sf-theory-building - SKILL.md Agent Skill

name: sf-theory-building description: Use when building the theoretical argument of a Social Forces (SF) manuscript into a portable, general-audience contribution — whether the work is quantitative, demographic, comparative-historical, ethnographic, network, or computational. SF prizes a theoretically grounded result over a bare finding. Structures the argument; it does not run analyses.

Theory & Argument Building (sf-theory-building)

At Social Forces a result is not a contribution until it is attached to an argument a general social-science reader can carry elsewhere. SF's reputation rests on rigor and on findings that mean something theoretically. This skill turns results into theory: explicit mechanisms, scope conditions, and observable implications, in the idiom appropriate to your kind of work — stated economically, because the reference-inclusive 10,000-word cap leaves no room to ramble.

When to trigger

The empirics are strong but the "so what / why" is thin
A reviewer said the paper is "atheoretical," "descriptive," or "just a finding"
You need to state mechanisms, assumptions, and scope conditions explicitly
The argument works for your case but you can't yet say who else can use it

Build the argument (by mode of work)

Quantitative / demographic

Concept — define the key constructs precisely; distinguish from neighbors and from the measures.
Mechanism — the social process: who does what, why, under what structural conditions.
Observable implications — what we should see if the mechanism operates (and what we should not). These become the tests in sf-research-design.
Scope conditions — where the argument holds and where it does not. Portability ≠ universality.

Comparative-historical / ethnographic

State the portable logic the case illuminates before the narrative detail.
Build the argument through evidence and counterfactuals; engage the strongest rival interpretation.
Show what the case lets the field see or theorize that it could not before.

Network / computational

Tie the structural or behavioral pattern to a social mechanism, not just a model output.
Distinguish predictions unique to your account from those shared with simpler explanations.

The "portability" test (SF-specific)

Ask: Could a researcher in another social-science subfield import this mechanism or concept to their own problem? If yes, you have a general-audience contribution. If it only works for your exact case, tighten it into a general logic or reframe (back to sf-topic-selection).

Anti-patterns

"Hypothesizing after results are known" (HARKing) — state theory before tests
Mechanisms named but never made observable
Universal claims with no scope conditions
A theory section so long it crowds out analysis under the reference-inclusive cap
Burying the argument under the empirics — the contribution must be stated plainly and early

Operating pass for Social Forces

Treat this skill as an executable review pass, not a prose hint. First lock the social mechanism, data scope, identification or interpretation, and contribution to a wider literature; then judge whether the current manuscript answers the venue's real reader: social-science reviewers who want generalizable social-process evidence across sociology, demography, and policy-adjacent topics.

Do the pass: Return a claim-evidence-risk ledger rather than a prose-only diagnosis; every recommendation must point to a manuscript location or missing artifact.
Return a ledger: give claim / evidence / risk / manuscript location rows, so the next agent can edit rather than rediscover the issue.
Sibling guard: compare against ASR/AJS for top sociology theory stakes, Demography for population process, JMF for family-specific claims; if a sibling owns the contribution, recommend re-routing before polishing format.
Stop condition: do not give submission-ready advice until the pack's resources/official-source-map.md has been checked for volatile rules and the manuscript has one concrete fix for the largest venue-specific risk.

Output format

【Core claim】one sentence
【Mechanism】the social/causal story
【Observable implications】testable consequences → research-design
【Scope conditions】where it holds / fails
【Portability】who else (in or beyond sociology) can use this argument
【Concision】argument stated without crowding the word/reference budget? [Y/N]
【Next】sf-research-design

Supplementary resources

../../resources/external_tools.md — analysis tooling across SF's methodological range
../../resources/official-source-map.md — SF scope and contribution expectations