INTRODUCTION TO SOCIAL SCIENCES AND APPLIED SOCIAL SCIENCES

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Introduction to
Social Sciences
and Applied
Social Sciences
Module 1

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Objectives:
 Generally, at the end of the module, you are expected to explain
clearly public perceptions about the work of social sciences and
applied social science practitioners. Specifically, you are most likely
to exhibit the following competencies:
 1. Differentiate social sciences from applied social sciences
 2. Describe your perspective on the relationship of social sciences
and applied social sciences.
 3. Self-assess the benefits and importance of Applied Social
Sciences to human life.

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Self-check:
 As Humanities and Social Sciences students, are you interested
to become a guidance counsellor, a social worker or work as a
journalist? Check one:
 Guidance counsellor
 Social worker
 Journalist or broadcaster

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 Do you know what kind of work they do?
 Yes No
 This module will enable you to clearly explain the work of social
sciences and applied social science practitioners.

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Reboot your memory
Which words are not directly related to social sciences?.

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Write inside the oblong the words left
without circle from the list above. Then read
each word aloud. What cluster of science
does this group of subjects belong?

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VOCABULARY LIST: RECALL AND
RECONNECT
 When you took-up Disciplines and Ideas in
Social Sciences, you learned the different
disciplines under social sciences which
belong to Pure Social Sciences. Can you still
remember them? Answer the following. The
jumbled words will guide you in identifying the
social science discipline being described.

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 1. Study of society, social institutions, and
social relationships
L O G I C O S Y O -
_______________________

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 2. Study of human origins, societies,
cultures, and races,
P Y L O G H A N T H O R -
__________________

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 3. Branch of social science that
deals with the production,
distribution, consumption, and
management of goods & services
M O C O N I E C S -
_______________________

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 4. Study of the natural features of the
earth’s surface, including topography,
climate, soil, vegetation, etc., and
man’s response to them
 G Y R E O G A H P
__________________________

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 5. Scientific study of language
 G L U I T I N A C S -
________________________

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 6. Scientific study of all forms of
human and animal behavior,
sometimes concerned with the
methods through which behavior can
be modified
 S C H O O G L Y P Y -
_____________________

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 7. Scientific study of human
populations especially with reference
to their size, structure, and distribution
P H O M R A G D I E C S
_____________________________

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 8. Study of government of
states and other political units
 S C E N I E C L O C L A P I L I
T - ______________________

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 9. Discipline of recording and
interpreting past events
involving human beings
 S T I R O H Y -
______________________

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 Social Sciences is the branch of science devoted to the
study of human societies and the relationships among
individuals within those societies.
 The term was formerly used to refer to the field of sociology,
the original "science of society", established in the 19th
century. In addition to sociology, it now encompasses a wide
array of academic disciplines, including anthropology,
archaeology, economics, human geography, linguistics,
management science, media studies, musicology, political
science, psychology, welfare and nursing studies and social
history.
 It is about people how they interact with others in their
society and how societies interact with each other.
(www.quora.com)

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 Applied Social Sciences branch of study that applies the
different concepts, theoretical models, and theories of the
social science disciplines to help understand society and
the different problems and issues. The applied social
sciences is utilized to provide alternative solutions to the
diverse problem of the society. These are those social
science disciplines, professions and occupations which
seeks to use basic social science research and theory to
improve the daily life of communities, organizations and
persons.
 This is about putting theories in to practice and
interfacing directly with the public.

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Three main career tracks for applied
social scientist:
 COUNSELLING
 SOCIAL WORK
 COMMUNICATION STUDIES

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COUNSELLING
 is one of the fields of applied social sciences as an
application of the social sciences, counselling provides
guidance, help, and support to individuals who are
distraught by a diverse set of problems in their lives.
Counselling can be done through the following:
 Guidance counselling
 Life coaching
 Career counselling
 Personal growth counselling

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SOCIAL WORK
 Social work practitioners
help individuals, families,
and groups, communities to
improve their individual and
collective well-being.

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COMMUNICATION STUDIES
 • Communication Studies- Applied
social science provide adequate
training for careers in the field of
journalism and mass communication
because of multidisciplinary knowledge
and skills that graduates learn from
social sciences.

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Practice Task 1: Which words do not belong to the
rest of the words inside the rectangle? Identify those
words and write them inside the circle. Write the
remaining words inside the triangle.

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TASK 2
 Which among the 3 Applied Social Science Career would you
like to have? Why?

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Counseling
 Counseling comes from the Latin word “Consilium”
meaning plan, council, wisdom and advice. Counseling
is a profession and a helping relationship that
facilitates the development of individuals, groups and
families that are based on the principle of
empowerment that helps achieve personal, social,
educational and career development. This is contrary
to our shared definition of counseling which focused
advice giving, but it more of a process which helps the
client (counselee) clarify and address problems.

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People who use Counseling in their work
 A list of professionals who used
counseling in their work are the
following:
❖ Counseling / Clinical Psychologists
❖ Welfare Workers
❖ Teachers
❖ Nurses, Health visitors, and midwives
❖ Occupational and speech therapists
❖ Social workers
❖ Physiotherapists
❖ Ministers of Religion
❖ Voluntary and Youth workers

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Goals of Counseling
 Different individuals have various issues and
concerns in life. Their reason for consulting a
Counselor or a Counseling Psychologist differs
based on their problems 6 and concerns. Why
are people coming to see a counselor or a
counseling psychologist? What is the goal of
counseling?

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 a. Facilitate change of
behavior - counseling has
specific goals, this specific goal
will help both of the client and
the counselor understand what
specific change of behavior is
desired.

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 b. Promote decision making - this enables individual make
critical decisions but not to decide which decisions the
clients should make to acquire understanding not only of
their abilities, opportunities, and interests but also their
emotions, behavior, and attitudes that could interfere their
choices and decisions.

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 c. Enhance coping skills and
adjustment - There are a lot of
pressures in life that a person
will face in his/her lifetime. It is
the goal of counseling to
empower individuals that can
enhance coping skills and
adjustment to be able to adapt
and survive in this complex
society we are living.

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 d. Improve relationship skills - Many
people go to a counselor because of
poor self-esteem or inadequate social
skills, some of them might be bullied by
classmates, and it is the goal of
counseling to help the client improve
the quality of life by becoming more
effective in teaching life skills and
interpersonal skills to improve
relationships.

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 e. Facilitate counselee or client
potential - one of the counseling
goals is to help an individual
maximize his freedom and seek
individual’s effectiveness by giving
him or her control over his
environment and/or overcome.
Counselors are working with people
with excessive smoking,
depression, and aggression they
help them to take care better of
their clients holistically: physical,
psychological and spiritual.

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 In summary, it is the ultimate goal of counseling to help
individuals realize their full potential or become self-
actualized, maintain an adequate level of development and
encourage them to verbalize an unexpressed feeling.

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Scope of Counseling
 Since all professions have scopes and
limitations, counseling also a profession has a
scope which will be based on the law which
regulates its practice. This practice may be
done individually, by the group and in the
community by the provision of the law.

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➢ Individual Counseling
 Identity problems, relationships,
anxiety, depression, family problems,
behavior management, gender
(identity and sexuality),
grief/bereavement, relationships,
sexual abuse recovery, workplace
stress and relationships, drug abuse,
eating disorders, HIV, spirituality,
status and middle age syndrome.

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➢ Marital and Pre-marital Counseling
 Marital and
relationship
dynamics,
Relationship and
fertility issues

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Family Counseling
 Family Counseling Children
and adult behaviors,
divorce/annulment and
separation problems and
adjustments, family
problems, life stages,
transitions, parenting and
remarriage relationship
counseling.

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Principles of Counseling
 There are principles of counseling that should be observed in a
counseling relationship and process. These basic principles are
essential requirements for the counseling relationship to be
efficient and to achieve its goals. The basic principles are the
following:

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 a. Listening skills – This is the number one skill that a
counselor should always consider in a counseling process.
When listening attentively to the client to show that we are
interested and we respect him/her whatever situation he/she
have right now. This will result in emphatic understanding and
can exploit develop a positive and healthy interaction with the
client.

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 b. Resistance - human behavior is very complex, and
people respond to things differently. It is important for
counselors not to take client’s resistance personally
since some resistance to therapeutic change is natural.

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 c. Respect - Counselor should have respect for his/her client no
matter how weird, strange, peculiar, different the customer is
with you. A counselor should be neutral and must be objective
no matter what. There are times that the counselor do not like
the customer, in that case, a counselor must put away personal
feelings and treat the client with respect. A counselor should
always see him/herself on the client’s situation, trying to put his
shoe on the shoes of his/her client.

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 D. Empathy or Unconditional Positive Regard -
Empathy requires listening and understanding
client’s feeling and their perspective. This principle
should be part of the counselor’s characteristics
since the success of counselee-counselor
relationship will depend on the quality of rapport
built along the process.

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 e. Clarification, confrontation, and interpretation - These
principles are techniques of therapeutic intervention that are
advanced. Clarification is an attempt by the therapist to
restate what the client is either saying or feeling so the client
may learn something or understand the issue better.
Confrontation is a skill that can assist clients to increase their
self-awareness that can be used to highlight discrepancies
that clients have been previously unaware of while
interpretation is when the counselor tries to interpret the
client’s situation based on noting and reflection of their story.

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 f. Transference and Counter-transference - a
process somewhat related to projection. It is
important to understand transference reactions for
this help the client gain more understanding of
important aspects of their emotional life. Counter-
transference refers to the emotional and
perceptional reactions the counselor has towards
the client.

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Task 1: EMPOWER ME!
 1. In our discussion on counseling goals, counseling
aims to empower the client by helping him/her to
change his/her behavior, make wise decisions in life,
ability to cope to his/her environment and improve
relationship skills. What do you think about this
statement? Do you accept or support it? How will it
empower you? Explain your answer.

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 2. If you will be given the chance to be one of the
practitioners of counseling, how are you going to
assist individuals, groups, or communities
involved in difficult situations like post-disaster,
court hearing about separation of celebrity couple
and cyber bullying?

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TASK 2: NAME THAT PRINCIPLE
 1. Among the six principles that we discussed
namely; listening skills, resistance, respect,
empathy or unconditional positive regard,
clarification, confrontation, and interpretation,
transference and counter-transference, which will
you choose to represent the most?

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 2. Why this principle? What aspect of the
principle influences you? Explain your
answer in two paragraphs with at least 200
words. Write your explanation in your
notebook.

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