The definitions and explanations offered here are based on the usage of the terms in this book. In most cases that is very similar to how the terms are used elsewhere, but by no means is this always the case. I have tried to include all the key concepts for which I felt an easy reference would be helpful to the reader.

Abnormal: Those characteristics that disable an individual from functioning in all types of human societies.

Altruism, Selfishness: Altruistic behavior is behavior in which the welfare of others is internalized as part of the actor's own welfare to the degree desired by that society. Behavior is labeled as selfish when the actor has not fused the welfare of others with his or her own welfare to the degree desired by that society. The distinction thus turns on the composition of the self, not on whether the action is self-oriented. All actions are presumed here to be self-oriented.

Aggression: Aggressive behavior aims at inflicting injury of some sort, verbal or physical, on others.

Androgen: A type of hormone that promotes male genitalia development and functioning as well as promoting the secondary characteristics (growth of beard, for example) that accompany genetic male maturation. The term androgen includes testosterone, aldosterone, and androsterone.

Anthropology: The field that studies human social life in a variety of cultural settings. As used here the focus is upon what American anthropologists call cultural anthropology and what the British anthropologists call social anthropology. However, the broader field of anthropology includes archeology, linguistics, and physical anthropology.

Assumption, Scientific: Fundamental assertions about the nature of the world we scientifically study. Such statements are not empirically testable, for they are the starting point of our reasoning. An example would be the assumption that the world is knowable through the senses.

Autonomy, Individual: Refers to the degree to which one is not controlled by outside pressures but permitted to rule oneself. The same term may be applied to parts of a society. For example, universities in America are generally not highly restricted by political and economic pressures, and thus American universities are high on autonomy.

Axiomatic Theory: At its simplest level it is a type of scientific explanation that involves stating premises that are assumed to be true and then logically deducing from those premises relationships that can be empirically tested.

Bestiality: Sexual relationships between a human and a nonhuman animal. Also called zoophilia.

Biology: The science that studies life processes of organisms. Included here would be physiology, anatomy, endocrinology, and primatology.

Bisexual: A person who is relatively equally sexually attracted to the same and opposite genders,

Body-Centered Sexuality: Sexual introduction focused upon the body of the partner rather than the personality of the partner.

Bonding: A strong emotional attachment between two individuals.

Bridewealth: A common marriage custom wherein the groom presents some gifts to the bride's family. Also known as brideprice.

Cause: One or more conditions that are necessary and sufficient for the production of some effect. A necessary condition is one that must occur if the effect is to Occur. A sufficient condition is one that is always followed by the effect. A condition may be necessary but not sufficient to produce the effect. Drug experimentation may, for example be necessary but not sufficient to produce addiction. A condition may be sufficient but only one of the ways to produce the effect, and thus it is not necessary. Loss of all one's blood, for example, is a sufficient cause of death but not the only cause and so not necessary. Rarely do we find conditions that are necessary and sufficient in social science. Causal analysis, like politics, is the art of the possible and the probable.

Causal Diagram: A diagram that presents the causally related variables in time sequences, usually with arrows drawn to indicate the causal direction (or directions), and showing whether the relationship is positive, negative, or otherwise. One type of causal diagram would be what sociologists call a path diagram.

Chromosomal Sex: Genetic sex usually symbolized by the presence of XX(female) or XY(male) genes in the chromosomes of the individual and present in all body cells.

Clitoridectomy: The surgical removal of the clitoris or portions thereof.

Coding, Research: A research procedure aimed at placing into clear categories responses obtained on a particular measure. For example, you may ask people how often they go to church and then divide their answers into several categories from zero to every day. That process of creating categories and putting answers into them is called coding. It is an essential part of quantitative research.

Cognitive Ideology: A lifeview that emphasizes the place of intellectual activity and choice in human decision making.

Correlation: The relationship of a change in one variable to a change in other variables. If only two variables are related, the correlation is bivariate; if more than two, multivariate. All causally related variables are Correlated, but not all correlations are causal. Going to college, for example, may be correlated with obtaining high-paying jobs, but it may well not be the college education that caused college people to obtain high-paying jobs. Rather, it may be that college people come from wealthier families to begin with and would get better-paying jobs even if they did not go to college.

Coverture: A feudal doctrine adopted into English common law that asserted that after Marriage a woman must turn over all her property and money to tier husband. From that point on the woman was unable to engage in legally binding contracts, and even her children legally belonged to her husband. Starting in the nineteenth century, the laws in the United States gradually rescinded such restrictions.

Culture: The social "inheritance" of a group, that is, the shared ways of thinking, feeling, and believing that are passed down from one generation to another. The term is also used to indicate a total society or group, particularly a small nonindustrialized society. It does not refer only to music and art.

Culture: Covert, Overt: Covert culture consists of those shared ways of thinking, feeling, and believing that are usually not directly communicated but whose presence can be detected by long-term residence in a group. Those elements of culture that are explicitly stated in obvious ways comprise overt culture.

Cultural Scripts: Normative statements shared by a group concerning the ways individuals in specific social roles should act, think, and feel.

Cunnilingus: Oral stimulation of the female genitalia.

Custom: A shared way of interacting socially that has been present in a group for a generation or more.

Deductive: A type of logical reasoning that starts with a general proposition and derives less general, lower-level propositions consistent with it. For example, "Sexual customs are viewed as important in all societies. The United States is a society. Therefore, U.S. sexual customs will be viewed as important." Such deductive reasoning is an essential part of axiomatic theory.

Definitions: Nominal, Operational, Real: There are three types of definitions. There is a nominal definition, which simply states that we agree to use these particular words to describe some phenomenon. The definition of tiglon as an offspring of a tiger and a lion is a nominal definition. It does not claim to be "true" but merely to be a convenient way to refer to such offspring. There are also operational definitions, which simply assert the specific measurements one will use to define a concept. An example would be using dollars of income to measure social class. Finally, there are real definitions, which attempt to get at the essence of a phenomenon. My definitions of sexuality and family are two examples of real definitions found in the glossary. Real definitions relate a term that has some shared social meaning to its definition. In this sense, a real definition asserts a proposition and thus can be tested empirically. One way of testing a real definition is to see if the common meaning of a term is identified with the definition of that term you have formulated. Do people think of sexuality when you refer to genital response? Real definitions, then, do have truth value and can be part of a logical system of inferences. All three types of definition are important in scientific work.

Dichotomy: The division of a class or category into two mutually exclusive groups, for example, rich and poor, black and white, male and female.

Disclosure: The degree to which one reveals parts of the self that are not obvious or widely known.

Double Standard: The judging of the same act by two different standards for two different groups, for example, allowing males more premarital heterosexual rights than females.

Dowry: A gift made at marriage by the bride to her husband.

Dysfunctional: A part of a social system that disrupts the operation of another part of that system. Abortion is dysfunctional for adoption, for example, since unwanted babies are the supply source for adoptions.

Emotions: Primary, Secondary: Primary emotions are those considered to be universal and basic, such as anger, fear, happiness, surprise, disgust, and sadness. Secondary emotions are those derived from some combination of these primary emotions, for example, jealousy.

Emotive ideology: A lifeview that asserts the priority of emotions in the decision making of humans.

Empirical: That which is derived from observation or experimentation.

Endocrine System: An integrated set of glands, such as the thyroid or the adrenal, that secret directly into the bloodstream. Our hormones are produced by such glands.

Endocrinology: The scientific study of the physiology of the endocrine glands.

Equalitarianism: A doctrine asserting the similar worth of all groups of people. Also called egalitarianism.

Equality, Social: Usually the equality of a group is measured in terms of the relative degree of power of that group in the major social institutions.

Erotic: That which arouses sexual desire.

Erotica: Literature of art that is intended to arouse sexual desire. Sometimes called pornography.

Erotica: Hardcore, Softcore: Hardcore erotica is that which explicitly displays the genitalia in states of sexual excitation and the behaviors accompanying such states. Softcore erotica may display genitalia but not in states of sexual excitement and often only simulates sexual behaviors.

Essence: That without which the thing being described would not exist, that is, its intrinsic and indispensable properties. Part of the essence of sexuality is erotic arousal and genital response. A person lacking that would not be experiencing the essence of sexuality.

Estrogen: A hormone present in much larger quantities in females that promotes the growth of female secondary sex characteristics, such as breasts.

Ethnographer: A person who studies a society and describes it for others. Usually the society is a nonindustrialized society and is not native to the ethnographer. Cultural anthropologists are ethnographers.

Ethnographic Atlas: The collection of computer-useable information on some 1200 cultures developed by George Peter Murdock.

Exchange Theory: An explanatory schema concerning human behavior that emphasizes the individual balancing of computed rewards and costs in the making of decisions.

Family Institution: The normative ways in which a small kinship group performs the key function of nurturant socialization of the newborn.

Fantasy: The creation of mental images through imagination, association, and invention.

Fellatio: The oral stimulation of the penis.

Feminism: The doctrine that asserts that women deserve equal rights with men in all spheres.

Freudianism: A set of beliefs derived from the ideas of Sigmund Freud (1856-1939). Basic among them are the importance of the unconscious, the stages of psychosexual development (oral, anal, and phallic), and, relatedly, the efficacy of helping patients resolve problems by exploring their earliest experiences.

Functional: A part of a social system that tends to support another part of that system. For example, norms supporting autonomy for teenagers tend to support their premarital sexual experiences.

Gender: A cultural construct applied to the newborn usually according to their genital appearance. Some cultures have more than just the male and female gender, and some allow for change of gender.

Gender Identity: Self-definition as a male or female (or other genders if the society has them).

Gender Role: The set of rights and duties given by a particular society to those occupying the specific gender categories in that society. Such rights and duties apply to behavior and attitudes in all the major life areas of that society.

Group: A number of individuals who have a "we" feeling, common norms, and patterned relationships with each other.

Group Marriage: A marriage in which there are multiple mates of more than one gender-a form of polygamy.

Hedonism: The philosophy that asserts that all people pursue pleasure and seek to avoid pain. This view goes back to Greek philosophers like Epicurus but was popularized in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries by British utilitarian philosophers like Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill. Mill added to the pursuit of pleasure a concern for producing the greatest amount of good by human actions. Many subtypes of hedonism have developed over the years.

Heterosexual: Cross-gender (male-female) sexual thoughts, feelings, or behaviors. Those who prefer this orientation are called heterosexuals.

Homosexual: Same-gender sexual thoughts, feelings, or behaviors. Those who prefer this orientation are called homosexuals.

Hormones: Internal secretions of endocrine glands.

Human Relations Area Files (HRAF): The original cross-cultural files started by George Peter Murdock in the late 1930s. Topics of interest on cultures were indexed on cards covering the information on that topic for all available cultures. Out of this endeavor came the Ethnographic Atlas and then the Standard Sample.

Hypothalamus: A structure at the base of the brain that can affect the hormonal balance in our bodies as well as our emotional behaviors. It controls the pituitary gland, which in turn regulates our entire endocrine system.

Ideology: The fundamental beliefs of a group concerning human nature. The cognitive and emotive ideologies are illustrative. There are more specific ideologies: for example, sexual ideologies assert the level of equality and permissiveness that agree with the nature of each gender as defined by that culture.

Inductive: A type of reasoning that starts with finding specific relationships and then logically derives a more general explanatory statement that will subsume the more specific statements. It is reasoning from the particular to the general. For example: "Sexual attitudes predict sexual behavior. Political attitudes predict political behavior. Thus, attitudes predict behavior." There is a probabilistic nature to inductive reasoning, as you can see in the example, and the need for empirical testing is obvious.

Infibulation: A custom that usually involves surgical removal of the clitoris and parts of the labia and the sewing up of the remaining labia so that coital access to the vagina is most difficult, if not impossible.

Institution: An accepted, normatively defined means by which individuals in specific social roles fulfill some crucial requirements of the society. An example would be the family institution composed of the ways in which kin groups nurture the newborn.

Institutionalized: The development of stable, predictable patterns of social interaction based upon a common normative agreement. The result of such institutionalization is the basic set of institutions that we find in all societies.

Isomorphism: The degree to which two things are seen as identical in form, for example, a map and the territory being mapped.

Jealousy, Sexual: A boundary-setting custom developed for limiting sexual access to those relationships that a group defines as important. On an interpersonal level it is a felt threat from an outsider to an important relationship in which one is involved and produces feelings of anger and fear.

Kinship: A social relationship defined either by belief in descent ties (parent-child or sibling ties) or affinal ties (in laws via marriage). In some societies there also are fictive kin ties, such as those with godparents.

Levirate: A custom that decrees that when an older brother dies, his younger brother should marry the widow.

Linkages, Social: The focus here is upon the ways in which one part of a society is connected to another part. To illustrate: in this book we have often spoken about how the differential social power of the genders is linked to the sexual customs of the genders.

Lordotic: A common position for primate sexual intercourse in which the female bends over with her rear in the air and the male mounts her from behind.

Love: A strong emotional attachment to another person. The exact specifications permitting the feeling to be called love depends on the cultural definition that prevails in one's group. The term is also used sometimes in connection with objects, ideas, and Gods.

Machismo: A characteristic of male gender roles that stresses male physical aggressiveness, high risk taking, and casual sexual relations with women. Men with this orientation are called macho.

Macro, Micro: In sociology these are two levels of analysis. A macro level of analysis searches for relationships among the larger segments of the society, such as between the political and economic institutions. Macro sociologists also compare entire societies with each other and are called comparative sociologists. A micro level of analysis searches for relationships within a single institution or within the smaller segments of society, such as friendship groups. Micro sociologists are closer to psychology, while macro sociologists are closer to anthropology in their conceptual interests.

Mahu: In Polynesian societies there often was one male in each village who was a transvestite and was called a Mahu. Most writers assume that the Mahu preferred homosexuality. The Mahu was a casual sexual outlet for some of the heterosexual males of the village.

Marital Institution: This institution consists of the normative ways in which husband and wife roles legitimate parenthood.

Marriage, Cross-Cousin: A cross-cousin is a child of your parent's sibling of the opposite gender. A common form of marriage would be matrilateral cross-cousin, wherein the male child would marry his mother's brother's daughter. Patrilateral cross-cousin marriage is rarer and involves the male child marrying his father's sister's daughter.

Marxism: The explanatory schema derived from the works of Karl Marx (1818-1883) stressing the important role of the economic institution in the creation of exploitative ruling groups. There are many varieties of adherents today.

Matriarchy: A society in which the major sources of power are in the hands of the female gender.

Matrilineal: A descent system that traces descent only through one of the four grandparents, namely, one's mother's mother.

Matrilocal: A residence system in which a bride brings her husband to live with her in or near her parental home. The term uxorilocal is also used.

Mobility: Geographic, Social: Geographic mobility refers to movement in physical space, as from one city to another; social mobility refers to movement in social space, as from one social class to another.

Nadle: A third gender in the Navajo culture. Members of this gender are those who are dissatisfied with the male or female gender role as well as those born with ambiguous genitalia.

Normality: Normality is the appropriate label for all characteristics except those that would disable an individual from functioning in all types of human societies.

Normative: Refers to being shaped by norms.

Norms: Norms are standards for behavior that are shared by the members of a group.

Nurture: The giving of emotional response and/or support.

Objectivity, Scientific: The state of being unbiased by private moral values in the conduct of scientific research. Fairness and impartiality are the goals of scientific research. Objectivity is another word for the accepted orientation towards scientific explanations.

Obscenity: This is a legal concept that in the United States implies that the erotic materials appeal to the prurient interest, violate community values, and have no serious scientific or other value.

Oceanic Kiss: An ancient way of kissing in Polynesia that emphasizes placing your face to the cheek of the other person and smelling his or her skin.

Ockham's Razor: The position that one should prefer the simpler to the more complex explanation. Named after a fourteenth-century British Franciscan.

Orgasm: A subjectively experienced significant peak of physical pleasure during sexual relationships.

Orgasm Disclosure Ratio: For a given time period it is the number of people who have seen you experience an orgasm divided by the total number of people with whom you are socially interacting.

Path Analysis: A type of causal analysis developed in genetics and economics and now widely used in sociology. The attempt is to determine the fit of a particular causal ordering of variables with the relationships that exist in your data set. It is based upon multipleregression techniques.

Patriarchy: A society in which the major sources of power are controlled by males.

Patrilineal: A system of tracing descent in which only one of the four grandparents is the direct line of descent, specifically, one's father's father. Also called aganatic descent.

Patrilocal: A system of residence wherein after marriage the husband brings his bride to live with or near his parents. The term virilocal is also used.

Person-centered Sexuality: Sexual interaction focused upon the broad range of traits making up the basic personality of one's partner.

Polyandry: A marriage system in which there is one wife and multiple husbands.

Polygamy: A marriage system in which there are multiple mates of at least one gender. Polyandry, polygyny, and group marriage are all forms of polygamy.

Polygyny: A marriage system in which there is one male and multiple wives.

Polynesia: An area of the Pacific Ocean forming a triangle between Hawaii on the north, New Zealand on the south, and Easter Island on the cast. Melanesia and Micronesia are other island areas just west of a line drawn from New Zealand to Hawaii.

Pornography: The popular term for what we call in this book erotica.

Postulate: A general term in theory building for a statement that is the beginning point of a line of reasoning. From such a statement one can deduce more specific propositions. For example, "The greater the social interaction level of a group, the greater its cohesiveness and relative power compared to other groups." From that postulate one may deduce that the professional group or the religious group or any specific group that interacts the most will be the most powerful. That deduction can then be tested empirically. Sometimes the concept axiom is used interchangeably with postulate.

Power: The ability of a person or group, against resistance, to influence another person or group. Power supported by norms is called legitimate or authorized, and the exercise of influence that is not so supported is called unauthorized power.

Proposition: A general term in theory building that refers to a statement relating two or more variables in a specific fashion. For example, "Die greater the power of a group, the greater the likelihood that they will possess what is valued in that society." Propositions are the prime element in theory construction in science.

Psychology: The science that studies individual thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. There are many specializations within psychology, and in recent decades the importance of the social context for understanding the individual has been stressed.

Rational: The ability to reason; often operationalized by the ability to choose the most efficient means to a given end.

Reality: Erotic, Everyday: Erotic reality consists of the way the world is experienced when one is erotically aroused. Everyday reality refers to the way the world is experienced when one is not erotically aroused. For example, the way one would treat another person may well vary by whether or not one is erotically aroused by that person.

Regression, Multiple: A form of multivariate analysis used when there are three or more variables. It allows one to discern the net affect of each independent variable on the dependent variable and to examine each relationship in greater detail than the use of only correlation coefficient would permit.

Relativism: A philosophical perspective that stresses the lack of universally valid conclusion concerning which perspective is better. This viewpoint can be applied beyond the field of ethics to any perspective on the world.

Reliability: The degree to which one can achieve the same results in a repeat measurement of a research instrument or scale. It is a measure of consistency and lack of ambiguity. A test may be reliable but not valid. That is, it may yield the same measurements time and again but not be measuring what it is supposed to measure. (Ask any student about this!)

Roles: Roles are the rights and duties that go with occupying a particular position in the social structure. Thus, a student has the right of attending class and the duty to take exams. One can speak of role performance as well as role expectation.

Sadomasochism: The combination of sadism and masochism. Sadism refers to obtaining sexual pleasure from inflicting pain on others, while masochism refers to obtaining sexual pleasure from receiving pain from others.

Science: Systematized knowledge based on observation and experimentation that is aimed at explaining and predicting the phenomenon studied.

Sensual: Pertaining to effects on any of the senses. Thus, sensual is broader than sexual. We can sensually appreciate a fine dinner but have no sexual response. All sexual responses would involve the senses in some fashion and thus be one type of sensual response. The reverse is obviously not true.

Sex: One's genetic or chromosomal sex. For example XX (female) or XY (male).

Sexual or Sexuality: From a societal point of view, those behaviors and attitudes that are part of a society's cultural scripts aimed at erotic arousal and genital response. The two major outcomes of sexuality are physical pleasure and self-disclosure.

Sexual Abuse: On a societal level this would consist of those sexual acts that are negatively sanctioned. On a personal level it would be those unwanted sexual acts that are imposed.

Sexual Scripts: Those cultural scripts that are aimed at erotic arousal.

Social Class: A category of people within a stratified society who share similar socioeconomic status and life chances.

Social Psychology: A scientific field that is part of both psychology and sociology that stresses understanding the ways in which the social system affects the individual, particularly in small-group settings such as in love or friendship groups.

Social System: An interrelated set of statuses and roles. This can be as broad as a society, with major institutions interrelated, or it can be as small as a single group, with individual member roles interrelated.

Society: A group with a shared culture and social roles structured for the occupants of the key positions in the major institutions. It is assumed that all major institutions will be present in a society; at a minimum that would include political, economic, family, and religious institutions.

Sociobiology: This term is used to refer to an explanatory approach that emphasizes the importance of biological evolutionary processes in shaping present social systems. For example, sociobiologists often say that males are more interested in a variety of partners than are females because it was to their evolutionary advantage to impregnate as many partners as possible and thereby increase the survival of their own traits. In contrast, a sociologist would stress group training and power differentials as the source of such a male-female difference.

Sociology: The science that studies human societies. It is broader than economics and political science, for it studies not only those institutions but others and the overall society thereby created. It overlaps a great deal with cultural anthropology, although it is generally more rigorous in its use of scientific methodology and less cross-cultural. There is some overlap with psychology, particularly for micro-oriented sociologists.

Sodomy: Usually refers to male homosexual anal intercourse. However, in our legal system sodomy can mean any "unnatural sexual act," and that could be construed to include heterosexual anal intercourse, oral sexuality, homosexuality in general, and heterosexuality in "unusual" positions.

Sororate: The marriage custom that states that when a sister dies, the surviving sister will marry the widower.

Standard Cross-cultural Sample: Also called the Standard Sample. A sample of 186 societies chosen by Murdock and White in 1969 as the best-described representative sample of the nonindustrialized cultures of the world. Many codes describing these cultures were formulated in 1969, and since then many have been added. The Standard Sample data are available on computer tape.

Statistically Significant: This means the relationship you are examining is rare enough so that you can rule out the effect of sampling and accept the relationship found as worthy of further investigation.

Status: Often used as an equivalent of social prestige or honor. Also indicates the rights and duties related to a position with a socially assigned amount of prestige. Roles are the dynamic acting out of the rights and duties connected with such a position.

Stratification, Social: A ranking of statuses and roles in a social system. Each rank has significant differences in power and prestige and may consist of people who identify with each other and share a common subculture. Such a rank can be called a social class or a social caste, depending on whether one's position is based on achievement or on ascription at birth.

Structure: A pattern or design in the relationship of parts in a system. In sociology, we speak of social structure meaning the patterned way in which the key institutional roles are interrelated. The structure of a marriage would entail the roles of husband and wife and the cultural prescriptions concerning how they are to interrelate. Sometimes the term system is interchanged with structure. The key difference is that those who use the term system focus on the dynamic aspect of the interrelations, while those use the term structure focus more on its stable form.

Subjectivism: A philosophical position that contends that our knowledge is produced by our own mind. The external world in such a view is either denied or viewed as unimportant. The term is also used to support a relativistic ethical position.

Subordination: The placing of a group or class in a lower rank relative to another group or class.

System: This is a general term simply referring to an interrelated set of parts. To illustrate: One may speak of the family system and thereby refer to the interrelation of husband-wife and parent-child roles, or one may speak of the interrelations of our major social institutions as a system.

Theory, Scientific: An interrelated set of propositions that explain the phenomena being examined. Theories can be tested by making predictions logically based upon them. They can be refined by examining them in a variety of social contexts to see if they vary. They can be refuted by an alternative explanation that is simpler or more accurate in its predictions. The ultimate goal of all science is to explain the world by developing sound theoretical statements.

Transsexual: An individual who feels that he or she is trapped in the body of the wrong genetic sex. Some such individuals undergo surgery to integrate their body with their gender preferences.

Transvestite: An individual aroused by dressing in the costumes of the opposite gender.

Universal, Social: An assertion about social life that holds in all societies. Examples would be "Nurturance of the newborn is always done by a small kinship group" or "Sexuality is always societally shaped." It is usually assumed that if such a practice is universally present, it likely is universally necessary for the survival of society. However, additional evidence and reasoning beyond universal presence are needed to establish such universal necessity.

Validity: The extent to which a measuring instrument measures what it purports to measure, is its validity. If you say you are measuring racial prejudice by an attitude scale, the validity can be examined if we have individuals whose prejudice level we believe we know. We can then administer the attitude scale to see if these individuals score in accord with our knowledge. If they do, we would to that extent affirm the validity of our measuring instrument.

Value, Social: That which a group feels ought to be desired. For example, in America, freedom, equality, love, and democracy are values. It is from such values that norms or standards for behavior are constructed.

Value Hierarchies: A group usually ranks its values to indicate which are more important. The resultant ranking of values is what is called a value hierarchy.

Value, Importance of: The further up the hierarchy of values, the greater the importance of a value. We assume that sexuality is always high on a society's hierarchy even when that society is striving to restrict sexuality to marriage.

Value Judgment: This is a statement about the world that is made in such a way as to imply how one ought to behave and that is stated in a fashion not scientifically testable. For example, "If you do not go to church, you will go to hell" is a value judgment. It instructs you how you ought to behave, and there is no scientific way to test it.

Variable: A concept defined so that its magnitude may be measured. For example, family size, degree of stratification, and level of sexual permissiveness are all variables, for they all can be quantitatively measured.

Variable: Dependent, Independent: A dependent variable is that which a researcher is trying to explain. In a causal framework it is the effect. An independent variable is that which is associated with some outcome. In a causal framework it would be a cause. Independent variables are sometimes called predictor variables.