Transcript Ch.4 - Webs

Chapter 4
Socialization
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The Role of Socialization
Socialization （社會化）is the process whereby
people learn the attitudes, values, and actions
appropriate to individuals as members of a particular
culture.
 From a micro-sociological perspective, socialization
helps us to discover how to behave properly and what
to expect from others if we follow (or challenge)
society’s norms and values.
 From a macro-sociological perspective, socialization
provides for the transmission of a culture from one
generation to the next and thereby for the long-term
continuance of a society.
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
Cont.
 Researchers
have traditionally clashed over
the relative importance of biological
inheritance and environmental factors in
human development. This conflict has been
called the nature（本性) versus nurture (教化）
(or heredity versus environment) debate.
 Today, most social scientists have moved
beyond this debate, acknowledging instead
the interaction of these variables in shaping
human development.
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 Environment: the
Impact of Isolation
– The Case of Isabelle
[first six years, total seclusion in a darkened room, no
contact with other people but her mother…]
– Primate Studies
[monkeys been raised away from their mothers and
contact with other monkeys…results: easily frightened;
isolation had damaging effects on them]
[use ‘artificial mothers’ on monkeys…results: infant
monkeys developed greater social attachments from
their need for warmth, comfort, and intimacy than
from their need for milk]
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 The
Influence of Heredity
– Identical twins who separated soon after their birth
and raised on different continents in very different
cultural settings.
– Certain characteristics, such as twins’ temperaments,
voice patterns, and nervous habits, appear to be
strikingly similar; these qualities may be linked to
hereditary causes.
– Twins reared apart differ far more in their attitudes,
values, types of mates chosen, and even drinking
habits; these qualities are influenced by
environmental patterns.
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the systematic
study of the biological bases of social
behavior. Sociobiologists basically apply
naturalist Charles Darwin’s principles of
natural selection to the study of social
behavior.
 In its extreme form, sociobiology suggests
that all behavior is the result of genetic or
biological factors and that social interactions
play no role in shaping people's conduct. 6

Socio-biology （社會生物學）is
The Self and Socialization
 Sociological Approaches
to the Self
– Cooley: Looking-Glass Self
In the early 1900s, Charles Horton Cooley advanced
the belief that we learn who we are by interacting with
others. Cooley used the phrase looking-glass self （鏡
中自我）to emphasize that the self is the product of our
social interactions with other people. A subtle but
critical aspect of Cooley’s looking-glass self is that the
self results from an individual’s ‘imagination’ of how
others view him or her.
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– Mead: Stages of the Self
George Herbert Mead continued Cooley's exploration
of interactionist theory. Mead developed a useful
model of the process by which the self emerges,
defined by three distinct states. During the
preparatory stage, children merely imitate the people
around them, especially family members with whom
they continually interact. During the play stage, the
child becomes able to pretend to be other people. Just
as an actor ‘becomes’ a character, a child becomes a
doctor, parent, superhero, or ship captain. Finally, in
the game stage, the child of about eight or nine years
old no longer just plays roles but begins to consider
several actual tasks and relationships simultaneously.
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– Goffman: Presentation of the Self
Early in life, the individual learns to slant his or her
presentation of the self in order to create distinctive
appearances and to satisfy particular audiences.
Erving Goffman refers to this altering of the
presentation of the self as impression management
(印象整飾). He makes so many explicit parallels to
the theatrical stage that his view has been termed the
dramaturgical approach (戲劇的探究途徑).
According to this perspective, people resemble
performers in action.
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– Goffman also drawn attention to another aspect
of the self– face-work. How often do you
initiate some kind of face-saving behaviour
when you feel embarrassed or rejected?
– E.g. in response to a rejection at the singles’ bar,
a person may engage in face-work by saying,
‘there really isn’t any interesting person in this
entire crowd’. We feel the need to maintain a
proper image of the self if we are to continue
social interaction.
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– Psychological Approaches to the Self
Piaget’s (1954) cognitive theory of development
identifies four stages in the development of
children’s thought process.
First, sensorimotor stage (感覺動作期) – use senses to
make discoveries.
Second, preoperational stage (運思預備期) – use
words and symbols to distinguish objects and
ideas.
Third, concrete operational stage (具體運思期) –
engage in more logical thinking.
Fourth, formal operational stage (形式運思期) –
capable of sophisticated abstract thought and can
deal with ideas and values in a logical manner. 11
Socialization and the Life Course
 Ways
of celebrating rites of passage, a means of
dramatising and validating changes in person’s
status. E.g. students at the Naval Academy throw
hats in the air, stag/hen night, adolescents among
the Kota people of the Congo in Africa paint
themselves blue, Mexican American girls go on a
daylong religious retreat before dancing the night
away, Egyptian mothers step over their newborn
infants seven times, etc…
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 Anticipatory Socialization and
Resocialization
– Anticipatory socialization (預期的社會化):
–
refers to the
processes of socialization in which a person
“rehearses” for future positions, occupations, and
social relationships. Occasionally, assuming new
social and occupational positions requires us to
unlearn a previous orientation.
Resocialization (再社會化): refers to the process of
discarding former behavior patterns and accepting
new ones as part of a transition in one’s life.
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– Total institutions (全控機構):
refers to institutions,
such as prisons, the military, mental hospitals,
and convents, that regulate all aspects of a
person's life under a single authority. Because
the total institution is generally cut off from the
rest of society, it provides for all the needs of its
members. The individual becomes secondary and
rather invisible in the overbearing social
environment.
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Agents of Socialization

Family: The
family is the most important agent of
socialization in the United States. Obviously,
one of its primary functions is the care and
rearing of children. The lifelong process of
socialization begins shortly after birth. An infant
enters an organized society, becomes part of a
generation, and typically enters into a family. As
the primary agents of socialization, parents play
a critical role in guiding children into those
gender roles deemed appropriate in a society.
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– Gender roles: refers to expectations
regarding the proper behaviour, attitudes,
and activities of males and females. E.g.
‘toughness’ as masculine and desirable
only in men, while ‘tenderness’ as
feminine.
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
School: Like the family, schools have an
explicit mandate to socialize people in the
United States—especially children—into the
norms and values of our culture. Functionalists
point out that, as agents of socialization,
schools fulfill the function of teaching recruits
the values and customs of the larger society.
Conflict theorists agree but add that schools
can reinforce the divisive aspects of society,
especially those of social class.
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– Peer Group: as a child grows older, the family becomes
somewhat less important in social development.
Instead, peer groups increasingly assume the role of
Mead’s significant others. Within the peer group,
young people associate with others who are
approximately their own age and who often enjoy a
similar social status. Peer groups may encourage a
young person to follow pursuits that society considers
admirable, as in a school club engaged in volunteer
work in hospitals and nursing homes. On the other
hands, the group may encourage someone to violate
the culture’s norms and values by driving recklessly,
shoplifting, engaging in acts of vandalism, and the like.
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– Mass Media and Technology: Television is a critical
force in the socialization of children in the United
States. Television has certain characteristics that
distinguish it from the other agents of socialization.
It permits imitation and role playing but does not
encourage more complex forms of learning. Issues
have been raised regarding the content of television,
popular music, music videos, motion pictures, and
Internet Web sites. These forms of entertainment
serve as powerful agents of socialization for many
young people in the United States and elsewhere.
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– Workplace:
learning to behave appropriately
within an occupation is a fundamental aspect of
human socialization. In the United States,
working full-time confirms adult status, it is an
indication to all that one has passed out of
adolescence. In a sense, socialization into an
occupation can represent both a harsh reality (‘I
have to work in order to buy food and pay the
rent’) and the realization of an ambition (‘I have
always wanted to be an airline pilot’).
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– The State: Social scientists have increasingly
recognized the importance of the state as an agent
of socialization because of its growing impact on
the life course. Traditionally, family members have
served as the primary caregivers in our culture, but
in the twentieth century, the family's protective
function has steadily been transferred to outside
agencies such as hospitals, mental health clinics,
and insurance companies. The state runs many of
these agencies or licenses or regulates them.
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