SOCIALISATION Flashcards
What is the nature/nurture debate?
What makes a person the way they are? Genes or upbringing?
Give an example of a study used in the nature/nurture debate?
Oxana Malaya.
Left in the kennel with the family dogs, and was seen to walk on all-fours and displayed ‘dog-like’ behaviour.
What does the Bruce and Brian Reimer study show about the nature/nurture argument?
Bruce’s penis was destroyed in a circumcision operation, thus, Bruce was raised as a girl. Bruce (Brenda) was so unhappy that at the age of 13 they attempted suicide.
What is socialisation?
The process by which an individual learns the norms and values of society.
What is primary socialisation?
The first and most important stage of learning.
What is secondary socialisation?
Continuation of the primary socialisation process.
What are the key agents of primary and secondary socialisation?
Primary: Family.
Secondary: Media, education, religion, peer group, workplace.
What do children learn from their parents in primary socialisation?
What is acceptable and unacceptable by a process of trial and error. Their parents will apply sanctions.
Lees - secondary socialisation.
Looked at the pressure put on teenage girls by peers and the double standards applied to girls and boys.
Harris - socialisation.
Looked at the comparative influence of parents and peer groups, concluding that the peer group can be more influential.
What is social control?
The ways through which our behaviour is controlled and reinforced by sanctions.
What are some examples of formal social control?
The police, courts, criminal justice system, the government and the military.
What is not traditionally seen as an agent of formal social control?
Education, as it has legal requirements such as attendance and behavioural codes.
What are two examples of sanctions used by formal mechanisms of social control?
- Warnings from the police.
- Exclusion from school.
What is informal social control?
Controls our behaviour more subtly - they would include peer group, education, religion, workplace etc.
Give two sanctions that may be used by informal mechanisms of social control.
- Socially excluding a person from a peer group.
- Being passed over for promotion at work.
What is the important thing to note with informal social control?
May be less obvious, but it is just as powerful in influencing our behaviour as formal control, more so in some cases.
What does Young state about media and socialisation? What may this lead to?
A ‘bulimic society’ in which people are left with a constant hunger and desire to binge on everything and anything.
What do Modood and Berthoud state about religion as a form of socialisation?
Surveyed young people and found that 67% of Pakistanis and Bangladeshis saw religion as ‘very important’ compared to 5% for white British.
Waddington - workplace.
Used the term ‘canteen culture’ to describe the set of norms and values that people are socialised into in a workplace.
