Welcome to AQA A Level Sociology

AQA A Level Sociology gives you the chance to explore how society works and why people’s experiences are often very different. Across the course, you will study education, crime, research methods and wider debates about power, identity, inequality and social change. The specification is built around core topics that everyone studies, alongside optional topics chosen by your teacher, with students taking one topic from Option 1 and one topic from Option 2.

What makes A Level Sociology interesting is that it helps you connect big ideas to the real world. You will look at sociological theories, current social issues, patterns in society and the methods sociologists use to investigate them. AQA also makes clear that the course focuses on contemporary UK society, while also considering wider global influences where relevant.

Core Topics

Education

In Education, you will explore what the education system does in society and whose interests it serves. This includes the role and functions of education, class, gender and ethnic differences in achievement, relationships inside schools, pupil identities and subcultures, the hidden curriculum, and the impact of policies such as selection, marketisation, privatisation and policies designed to improve equality of opportunity.

Methods in Context

Methods in Context focuses on how sociologists apply research methods to the study of education. This part of the course helps you think carefully about which methods are most useful in educational settings and what practical, ethical and theoretical issues might affect sociological research in schools and colleges.

Theory and Methods (Y13)

Research Methods (Y12)

Theory and Methods runs through the whole course and introduces some of the biggest debates in sociology. You will study quantitative and qualitative methods, primary and secondary data, positivism and interpretivism, practical and ethical issues in research, and debates about science, objectivity, value freedom, modernity, postmodernity and the relationship between sociology and social policy. This area appears in both the Education paper and the Crime and Deviance paper, so it is a central part of AQA A Level Sociology.

Crime and Deviance

Crime and Deviance looks at how societies define, explain and respond to rule-breaking behaviour. You will study crime, deviance, social order and social control, patterns of crime by class, gender and ethnicity, and topics such as the media and crime, green crime, state crime, globalisation and crime, victims, surveillance, punishment and the criminal justice system.

Optional Topics

Culture and Identity

Culture and Identity introduces key ideas about how people develop a sense of self and belonging. You will study culture, subcultures, popular culture, global culture, the agencies of socialisation and the ways identity is shaped by age, disability, ethnicity, gender, nationality, sexuality and social class. The topic also looks at how identity is linked to production, consumption and globalisation.

Families and Households

Families and Households explores how family life has changed and why sociologists disagree about its meaning and importance. You will study family diversity, marriage, cohabitation, divorce, childhood, domestic labour, power relationships and demographic trends such as birth rates, death rates, life expectancy, ageing population, migration and globalisation.

Health

Health examines how health and illness are shaped by society rather than simply biology. You will look at the social construction of health, illness, disability and the body, inequalities in health chances, access to healthcare, mental illness and the role of medicine, health professionals and the global health industry.

Work, Poverty and Welfare

Work, Poverty and Welfare focuses on inequality in everyday economic life. You will study poverty, wealth and income, welfare provision, the labour process, technology, skill and deskilling, and the effects of work and worklessness on life chances. This topic is especially useful for understanding how social class and economic change shape people’s lives.

Beliefs in Society

Beliefs in Society looks at religion, ideology and spirituality in the modern world. You will explore religion and social change, religious organisations such as churches, sects and cults, the relationship between religion and different social groups, and debates about secularisation, globalisation and the continuing significance of religion in contemporary society.

Global Development

Global Development examines inequality between countries and across the global system. You will study development and underdevelopment, global inequality, globalisation, the role of transnational corporations and international agencies, and issues such as aid, trade, industrialisation, urbanisation, war, conflict, health, education and gender.

The Media

The Media explores the growing importance of media in contemporary society. You will study new media, ownership and control, news production, globalisation, popular culture, media representations of different social groups, and the relationship between media content and audiences.

Stratification and Differentiation

Stratification and Differentiation focuses on social inequality and life chances. You will examine class, status and power, patterns of inequality by class, gender, ethnicity, age and disability, the problems of defining and measuring class, social mobility and wider changes in the structure of inequality, including the effects of globalisation.

How the course is organised

In AQA A Level Sociology, everyone studies the core content of Education with Theory and Methods and Crime and Deviance with Theory and Methods. Alongside this, students study one topic from Option 1 and one topic from Option 2. The course is assessed through three written papers, each worth one third of the A level.

AQA A Level Sociology is a course that helps you understand the forces shaping modern life, from schools and families to crime, media, religion and inequality. It gives you the chance to develop strong analytical skills, think critically about evidence and theory, and see the links between your own experiences and the wider social world.

Tell Me Which Optional Topics You Study

Help shape future AQA A Level Sociology resources by telling me which optional topics you study. Choose your Section A and Section B topics, then submit your response. Your answers will help me prioritise revision guides, model answers, lesson activities and exam support for the topic areas students need most.