SOCIALIZATION.

Please watch these videos for more insights.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B34rYNTcqm8.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H4Ycbkx7Isc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W0Kkin-bY0U
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GEzwJLbJF-M) -(Types of societies.)

Socialization

The process of learning the roles, statuses and values that are necessary for participation in
social institutions is called socialization. Socialization is a lifelong process. Our self-concept
and initial social roles are learned in childhood but the learning and renegotiation of the
self-concept continues throughout life. When you join a new group, assume a new role,
new norms and redefine our identity. There are three major types of socialization; primary,
anticipatory and resocialisation.

Primary Socialization
This takes place during early childhood and is most critical for later development. In this
period children develop personality and self-concept, , acquire abilities, reasoning and
language skills, become aware of significant others, get exposure to the social world
consisting of roles, values and norms. Learn that conforming to the rules is an important
way to gain acceptance and love from significant others and then from the larger society.
Because of dependence on love and acceptance, the young are under pressure to conform to
the expectations of their family. This is the first step in their becoming conforming
members of society

Anticipatory socialization
As we grow up, we continually shade old roles and adopt new ones, these changes become
easy because of anticipatory socialization- role learning that prepares us for the roles that
we are likely to assume in the future. People get prepared for the responsibilities they will
face as spouses, parents. Through this, skills are acquired and attitudes developed that
prepare one to accept and embrace adult roles.

Socialisation
This occurs when we abandon our self-concept/ way of life for a radically different one.
Changing the social behavior values and self-concept acquired over a long period of time is
difficult and a few people will undertake the change voluntarily. Resocialisation can occur
when people become disabled; their social roles and capacities do change.
Resocialization may also be deliberately imposed by society for example when an individual
behaves in a way that is problematic to society, society may force this person to abandon
their old identity and accept a new one. Resocialisation may require a total change in the
environment, this is most efficiently done in total institutions- facilities in which all aspects
of life are controlled for the purpose of radical resocialisation, for example prisons, and
mental hospitals. The social roles that form the initial self-concept are systematically
eliminated; individuals are encouraged to engage in self-analysis and self-criticism.

Agents of socialization
Socialization is a continuous process of learning and learning takes place in so many
contexts. Home, school, job friends and the media. These have a strong effect on the
development of the personality self-concept and the social roles that we assume.

The family; the family is the most important agent of socialization, the initial care and love
that one receives is essential for normal, cognitive, emotional and physical development.
Parents are first teachers, from them are learnt the goals and aspirations that may stay for
the rest of an individual’s life. The self-concept formed in childhood has lasting
consequences; they form the foundation for later stages of development

School; Schools do much more that teach the basic skills and technical knowledge, they also
transmit society’s central cultural values and ideologies, school expose children to
situations in which the same rules regulations and patterns of authority apply to everyone.
Here from they can learn that levels of achievement do affect one’s status in a group.

Peers; Membership in peer groups places an individual in a social context where most of
the learning that occurs is non-deliberate and non-authoritative. A peer group represents a
choice in companions, relationships and activities based on the interest of individual
members, an agent of socialization that one actively chooses, it’s a reflection prior learning
and a source of new knowledge. PG has an effect on the development and validation of the
self-concept, provides a looking glass without the constraint of love or duty. The peer group
provides an arena for one to practice the skills at role taking, is a mechanism for learning
social roles that adults don’t want to teach.

Mass media; Messages from television, radio, films, these can help in supporting and
validating what we already know, through selective perception special notice is given to
material that supports our beliefs and self-concept and ignore those that challenge.
Religion is an important source of self-direction in every society, doctrines values and
moral principles give guidance about appropriate roles and behaviors. Values learnt in
religion are compatible with those learnt through other agents.

Workplace; A lot of our adult lives will be spent outside home working for wages and
salaries. The environments of work are quite diverse. The amount of autonomy, degree of
supervision and routine demanded by the job has consequences of the workers. Work that
demands self-discipline, subordination routine may make the workers see these traits as
natural and desirable. The status at work may also have consequences on self-concept and
behavior.Multitudes of associations and social networks that continuously contribute to our
learning.

IMPORTANCE OF SOCIALISATION
Socialization converts man, the biological being into man, the social being. Man is not born
social; He becomes social by virtue of the process of socialization. Various instances like-
that of the wolf children of India and others have made it very clear that only through
constant training the newborn child becomes social in nature.

Socialization contributes to the development of personality. Personality is a product of

society. In the absence of groups or society, no man can develop a personality of his own.
But socialization is a process through which the personality of the new born child is shaped
and molded. Through the process, the child learns an approved way of social life. At the
same time, it also provides enough scope for the individual to develop his individuality.

Helps to became disciplined; Socialization is social .learning. Social learning is essentially

the learning of rules of social behavior. It is the values, ideals, aims and objectives of life
and the means of attaining them. Socialization disciplines an individual and helps him to
live according to the social expectations.

Helps to enact different roles; Every individual has to enact different roles in his life. Every
role is woven around norms and is associated with different attitudes. The process of
socialization assists an individual not only to learn the norms associated with roles but also
to develop appropriate attitudes to enact those roles.

Provides the knowledge of skills; Socialization is a way of training the newborn individual
in certain skills, which are required to lead a normal social life. These skills help the
individual to play economic, professional, educational, religious and political roles in his
latter life. In primitive societies for, example, imparting skills to the younger generation in
specific occupations was an important aspect of socialization.

Helps to develop right aspiration in life; Every individual may have his own aspirations;
ambitions and desires in life. All these aspirations may not always be in consonance with the
social interests. Some of them even be opposed to the communal interests. But through the
process of socialization an individual learns to develop those aspirations. Which are
complementary to the interests of society. Socialization helps him to direct or channelize his
whole energy for the realization of those aspirations.

Contributes to the stability of the social order; It is through the process of socialization
that every new generation is trained acceding to the Cultural goals, ideals, and expectations of
a society. It assures the cultural continuity of the society. At the same time, it provides
enough scope for variety and new achievements. Every new generation need not start its
social life a fresh. It can conveniently rely on the earlier generation and follow in cultural
traditions. In this regard, socialization contributes to the stability of the social order.

Helps to reduce social distance; Socialization reduces social distance arid brings people
together if proper attention is given to it. By giving proper training and guidance to the
children during their early years, it is possible to reduce the social distance between people of
different castes, races, regions, religions and professions.

Provides scope for building the bright future; Socialization is one of the powerful
instruments of changing the destiny of mankind. It is through the process of socialization that
a society can produce a generation of its expectations can be altered significantly. The
improvement of socialization offers one of the greatest possibilities for the future alteration of
human nature and human society.

The Nature - Nurture Debate

The “nature/nurture debate” is one between those who think that human behavior and
psychology is determined by biology (that is, genetics, both evolutionary and individual,
hormones, neurology, etc) and those who believe that it is determined by environment (that
is, socialization, cultural context, experiences in childhood, etc).

Sociologists have engaged in this debate on whether the differences in personality, behavior
and social roles between women and men are the product of biological or sociocultural
factors. Are women and men naturally different or are they made so by the society they live.
Sociology looks at human behavior (all of the things that people do). There are many ways of
explaining why certain people do things in certain ways. Some biologists think that people
behave as they do because they are animals who act according to animal instincts. (Nature
theory of human behavior).Most sociologists on the other hand believe that people do certain
things and think certain things because they are taught to do them (a Nurture theory ofhuman
behavior). Sociologists think that people act as they do because they learned to be the people
that they are.

Explaining human behaviour

Biologists put forward nature explanations of human behavior. They say that people behave
the way they do because they are just animals. For example they say that men are aggressive
because they have different hormones. Sociologists would say that some people were brought
up to be kind and others are brought up to be tough. Children are made to be the people they
are by others around them telling them what is right and wrong.

Which is the best explanation? If you explain human behavior as being the same as animal
behavior, this would mean that humans would all behave in the same way. They do similar
things. Do all people all over the world behave in the same way? Sociologists object to this
because were human behaviors to be like animal behavior, then it would hardly change over
a period of time just as animal behavior changes very slowly.

Secondly, anthropological evidence shows that people behave differently in different

societies, if human behavior was in our genes then people all around the world would behave
in the same way.

Thirdly, if our behavior was just to do with nature, then people brought up without other
people would behave as other people do. Dogs brought up without other dogs will still wag
their tails and bark, would humans brought up without other humans learn to talk and behave
like normal human beings.