He said social scientists must study social facts in the same way natural scientists study natural facts. Natural facts are widely accepted aspects of nature. Social facts are widely shared aspects of society. Sound is a natural fact. Language is a social fact.
Hair is a natural fact, but hairstyles are social facts.
Natural facts exist regardless of human socialization. Social facts exist because of human sociability. Given their facts, natural scientists and social scientists study how those facts vary with one another. At a glance, suicide may look like an individual, personal, and psychological act of self-destruction, but Durkheim established that suicides are social and interpersonal acts open to sociological analysis. Durkheim indentified four types of suicide.