Sociology Assignment: Fallacy, Prophecy, and the Matthew Effect

This sociology assignment delves into three key sociological concepts: ecological fallacy, suicidal prophecies, and the Matthew effect. The assignment begins by defining and illustrating the ecological fallacy, using the example of assumptions made about men and women drivers, and explaining why drawing conclusions about individuals from population-level data can be problematic. The second part focuses on suicidal prophecies, presenting two examples: an interview scenario and a sports team scenario, and analyzing how the fear of a negative outcome can paradoxically lead to its avoidance, or in the second case, its occurrence. Finally, the assignment explores the Matthew effect, explaining how initial advantages lead to further success, using the example of Apple Inc.'s growth and success. The assignment includes references to relevant academic literature supporting the concepts discussed.

Running head: SOCIOLOGY AND SOCIAL SCIENCE
SOCIOLOGY AND SOCIAL SCIENCE
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author note:

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Assignment 1
1. One example of “ecological fallacy”
It is seen that men drivers are generally more efficient than their women
counterpart. The general assumption is that the men are more precise and efficient at
driving. However, in individual cases it might be seen that a woman driver is exceeding
the driving skills of other male drivers. This is an example of ecological fallacy.
2. Why is it problematic to draw conclusions about individuals from information
about the population?
Ecological fallacy is the problem of assuming a particular fact on the basis of a
widespread belief. The widespread belief is that smoking causes cancer, however it might
be seen that in a particular case even excessive smoking might not have caused cancer.
So the idea that is perceived to be true by the larger section of the population may not be
true in individual or smaller number of cases (Brewer and Venaik 2014).
There is a widespread belief about the scarcity of driving skills in women. There
are few statistics which however show that the men drivers are involved in more number
of accidents, but this is mainly because number of miles’ males drive is considerably
more than women. So it can be taken at face value that a particular woman drives worse
than a particular man. This fallacy may be a cause uninformed opinion as an individual
woman may easily be superior in driving than anyone else. However, the perception of
women as driver is changing for the better these days. Studies say that women are more
likely to be obedient followers of traffic laws and they are more careful while driving.

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According to studies men are paying more for insurance, that may be because of
the perception about men that they engage in more reckless driving and risky behaviors
on the streets.
3. Hypothetical newspaper headline
“As widely believed women are still causing more accidents on the streets than men, proves
study”
In the above headline the term “widely believed” has been used which denotes the ecological
fallacy of assuming that the women drivers are less skilled in driving than the men. There
may be some statistics which may show that in a particular region in a particular time frame
women have caused more accidents but that does not signify that the women universally are
more likely to cause accidents and the women drivers are individually less skilled.
4. Correction of the hypothetical fallacy so that does not cause the mistake of fallacy
“A recent study has shown that the women are recently causing more accidents than men.”
In this headline the ecological fallacy has been corrected as the terms “as widely believed”
has been removed. Now it seems more like that a particular study has found trends that the
women may be causing more accidents in a particular area in a particular time frame which
may be the case, therefore the problem of the ecological fallacy is solved in this second
headline. Generalizing facts on the basis of widespread belief system is the phenomenon of
“ecological fallacy”.

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Assignment 2
5. Two examples of suicidal prophecies
a. The fear of an interview at the office where a person has applied gave rise to the
feeling that the interview would be botched up, in that anxiety the applicant starts to
prepare for the interview in an unprecedented way. The person started watching
YouTube videos, reading articles about probable questions at the interview being
scared about the consequences that might follow if the interview is botched up. The
individual works hard day and night to avert any untoward and unwanted situation at
the interview. Ultimately when the interview day comes it is seen that the interview
went perfectly because of the knowledge that the person received in order to avert the
fear of the interview getting botched up.
b. A top performing international cricket team has an upcoming international match
with another international team but which is smaller and having not many good
records at the international cricket scenario. Therefore, the top performing cricket
team assumes that they will win the match very easily and there are not much reasons
to practice a lot. This leads to the behavior that the players do not practice and they
take the cricket match very casually. This results in the top cricket team loosing on
the match day in the hand of the smaller cricket team. Therefore, the assumption and
belief of the players of the top performing cricket team about winning the match
results in the reversal of the situation where they actually lose the match.
6. Description of each of these suicidal prophecies
a. In the first case the self-fulfilling prophecy of the fact that the interview will be
botched up gives rise to the situation where the individual designs his behavior in a

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way that the prophecy is not fulfilled, it actually is reversed and the interview actually
goes well. This can be an ideal case of “suicidal prophecy” (Jussim 2012). The theory
of suicidal prophecy is that the self-fulfilling prophecy dies out because of the change
in pattern of the behavior of the individual or the group of people which is caused by
the idea of the self-fulfilling prophecy.
b. In the second case the suicidal prophecy is seen to be formulating in a team scenario.
In this situation the self-fulfilling prophecy that “the smaller team is weaker therefore
the stronger team will win” is defeated by the change in behavior of the players of the
stronger team. The players do not practice seriously and shows an attitude of
carelessness towards their commitment to the games, which causes the team to lose.
This is a case of suicidal prophecy in terms of a group scenario.
Assignment 3
7. An example of the Matthew-effect
Matthew effect is the name of the phenomenon which summarizes the idea that
the beneficial section of the society gets more benefits and the weaker section becomes
weaker. Or in other words it also summarizes the idea that “success brings success” with
it (Azoulay, Stuart and Wang 2013). The concept was devised by Robert K Merton in
1968 and the name of the theory was derived from the biblical text “the Gospel of
Matthew”. In the Parable of talents, it is mentioned that “For to everyone who has will
more be given, and he will have abundance; but from him who has not, even what he has
will be taken away. — Matthew 25:29, RSV.” In addition, “I tell you, that to everyone
who has will more be given; but from him who has not, even what he has will be taken

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away. — Luke 19:26, RSV.” Therefore, the concept has been reprised and presented in
the new form as the “Matthew effect”
One example of Matthew effect is the fact that the large industries keeps on
adding to their wealth and becomes richer by the day. Apple which is a successful
technological company continues to draw benefits from its success and increases its
wealth by adding new products, new stores, and new software to its lineup.
8. Description in details
The Matthew effect mentioned above can be described well by exploring the history in which
the company Apple Inc. has grown by the day. The company started with a very humble
beginning but saw the face of success by the innovation it brought with its products. This success
was multiplied into more successes as time went by. Apple McIntosh computers became very
popular, Apple iPhone became craze, and its software were in high demand. This is the ideal
example of the fact that how the first instance of success brought further success to the company
which enabled it to grow to a gigantic size, and today the company is the largest tech company of
the world. Therefore, if success can be achieved once in a given scenario, automatically more
number of successes follow. The case is the same with failure when a failure can result in a
number of wrong decisions from the authority which may cause further failures. This is what is
Matthew effect in terms of success and failure in any given context. Google also had a humble
beginning in a garage, but as days passed by Google experienced many successes which helped
the company to become the world’s largest company. The company still today takes failure as a
challenge and even small failures are seen as major challenges that pose a threat to the growth of
the company.

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References and Bibliography:
Azoulay, P., Stuart, T. and Wang, Y., 2013. Matthew: Effect or fable?. Management
Science, 60(1), pp.92-109.
Brewer, P. and Venaik, S., 2014. The ecological fallacy in national culture
research. Organization Studies, 35(7), pp.1063-1086.
Jussim, L., 2012. Social perception and social reality: Why accuracy dominates bias and self-
fulfilling prophecy. OUP USA.
Kagan, J., 2018. Galen's prophecy: Temperament in human nature. Routledge.
Loney, T. and Nagelkerke, N.J., 2014. The individualistic fallacy, ecological studies and
instrumental variables: a causal interpretation. Emerging themes in epidemiology, 11(1), p.18.
Merton, R.K., 2016. The self-fulfilling prophecy. The Antioch Review, 74(3), pp.504-521.
Perc, M., 2014. The Matthew effect in empirical data. Journal of The Royal Society
Interface, 11(98), p.20140378.
Sedgwick, P., 2015. Understanding the ecological fallacy. BMJ: British Medical Journal
(Online), 351.