Title: A New Sociology for a New Century: Transforming the Relations between Sociology and Neuroscience, through a Study of Mental Life and The City.
Funder: Economic and Social Research Council

Abstract: This project is about finding a new role for biological knowledge in the social sciences - and vice versa. When sociology first emerged as a discipline at the beginning of the twentieth century, its founding figures saw no significant distinction between this new science of social, cultural and political life, and cutting-edge biological knowledge about the development of human beings as particular kinds of animals. For example, early urban sociologists wrote about the problems and the politics of city life - but they were also keen to pool their knowledge with psychiatrists and neurologists who were interested in the psychoathological effects of urban living. As sociology developed, however, this connection became somewhat lost, for a host of reasons (some good, such as a post-war fear of the consequences of reducing human beings to only their biology; and some bad, such as a worry about the biological sciences colonizing all kinds of inquiry about human life). But in an era of exciting new developments in the brain and genomic sciences, this project is keen to re-establish that connection. If it is true that neuroscientific and genetic advances have not always lived up to their hype, and also that there is strong danger of uncritically embracing these new sciences - nonetheless, we know a lot more than we used to about the neurological constraints within which human beings make and live their social lives. it is time to risk pooling these insights with sociological knowledge on human cultural and social life. At the same time, the more that neuroscientists find out about the functional biology of our brains and genomes, the more they realize that their development is heavily influenced by the environment - that is, by social relations, by culture, and by the kinds of society that we live in. This realization provides an even greater impetus for sociologists to re-connect with these disciplines: what can sociological research contribute to this growing awareness, and how can it help neuroscientific understandings of 'society' and 'the environment' to become much more rigorous and much more useful? This project explores this question through one case study: the relationship between city living and psychiatric disorder. Urban sociology is an area in which there is a strong history of links to the psychiatric and neurological sciences - even if this connection has dissipated recently. At the same time, several groups of neruoscientists are currently working to establish the effects of 'urbanicity' (i.e. city living, or the effect of being born in a city) on the development of psychiatric disorder. We suggest that this is an ideal case to re-connect sociological and neurobiological knowledge - and to show in particular how 'the sociology of the city' and 'the neuroscience of the urban' can join together in the pursuit of a single research project. We will use two methods to achieve this: first, through historical and literary analysis, we will remind sociologists of their biological roots, and in particular of their foundational connections to psychiatry and neurology; second, we will stage a series of workshops with a select group of urban sociologists and neuroscientists, toco-design a piece of research that will truly mix sociological and neurobiological insights. If we can do this, finally, we think we will have shown just why sociologists - and other social scientists - can, without fear, re-connect with the 'vital' or biological aspects of human existence, thus laying the ground for what we have called 'a new sociology for a new century.'


Research activity codes: 2.3 PSYCHOLOGICAL, SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC FACTORS
Health categories: MENTAL HEALTH