Sociology Chapter 4: Socialization

What role does Media play in the socialization process?

It helps; display role models for children to imitate, offer children ideas about the values of their society, provide children with images of achievement and success, activity and work, and equality and democracy.

What role do Peer Groups play in the socialization process?

It helps; give young people an opportunity to engage in give-and-take relationships, give children self-direction, make their own decisions and experiment with new ways of thinking.

What role do Schools play in the socialization process?

It helps; introduce children to life beyond the home, hidden curriculum: the informal and unofficial aspects of children are taught in preparation for life, and they reward and punish based on your performance.

Looking-Glass Process

It is a self-concept based on our idea of others' judgments of us. It's a product of a 3-Stage Process.

How does Conflict approach to the study of socialization?

It is a way of perpetuating the status quo. Example: When people are socialized to accept their family's social class, they help preserve the current class system.

How does Functional approach to the study of socialization?

It stressed how socialization contributes to a stable society.

How does Conflict view the role that media plays in socialization?

Newspaper editors exercise power by setting the political agenda for a community.

Desocilization

The process by which people give up old norms, values, attitudes, and behaviors.

Resocialization

The process in which people adopt new norms, values, attitudes, and behaviors.

Anticipatory Socialization

The process of preparing (in advance) for new norms, values, attitudes, and behaviors. Involves voluntary change.

The 3-Stage Process of the Looking-Glass Process

1) We imagine how we appear to others (our perception of how others see us. 2) We imagine the reaction of others to our imagined appearance. 3) We evaluate ourselves according to how we imagine others have judged us.

An example of "Me"

An angry child may unexpectedly yell hurtful words at their parent whom he/she loves.

Generalized Other

An integrated conception of the norms, values, and beliefs of one's community or society.

What did the two following studies reveal to sociologists about the impact that isolation has on the socialization process?

Anna: born to an unmarried mother, she only drank milk for 5 years, she could not walk or talk, she had to go to a disabled school for children, her developing capacity for emotional attachment was with a doll she loved. Isabelle: born to an unmarried, deaf mother, lived in a dark room, physically ill, she feared strangers and men, and her legs were so bowed that when she stood, the soles of her feet rested against each other.

Game Stage

Children learn to engage in more sophisticated role taking as they become able to consider the roles of several people simultaneously.

Examples of Desocialization

Depriving someone of the personal items (long hair, hair brushes, ball caps) they have used to present themselves as unique individuals.

What did Harlow's research on rhesus monkeys reveal?

For human infants, emotional needs for attention, intimacy, and warmth are as important as physiological needs for food, water, and protection.

Peer Group

Individuals of roughly the same age and interests. Example: A child may belong to a play group, a clique at school, an after-school club, or a sports team.

Role Taking

It allows us to see ourselves through the eyes of someone else.

Examples of Anticipatory Socialization

It does NOT occur in prisons or mental hospitals. Example: Teenagers want to resemble their own age so they may willingly abandon many of the norms, values, attitudes, and behaviors learned previously.

What does successful socialization enable?

It enables people to fit into all kinds of social groups.

How does Symbolic Interaction approach to the study of socialization?

It helps explain ideas of self-concept, significant others, generalized other, role taking, and looking-glass self. It also holds that socialization is the major determinant of human nature.

What role does Family play in the socialization process?

It helps; developing basic values and attitudes, thinking and speaking, developing a capacity for intimate and personal relationships, acquire a self image, and your social class shape you.

Distortion in the Looking-Glass Process

It's our imagination, it may not accurately reflect others' opinions of us.

Mass Media

Means of communication designed to reach the general population. Examples: TV, radio, newspapers, magazines, movies, books, the Internet, tapes, and discs.

And how does Functional view the role that media plays in socialization?

Network TV programs encourage social integration by exposing the entire society to shared beliefs, norms, and values.

Total Institutions

Places where residents are separated from the rest of society, they are not free to manage their own lives. Examples: mental hospitals, cults, and prisons.

Examples of Resocialization

Rewards for taking on a new "identity" can include extra food, special responsibilities, or periods of privacy.

Socialization

The cultural process of learning to participate in group life, such learning takes place in cultural transmission.

When is the most important learning stage?

The early stages of life.

"I"

The first reaction of the self. It normally takes the "Me" into account before acting. It is the part of the self that accounts for unlearned, spontaneous acts.

Reference Group

The group they use to evaluate themselves and from which they acquire attitudes, values, beliefs, and norms. Example: teens.

"Me"

The part of the self created through socialization. It accounts for predictability and conformity.

Significant Others

The people whose judgments are most important to our self concepts. Example: for a child, their significant others include their parents, grandparents, teachers, and playmates.

Play Stage

The stage during which children take on roles of others one at a time.

How does Symbolic Interaction view the role that media plays in socialization?

Through words and pictures, children's books expose the young to the meaning of love, manners, and motherhood.