Post on 28-Dec-2015
Socialization
Transforms Biological Organisms into Social Beings
“Self”
Our recognition that we are at once distinct and part of a whole
If socialization makes us….
Then what does isolation do? = a dysfunctional self From Pavlov’s Dogs to
Harlow’s MonkeysSocial behavior is learned
Feral Children - “mythic” –
legendary accounts Neglected Children
“reality” Raised in relative
isolation Cambodian "junglewoman"
ANNA: In the late 1930s and 1940s a noted sociologist, Kingsley Davis, was called to investigate the case of Anna, a young girl who was the illegitimate daughter of a poor and mentally impaired mother who left Anna alone, locked in the attic. Anna’s mother had kept her locked up in an attic room to avoid Anna’s grandfather’s anger at her birth. Aside from brief visits to bring food, she had almost no human contact. When found, she was unable to walk or to speak. Her hearing and vision were normal. She seemed to show potential to learn and did desire human contact. She died at age 10
Before her death, Anna learned to walk, understand simple commands, feed herself, and achieve some neatness. Although she seemed to show some potential to learn language, she spoke only in phrases, rather than complete sentences.
She could bounce and catch a ball, string beads, identify a few colors, and build with blocks.
When found, Anna had the mental capacity of a newborn infant. At her death she had achieved a mental level of approximately 2 to 3 years…
GENIE: A more recent case from the 1970s teaches us a lot. This is the case of Genie written about in your text. Extensive tests showed that in many ways Genie was highly intelligent.
But her language abilities never advanced beyond that of a 3rd grader. Genie never became a truly social being. Eventually the scientists who worked with her concluded that the most severe deprivation that caused her to fail at language was her lack of emotional learning and her feelings of loss and lack of love. Genie was never fully capable of living independently and spent her life in a home for developmentally disable adults.
Secrets of the Wild Child
Bulgaria's Children
ISABELLE was 6½ years old when she was found. Isabelle’s mother was a deaf mute (could not hear or talk) who stayed in a dark room with Isabelle, shut off from the rest of the family. Like Anna, Isabelle was in bad shape both physically and mentally. She spent most of her life in a room with her mother.
For speech she made a strange croaking sound. (secret language?)
She reacted to strangers, especially men, with much fear. She behaved like a deaf child, and her mental capacity was no more than that of a 6-month of baby.
An intensive training program was started right away and gradually Isabelle began to respond. Then suddenly she began to learn rapidly.
Two months – full sentences and Sixteen months - a vocabulary of 1,500-2,000 words
Her I.Q. tripled in a year and a half.
Spitz Research
Comparison of those raised in nursing home with those in orphanage
Much higher death rates for those left in the orphanages
Skeels and Dye Research
IQs increased by 28% over time with mentally disabled women
IQs decreased by 30% for those left in the Orphanage --
Teaches us that cognitive development depends upon healthy socialization
Stimulating interaction is essential for the development of “self”
Socialization into a full sense of “self” requires group experience and social interaction to develop a normal human personality.
Language (any kind we create) allows us to internalize and make sense of the
culture surrounding us
Social Psychological perspectives on the development of self
Informed by sociology as well as psychology
Self concept
“totality of our beliefs and feelings about our selves”
physical “I’m wrinkled” active “I’m good at soccer” social “I’m nice to dogs and elderly
people” psychological “I am opposed to war”
Mead
“Without language there is no mind, therefore the mind itself is a social
product.”
Through socialization we learn to take the role of the “significant” other and
then the “generalized” other. results in …..
“I” and “Me”
Cooley
Looking Glass Self
Society is internalized & becomes part of the self through the interaction
Sociological perspectives on the self compliment traditional theories by placing the development of self in context
Goffman
We have virtual selves…… “If I were ever in a room with
everyone I have ever known, I would not know who to be”…..
Some call it “flexible”, others “mutable”
Some call it saturated…. We can be too many selves at once!!
Id
impulsive drives and is present at birth
the id is supposed to be the instinct which gives rise to our
more brutish, irrational behaviors
Ego
links the self to the real world, mediating the drives of the id and
the control of the superego. The ego is our cognitive system -
i.e., our perceptions - it's what controls action and organizes our
personalities
Superego
has three jobs to do – 1 - to inhibit the impulses of the id
2 - to persuade the ego to substitute moral goals for realistic
ones 3 - to strive for perfection.
Piaget’s “cognitive development” or “stages of
learning” Sensorimotor - no symbolic
thought “out of sight, out of mind” preoperational - begin to use to
words as mental symbols to describe but not translatable
concrete operational – begin to take the role of others but limited
formal operational – moral reasoning – can think abstract thought, impute motives, consider justice
Summary of Mead, Cooley, Freud, and Piaget
Mead and Cooley - personality/self develops through role-taking and interaction (development is social)
Freud - personality develops as inborn desires clash with social constraints (development is social but in response to biological drives)
Piaget - learning occurs in stages as our ability to reason increases, i.e., moral reasoning (highlights the stages of learning - also very dependent upon socialization)
Kohlberg - moral development
Pre-conventional Levels little concern for views of others -
based on punishment Conventional Level
behavior is dependent upon approval wide approval is interpreted as right
(significant others, peers) Looking glass self
Post-conventional Level (few adults reach this stage)
Morality is viewed in terms of individual rights
Moral conduct -- the final stage is judged by
principles based on human rights that transcend
government and laws.
Men – often make decisions using notions of justice – What’s Fair?
Women – often make decisions using notions of relationships -- who gets hurt
the least?
She identified Justice based reasoning as male
Care-based reasoning as female
Studies that have compared male and females have found examples of both.
Some have found one main factor is education.
Gender Socialization
(What is it to be male? Female?)
The role of parents and schools in gender socialization
Recent survey found…..
Boys and Men are called upon more frequently in school
African American boys are more punished for small infractions
College remains a “chilly” climate for women
Gender Stereotypes associated with Men:
Aggressive No Emotions Loud Messy?? Are Men really Messy? Athletic Math and Science Oriented CEO Money Maker
Gender Stereotypes associated with Women:
Submissive Emotional Quiet Neat/Clean Clumsy Artsy Housewife Child rearing
Some quizzes to check out!!
Early socialization Kids say the funniest things....Gender
Role Reversal Role reversal
Racial Socialization
What is it to be African American, Jewish, Italian, Hispanic, Asian, German,
Scotch, Irish, Native American, etc.. Rituals, Festivals, Food, Pop culture,
Religion – all facilitate racial socialization – some facilitate negative
racial socialization
Class socialization
Some children are taught early to demonstrate the following:
obedience, neatness, cleanliness
Which Social Class might this represent?
Some children are taught early to demonstrate the following:
Curiosity, happiness, and self-control
Which Social Class might this represent?
Kohn found that social class by itself was helpful but didn’t explain
it all.
Instead, he looked closer at the occupations the parents held….
And sure enough…..
Those with jobs that had autonomy… encouraged self expression etc..
Those heavily supervised encouraged obedience, promptness, etc..
Agents of socialization:
family -- the primary agent religion sports schools mass media peer groups workplace
Family – Primary Socialization
1 - primary locus for procreation and socialization as well as the primary source of emotional support (functionalist might focus on this)
2 - family is where we acquire our specific social position in society (symbolic interaction might examine role-taking)
3 - the socialization reproduces the class structure as it is passed to next generation (conflict theorists look at this)
Education: secondary socialization
1 - teaches specific knowledge, skills affects self-image, beliefs, values
2 - transmission of culture, social control selection, training, tracking
3 - “hidden curriculum” poor schools versus wealthy schools - similar to
Kohn’s findings
Teachers socialize kids along class, racial and gender lines as well.. Emphasizing different traits…..
Media – informal agent
The most pervasive form is TV / Facebook / Video games– between the ages of 8 and 18 11hrs per day of media combined….
Story Telling through media Cultivation through the media creates a predisposition Cultivation through Media
Provides information and introduces us to variety, an array of viewpoints, norms available in culture, entertainment……
Kids who watch 28 hours of TV a week will see 16,000 simulated murders and 200,000 acts of violence by the time he/she reaches 18 years of age!
Globalization impacts socialization too
Greater exposure to variety, explosion of self expression, political activism
Potential of being toxic
Born digital... good, bad, and.....
http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?statistics) : There are over 800 million members Up to 50% of the members are online at any given time Approximately 250 million photos are uploaded everyday Average user is connected to 80 community pages and groups 75% of members are not American 350 million users access facebook through mobile devices
Front stage/back stage --
Media Critics argue…..
Advertising is an informal agent of socialization and can lead to unrealistic, even destructive, gender role images. Kilbourne (1990)
Advertisement Stereotypes in Advertising
Distortion of reality?
Working class and poor are disproportionately represented
with only 1.2% of the characters portrayed
Yet they constitute more than 30 percent of the population
Women?
As women age, they get less roles and those they get are of stereotypes, e.g.,
Witches, Mothers, Nuns, etc…
Peers
People linked by common interests, equal social position and usually, similar
ages
1 - contribute to our sense of belonging -- self-worth
2 - normative -- peer groups can have their own norms, attitudes, speech, and
dress codes....
Anticipatory & Resocialization
Rites of passage…..
Say something about our social structure – Voluntary
Rites of passage can create a sense of belonging….. Durkheim: “They hold society together and are often the site of the sacred in a given society.”
Rites of Passage Involuntary
De-socialization often occurs before
re-socialization
“total institution” Other examples of
resocialization? - kids and technology?
Emotions
Why do they fit in discussions about socialization?
Have you ever felt one way but expressed something different?
Emotions Defined
“a bodily cooperation with an image, a thought, a memory—a cooperation of which the individuals is usually aware.”
Structural View
Kemper’s model: within social structures we have varying degrees of (power) authority and status (prestige or honor). Kemper essentially uses Weber’s notion of power. Changes in relative power result in the arousal of negative and positive emotions.
More power = satisfaction, security, and confidence
Less power = anxiety, fear and loss of confidence
Status Shields
Primary Emotions
Result from situations that bring about physiological arousal
But society instructs us how to respond to them…..
Social Structure May Inhibit Certain Emotions……
Emotions are social objects experienced in public but felt in
private
There are emotion norms just as there are behavioral norms and we
learn these via socialization “feeling rules”
Emotions are……
responses that have been institutionalized by society and
transmitted through culture
Feeling rules – Boundaries that delineate the
privileges and obligations for what we must feel in a given situation – they provide direction for feelings and duration
“a zone” she calls it.
Secondary
Those emotions we learn to feel via feeling rules/emotion norms
Guilt Proud Shame Embarrassment
Emotions also reflect the Looking Glass Self and the Game
Stage Supposed to be Angry when insulted Calm and cool under pressure Happy at weddings Sad at funerals Rejoice at good news but not too
much if it is at someone’s expense