How do we learn to socialize?
Institutions of socialization are the groups of people who teach the individuals the values and norms of the new members of society, and train them how to live in it. Ex- How to interact in school?
From reading books to making friends in school, knowing about our culture and religion to adapting and learning skills in workplace and every aspect of living in society, we learn from these mediums
First From the Family
This is the first and most crucial institution of socialization as we learn communication, reading, writing, and eating everything from our family only, so it has a major impact and influence on us and we learn about society from family only.
The family reproduces society biologically via procreation and socially through socialization.
Family, as a source of socialization
Families provide children with a basic system of norms, values, and social skills. They teach us who we are and deserve out of society and life.
It is the family that helps us how we are and chooses adjectives for ourselves as smart or dumb, strong or weak, hard-working or lazy, good looking or ugly.
Sociologist Melvin Kohn pointed out that they train children according to their parents’ workload.
The parent’s economic condition also reflects on the child as children from poor backgrounds are obedient. In contrast, the children are more creative if they are from rich families.
The reason is education and type of jobs as poor families are less educated and have repetitive jobs (like cleaning) while rich families are more educated and have creative jobs (like executives).
Start with the School
The school makes conventional and deliberate efforts by society and shapes children according to the society and handles their overall growth.
Children spend 1/4th of their waking hours I’m the school which signifies the importance of school in socializing and communication.
The main purpose of getting children to enroll in school is education and learning about all aspects of life essential.
Through the process of education, a child learns everything from social skills, knowledge, values, and norms are transferred from one generation to another
Schools use both formal and informal curricula from the formal curriculum they learn math, reading, and writing while in the hidden or informal curricula they learn societal norms and values from schools.
For example, Schools teach your children fair play when they take part in math/English competitions and teamwork in group projects.
The Near Neighborhood
We can define a neighbor as a geographically localized community within a larger city or town. Or, in simple words, people who live near us.
Social interaction builds a neighbor. Ex- You know everything about the owner of your local grocery shop
Parents know which neighborhood is better for their wards and which is not in the aspect of facilities and safety. We derive these common things from sociological research.
According to sociologists, wealthy neighborhoods watch out for their and are concerned about their children as compared to poor parents.
Peer Group
Peer groups are people of the same age, status, and interests. They provide a source or platform through which we learn about societal norms and values, which may differ from family norms and values.
Most adults and teenagers get influenced by this and try to fit in that group. Now they try to build new relationships and the influence of family and school get reduced. This develops a feeling of independence and self-sufficient ness in individuals.
Peer groups often result in peer pressure, which can be positive or negative and compel adolescents to go against their beliefs and choices. For example, watching trending series they don’t want, smoking, alcohol, drugs, etc.
The Work Of Workplace
Most employees spend most of their time at their workplace. The workplace makes a wonderful socializing institution as it requires particular skills, behavior, and knowledge of the workplace.
Earlier people stuck to one until they retired, but now the trends have changed and now employees usually give 5 years to one job which implicates the dire need of socialization in the workplace.
On-boarding (organizational socialization) is the process where most of the socialization happens and it acts as enzyme because they teach new employees about the work environment, skill, and knowledge to climb the top of the corporate ladder.
Socializing with Social Media
From reading the newspaper to morning, posting morning selfies to scrolling Instagram reels at night, social media has become a part of our routine and life.
It is both a medium of fun and information and especially the new generation are getting highly influenced by it. They try to shape their lifestyle and behavior according to it. From news, blogs, culture, tradition, fashion, everything is available in one click.
An individual learns what is happening in society, in their own country and globally from the media only. Not only the new generation but older generations are also getting familiar with the new age media.
Social Media and its support for socialization
Now people have changed according to social media. They dress, eat according to it and they want to share every part of their life and routine to the social media, from vlogs, outfits, recipes, trips to morning and night selfies.
Though the exact extent of media cannot be calculated but it molds our culture and behavior.
Like people who play violent games or see violent movies are more aggressive than those who don’t watch it.
Conclusion
In conclusion, we can say that our family, school, peer groups, workplace and social media are the institutions where we learn about socialization as we grow. It just changes with time ,environment ,age, location, religion culture etc.
We know all about society and socialization from our parents, society, school, workplace and media only and also some political cultural, and religious organizations shape our ideologies.
.But we should be mindful of what we are absorbing from these institutions and build our individual thinking ,choices and lifestyle and not fully get influenced by it and parents, teachers, seniors should also be mindful of what they are teaching and things like cyber bullying, stereotypes should not be taught.
Reference-https://www.eathyreading.website/2020/10/agent-of-socialization.html?m=1