudinal studies, interpreting data and social policySampling frames, sampling techniques and choosing a sampleAccess, gatekeepers and research ethicsQuestionnaires, structured interviews, statistics, content analysis and observationUnstructured interviews, ethnography and methodological pluralism
Understanding Social Inequalities
Globalisation and the Digital Social World
Crime and DevianceComponent 03
Topic overviewDefining crime and deviance, social control and relativitySocial construction of crime and police recorded crimeThe Crime Survey, victim surveys and self-report studiesCrime patterns by social class, gender and ageCrime patterns by ethnicity, crime trends and global organised crimeGlocal organised crime and green crimeFunctionalist, strain and subcultural theories of crimeMarxist, interactionist and left realist theories of crimeRight realism, New Right, feminism and explaining ethnic and age patternsLeft-wing crime reduction, social crime prevention and restorative justiceSituational crime prevention, zero tolerance and punitive justice
EducationComponent 03
Topic overviewFunctionalist, Marxist and liberal views of the role of educationSocial democratic, New Right and feminist views and vocational educationClass and ethnic patterns in educational attainmentGender patterns, global educational inequality and intersectionalityInside-school factors: labelling, setting, triage and institutional racismMaterial and cultural deprivation and cultural capitalExplaining gender and ethnic differences and theoretical views of achievementTypes of school and education policy since 1988Ideology, marketisation and equality of opportunity in education policy
Religion, Belief and FaithComponent 03
Topic overviewDefining religion, faith and belief, churches and denominationsSects, cults, new religious and new age movements and fundamentalismMeasuring religiosity and believing without belongingFunctionalist and Marxist views of the role of religionNeo-Marxist, Weberian, feminist, phenomenological and postmodern views of religionReligion, social change and whether religion is positive or negativeClass and gender patterns in religiosityWomen's changing religiosity and ethnic and age patternsAge cohorts, global religious trends and resurgenceDefining secularisation and evidence of religious declinePro- and anti-secularisation theoriesReligion and social policy, the golden age critique and global patterns
Education
- 9 subtopics
- 24 things to know
- Component 03
- Component 03 Section B option, one of three
What Education covers
Education is examined on component 03 of OCR Sociology, Debates in contemporary society. It is one of the three Section B options on that paper, of which a student sits one. 119 recall questions across 9 subtopics.
Where it is assessed
Component 03
Debates in contemporary society, Section B option of three.
Check the OCR specification ↗The 9 subtopics
Each one has its own page.
- Functionalist, Marxist and liberal views of the role of educationRecall questions on Durkheim on social solidarity and specialist skills, Parsons's school as a bridge, Davis and Moore's role allocation, Althusser's ideological state apparatus, Bowles and Gintis's correspondence principle, hidden curriculum and myth of meritocracy, Willis's lads, and the liberal view of education and the schooling it favours.Open →
- Social democratic, New Right and feminist views and vocational educationRecall questions on social democratic views and comprehensive schooling, New Right views and Chubb and Moe, liberal, radical and Marxist feminist views of education, functionalist, Marxist and New Right views of education and work, vocational education, T Levels and the apprenticeship levy, Finn and Cohen's criticisms, and parity of esteem.Open →
- Class and ethnic patterns in educational attainmentRecall questions on the relationship between social class and attainment, free school meals as an indicator, the widening class gap, class and access to higher education, and ethnic patterns in attainment, including Chinese, Indian, Gypsy, Roma and Traveller, Bangladeshi, Pakistani, Black Caribbean and white British pupils.Open →
- Gender patterns, global educational inequality and intersectionalityRecall questions on the gender gap in attainment and when girls moved ahead, gendered subject choice, debates about boys' underachievement, gender apartheid and barriers to girls' schooling globally, differences in provision between rich and poor countries, learning poverty, modernisation and dependency explanations, and how class, gender and ethnicity combine.Open →
- Inside-school factors: labelling, setting, triage and institutional racismRecall questions on inside-school and outside-school explanations, structural, material and cultural explanations, Becker on labelling, Rosenthal and Jacobson's self-fulfilling prophecy, streaming and setting, Lacey's differentiation and polarisation, Gillborn and Youdell's educational triage, the ethnocentric curriculum and institutional racism in schools.Open →
- Material and cultural deprivation and cultural capitalRecall questions on material deprivation and Callender and Jackson on debt aversion, cultural deprivation theory, Bernstein's restricted and elaborated codes, Douglas and Sugarman, Keddie's critique, Bourdieu's cultural capital, habitus and symbolic violence, and the outside-school factors used to explain ethnic differences in achievement.Open →
- Explaining gender and ethnic differences and theoretical views of achievementRecall questions on family-based explanations of Black Caribbean boys' attainment and Sewell, the outside-school changes behind girls' improved performance, and functionalist, Marxist, interactionist, social democratic, feminist and New Right explanations of differential educational achievement.Open →
- Types of school and education policy since 1988Recall questions on the types of institution in UK education, academies, free schools, selective and non-selective schooling, the Education Reform Act 1988, quasi-markets, league tables and inspection, New Labour policies against disadvantage, tuition fees, Coalition and Conservative reforms after 2010, and post-1988 vocational training.Open →
- Ideology, marketisation and equality of opportunity in education policyRecall questions on New Right and social democratic ideology in post-1988 policy, New Labour's hybrid approach, cream-skimming and silt-shifting, Ball's myth of parentocracy, debates about rising standards and a narrowing curriculum, and how far policy has improved equality of opportunity by class, gender and ethnicity, including multicultural and anti-racist approaches.Open →
What you need to know
Answer each one before you reveal it.
Your recallNot started
Key term
How does the Marxist feminist account of education differ from the liberal feminist one?
Key term
Distinguish structural, material and cultural explanations of differential achievement.
Key term
Explain Bernstein's distinction between the restricted and elaborated speech codes.
Key term
Explain Bourdieu's concept of cultural capital.
Key term
What is a free school, and how does it differ from an academy?
Key term
What is the overall direction of structural change in English schooling since 1988?
Key term
What is a quasi-market in education, and what was it meant to achieve?
Key term
Exam results have risen steadily since 1988. Why do sociologists disagree about whether standards have risen?
Who and when
Why did Durkheim argue that a modern industrial economy could not function without schooling?
Numbers
Define vocational education and name two vocational routes introduced in Britain after 1988.
Key term
Which ethnic groups in England typically attain above the national average at GCSE?
Key term
Which ethnic groups have persistently the lowest recorded attainment in England?
Numbers
When did girls move decisively ahead of boys in national results?
Key term
Give examples showing that subject choice remains gendered despite girls' overall lead.
Key term
Distinguish between inside-school and outside-school explanations of differential achievement.
Key term
What is the social democratic explanation of underachievement, and what remedy follows from it?
Key term
How has policy addressed gender in education, and what has it not fixed?
Key term
Functionalists and Marxists agree that education sorts young people into unequal positions. Where do they disagree?
Numbers
What are T Levels, and what does the apprenticeship levy do?
Key term
Which large group of pupils is now among the lowest attaining in England, and why does that surprise people?
Key term
Give an example showing why class, gender and ethnicity must be considered together rather than one at a time.
Who and when
What is labelling, and what kind of pupil did Becker find teachers rewarded?
Who and when
What values did Douglas and Sugarman identify as holding some working-class pupils back?
Take Education further
The same content, four other ways.
Questions from this topic
Each one with the model answer underneath.
- 1
According to Durkheim, what does education create by passing the shared culture on to each new generation?
Model answer
It creates social solidarity — a feeling of belonging to one community — because pupils absorb the same history, beliefs and rules and come to see themselves as part of something larger than themselves.
- 2
Why did Durkheim argue that a modern industrial economy could not function without schooling?
Model answer
A complex division of labour needs workers with specialist skills, and school is where those skills are taught so that specialists can cooperate in production.
- 3
Explain Parsons' idea that the school acts as a bridge between the family and wider society.
Model answer
In the family a child is judged by particularistic standards and holds an ascribed status, while wider society judges everyone by the same universalistic standards and rewards achieved status, and school is the first place a child is treated in that impersonal, universal way.
- 4
What did Davis and Moore see as the main function of education, and how do they defend unequal rewards?
Model answer
They saw education as role allocation, sifting and sorting pupils by ability so the ablest reach the most important positions, and they argue high rewards are needed to persuade talented people to undertake long training for demanding jobs.
- 5
What did Althusser mean by calling education an ideological state apparatus?
Model answer
He meant education maintains ruling-class power by shaping ideas rather than by force, unlike the repressive apparatus of police and army, and it does so by reproducing both labour power and an ideology that makes inequality seem natural.
- 6
Explain the correspondence principle put forward by Bowles and Gintis.
Model answer
They argue the social relationships of school mirror those of the workplace — hierarchy, obedience to authority, competition, fragmented tasks and rewards that lie outside the work itself — so schooling quietly rehearses pupils for subordinate labour.
What is inside Levo
Six ways to work the same material.
Education revision questions
- What does Education cover in OCR A-Level Sociology?
- 9 subtopics: functionalist, marxist and liberal views of the role of education, social democratic, new right and feminist views and vocational education, class and ethnic patterns in educational attainment, gender patterns, global educational inequality and intersectionality, inside-school factors: labelling, setting, triage and institutional racism, material and cultural deprivation and cultural capital, explaining gender and ethnic differences and theoretical views of achievement, types of school and education policy since 1988 and ideology, marketisation and equality of opportunity in education policy. Each one has its own page with questions and model answers.
- How is Education organised?
- By the OCR H580 specification, subtopic by subtopic, so it matches the order you are taught it in.
Every question in Education, on a schedule.
Attempt a question from memory, write the correct version, then attempt it again. Levo records the jump between your first attempt and your last, and brings each question back on the day you are due to forget it.
Or £46 a year, about £3.83 a month. Cancel anytime.