Master's programs

Minor Social Sciences

The minor in Social Sciences studies relations and interaction between agents at distinct levels of analysis – ethnic groups, families, social networks, teams, organizations, and networks of organizations. The focus is on the differential effects of macro-social, institutional and organizational variables on distinct aspects of social behaviors or agents.

The Research Master in general addresses the topic of the individual in its social context. In the minor social sciences, which is driven to a large extent by the sociological framework, the meso and macro contexts are central. Examples of such contexts are work organizations, schools, neighborhoods, and voluntary organizations.
The leading question is how such contexts influence the way individuals think and act and, in turn, how individuals help shape and change the context in which they are embedded. Examples of questions that can be studied are: How does cohesion in a neighborhood affect crime and other deviant behavior? Why are certain work organizations better able in motivating their employees than other work organizations? Why do students in ethnically mixed schools perform worse than students in homogeneous schools?

In addition to these concrete contexts, the minor also looks at the role of more diffuse but nevertheless supra-individual contexts, namely the networks of relationships in which individuals participate. Finally, society or specific geographical regions of societies can be seen as contexts which influence the way individuals think and act. In terms of the analytical approach, much emphasis is on the collection and modeling of so-called multilevel data, i.e., combined data on multiple individuals in multiple contexts.

In the course Social Networks core concepts of network analysis are explained. In addition, several theories on the network formation are dealt with, and attention is paid to the consequences of embeddedness in social networks. Interaction between individual agents is partially derived from generic social interaction patterns like those in families, networks of friends, and acquaintances, or work colleagues. Some of these interactions are less, some are more intimate, some interactions are socially embedded e.g. in family or school settings, other interactions are prescribed and regulated by law. These different organizational and social roots of networks affect their relative impact on behaviors of agents.

In the course Institutions and Intra-organizational teams the content is two-fold. On the one hand, we look at interaction and intra-organizational dynamics in groups and teams as derived from the intra-organizational context. Behavior of individuals is, to a large extent, determined by agents’ membership of many distinct intra-organizational teams simultaneously. On the other hand, interaction is prescribed by macro-social institutional regimes that standardize and align, and therefore stifle group dynamics. The twofold focus of this course should enable more fully-fledged explanations of intra-organizational dynamics in groups and teams.

The literature is derived from sociology and organization sciences.

If you would like to know more about our program or our group you can contact the Social Sciences coordinators, dr. Ellen Verbakel (e-mail: E.Verbakel@uvt.nl) and

dr. Patrick Vermeulen (e-mail: patrick.vermeulen@uvt.nl)