What is Socialization and Personality?

Ø      Socialization and Personality

“Socialization is the lifelong social experience by which people develop their human potential and learn culture.” JJ Macionis

“Social experience is also the foundation of personality, a person’s fairly consistent patterns of acting, thinking and feeling.”

Peter woesely “Process of transmission of culture, the process whereby men learn the rules and practices of social groups.”

Horton and Hunt “ Socialization is the process whereby one internalizes the norms of the groups among whom one lives so that a unique “self” emerges.”

Types of Socialization

1.      Primary Socialization

2.      Anticipatory Socialization(learning out group in anticipation)

3.      Developmental Socialization

4.      Re-Socialization

Methods of Socialization

1.      Cultural Conditioning(Learining of cultural norms, by repetition)

2.      Personal-Social Learning/Learning by reason

Individual as a Social Product

Sources/Agencies of Socialization

1.      The Family

2.      Peer or Age mates

3.      Social institutions

4.      Literature and Mass Media of Communication

5.      The Community

Socialization and the life course

1.      Childhood

2.      Adolescence

3.      Adulthood

Early Adulthood and Middle Adulthood

4.      Old Age

5.      Death and Dying

Functions of Socialization

                                                              I.      Socialization converts human from biological being to social being

                                                           II.      It contributes in personality development

                                                         III.      It helps to become disciplined

                                                        IV.      It helps to perform different roles

                                                           V.      It establishes knowledge and skills

                                                        VI.      It contributes in the stability of social order

                                                      VII.      It transmits culture from one generation to other.

                                                   VIII.      It creates right aspirations in social life

Human Development: Nature and Nurture

Charles Darwin: The Role of Nature

Naturalists during the mid 19th century, applying Charles Darwin's theory of evolution, claimed that all human behaviour was instinctive. Although this is no longer a dominant view the thinking is still with us as people, for example, talk about "born criminals."

The Social Sciences: The Role of Nurture

Social scientists reject much of the biological argument and see human nature itself as shaped by cultural context.

Psychologist John Watson challenged the naturalistic perspective and developed an approach called behaviourism, claiming that all human behaviour was learned within particular social environments. The work of anthropologists illustrating the great cultural variation existing around the world supports Watson's view.

Contemporary social scientists do not argue that biology plays no role in shaping human behaviour. At the very least, human physical traits are linked to heredity. Also, certain characteristics such as intelligence, potential to excel in music and art, and personality characteristics seem to be influenced by heredity. The current position on this issue is that nature and nurture are not so much in opposition as they are inseparable.

Social Isolation

For obvious ethical reasons research on the effects of social isolation has been limited to the study of animals. A few rare cases, like Anna's, of human isolation have been investigated.

Effects of Social Isolation on Nonhuman Primates

Classic research by Harry and Margaret Harlow using rhesus monkeys has illustrated the importance of social interaction for other primates besides humans. Using various experimental situations with artificial "mothers" for infant monkeys they determined that while physical development occurred within normal limits, emotional and social growth failed to occur. One important discovery was that monkeys deprived of mother-infant contact, if surrounded by other infant monkeys, did not suffer adversely. This suggested the importance of social interaction in general rather than specifically a maternal bond. A second conclusion was that monkeys who experienced short-term isolation (3 months or less) recovered to normal emotional levels after rejoining other monkeys. Long-term separation appears to have irreversible negative consequences.

Effects of Social Isolation on Children

The cases of Anna, Isabelle, and Genie, all of whom suffered through years of isolation and neglect as young children are reviewed. Each case suggests that while humans are resilient

creatures, extreme social isolation results in irreversible damage to normal personality development.

UNDERSTANDING THE SOCIALIZATION PROCESS

Sigmund Freud: The Elements of Personality

While trained as a physician, Freud's most important contribution was the development of psychoanalysis and the study of personality development.

Basic Human Needs

Freud saw biological factors having a significant influence on personality, though he rejected the argument that human behaviour reflected simple biological instinct. He conceived instincts as general urges and drives. He claimed humans had two basic needs or drives; eros, a need for bonding and thanatos, which related to a drive for death.

Freud's Model of Personality

Freud's perspective combined both these basic needs and the influence of society into a unique model of personality. He argued the personality is comprised of three parts. One is the id, rooted in biology and representing the human being's basic needs, which are unconscious and demand immediate satisfaction. Another, representing the conscious attempt to balance innate pleasure-seeking drives of the human organism and the demands of society, he labelled the ego. Finally, the human personality develops a superego which is the operation of culture within the individual which ultimately defines, for the individual, moral limits.

Personality Development

There is basic conflict between the id and the superego which the ego must continually try to manage. If the conflict is not adequately resolved personality disorders result. The controlling influence on drives by society is referred to as repression. Often a compromise between society and the individual is struck, where fundamentally selfish drives are redirected into socially acceptable objectives. This process is called sublimation.

Id-centred children feel good only in a physical sense but after three or four years, with the gradual development of the superego they can begin to evaluate their behaviour by cultural standards.

While being controversial, Freud's work highlights the internalization of social norms and the importance of childhood experiences in the socialization process and the development of personality.

Jean Piaget: Cognitive Development

A prominent psychologist of the 20th century, Piaget's work centred on human cognition, or how people think and understand. He was concerned with not just what a person knew, but how the person knows something. He identified four major stages of cognitive development which he believed were tied to biological maturation as well as social experience.

The Sensorimotor Stage

The sensorimotor stage is described as the level of human development in which the world is experienced only through sensory contact. This stage lasts for about the first two years of life. The understanding of symbols does not exist during this period. The child experiences the world only in terms of direct physical contact.

The Preoperational Stage

The preoperational stage was described by Piaget as the level of human development in which language and other symbols are first used. This stage extends from the age of two to the age of six. Children continue to be very egocentric during this time, having little ability to generalize concepts.

The Concrete Operational Stage

The third stage in Piaget's model is called the concrete operational stage and is described as the level of human development characterized by the use of logic to understand objects or events. This period typically covers the ages of seven to eleven. Cause and effect relationships begin to be understood during this period. The ability to take the perspective of other people also emerges.

The Formal Operational Stage

The fourth stage is the formal operational stage and is described as the level of human development characterized by highly abstract and critical thought. This stage begins about age twelve. The ability to think in hypothetical terms is also developed.

Some critics suggest that the model may not fit traditional societies and that, even in our own society, as many as a third of adults do not reach the final stage.

Laurence Kohlberg: Moral Development

Kohlberg used Piaget's theory as a springboard for a study on moral reasoning. He suggests a preconventional stage based on pain and pleasure, a conventional stage (in the teenage years) where right and wrong is understood within cultural norms and a postconventional stage where abstract critique of the social order is possible.

Kohlberg's theory may not apply equally well in all societies and it would appear that many North Americans do not reach the final stage of moral development. As well his research subjects were all boys.

Carol Gilligan: Bringing in Gender

Gilligan, as a response to the gender limited work of Kohlberg, concludes that males and females make moral judgements in different ways. Males use a justice perspective; it's wrong if the rules define it that way. Females use a care and responsibility perspective; it's wrong if it damages relationships. Her recent research on self-esteem demonstrates that female self-esteem begins to slip during adolescence, as they encounter more authority figures who are men.

The Applying Sociology Box (p. 114) suggests that men and women may not be very different with respect to the expression of violence.

George Herbert Mead: The Social Self

Our understanding of socialization owes much to the work of Mead. His analysis is often referred to as social behaviourism where he focuses on mental processes.

The Self

Mead understood the basis of humanity to be the self, a dimension of personality composed of an individual's self- conception. For Mead, the self was a totally social phenomenon, inseparable from society. The connection between the two was explained in a series of steps, the emergence of the self through social experience, based on the exchange of symbolic intentions, and occurring within a context in which people take the role of the other, or take their point of view into account during social interaction.

The Looking-Glass Self

The process of taking the role of the other can be understood using Charles Horton Cooley's concept of the looking-glass self. This term focuses on the ideas that a person's self-conception is based on the response of others, perhaps explaining Gilligan's observations on the loss of self-esteem of young women.

The I and The Me

The capacity to see oneself has two components, namely: (1) the self as subject by which we initiate social action and (2) the self as object, concerning how we perceive ourselves from the perspective of others. The subjective part of the self Mead labelled the "I". The objective aspect Mead called the "Me". All social interaction is seen as the continuous interplay of these two aspects of the self.

Development of the Self

Mead minimized the importance of biology in personality development. Mead saw infants as responding to others only in terms of imitation. As the use of symbols emerges the child enters a play stage, in which role-taking occurs. Initially, the roles are modelled after significant others, especially parents. Through further social experience children enter the game stage where the simultaneous playing of many roles is possible. The final stage involves the development of a generalized other, or widespread cultural norms and values used as a reference in evaluating ourselves.

Figure 5-1 (p. 116) illustrates the development of the self as a process of gaining social experience. Although Mead's work is criticized as being radically social he helps us to understand the importance of symbolic interaction to the development of self.

Erik H. Erikson: Eight Stages of Development

Erikson offers a broader view of socialization, suggesting that personality continues to change throughout life. His eight stages begin in infancy and end in old age.

Some are critical of the apparent rigidity of the model but it does force us to examine the influence of agencies of socialization other than the family.

Personality and Socialization

            The meaning of Personality

“One’s personality includes all of one’s behaviour characteristics.”

“Personality is the totality of behaviour of an individual with a given tendency system interacting with a sequence of situations.”

According to Park and Burgess “The personality is the sum and organization of those traits which determine the role of individual in group. Here the traits of an individual organized together and used in performing his role is called his personality.”

                                    Factors in the development of Personality

1.      Biological Inheritance and Personality

2.      Physical Environment and Personality

3.      Culture

4.      Group Experience

5.      Unique Experience

Importance of Self-Image