Related Experiment Video
Updated: Feb 7, 2026

The Social Dimension of Stress: Experimental Manipulations of Social Support and Social Identity in the Trier Social Stress Test
Published on: November 19, 2015
Professions and the Social Order: Some Lessons from Burkina Faso?
Natéwindé Sawadogo1, Robert Dingwall2
1University of Ouaga II.
Abstract:
The study of professions has been dominated by Anglo-American models, with their focus on a small group of legally licensed occupations. The field has recently shifted, mainly through studies of European experience, to a wider examination of the social management of expert workers. Very little has been written about developments in Africa and their implications for the way in which we might think about professions. This paper presents a case study of the role and practices of the medical profession in Burkina Faso, which has a relatively open market for the supply of healing services and limited regulation of the suppliers, whether physicians or traditional practitioners. The study returns to classic questions about the extent to which practice is shaped by the nature of occupational niches within the division of labor or to the development of a distinctive moral character among the workers within that niche.
Related Concept Videos
The Sense of Self: Reflected Self-Appraisal and Social Comparison
Social Proof
Social Scripts
Social Traps
Social Facilitation
Social Loafing

